Category Archives: Baseball

The Reliever starring Eric Gagne

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April 10th 2008. 6:30 PM. Top of the 8th inning. The Cubs and Brewers are tied 3-3.

[Eric Gagne starts to walk towards the bullpen door, but David Riske stops him.]

David Riske

DAVID RISKE: Eric, you don't have to do this. I'm here. I'm really here. What do you call that?

[Guns N' Roses "Welcome to the Jungle" starts to play.]

Eric Gagne

ERIC GAGNE: Hey, you hear that? This is where I belong. Gotta go.

[Eric Gagne exits the bullpen and heads towards the mound.]

David Riske

DAVID RISKE: (crying) No. Eric! ERICCCCCCCCCC!

Brewers Fans

FANS: (groan) Ugh.

[Gagne makes his way to the mound, but instead of throwing the customary warmup pitches he calls for a microphone.]

Eric Gagne

ERIC GAGNE: I just want to say to you all tonight I'm very grateful to be here. A lot of people told me that I'd never pitch again and that's all I do. You know, if you live hard and play hard and you burn the candle at both ends, you pay the price for it. You know in this life you can loose everything you love, everything that loves you. Now I don't hear as good as I used to and I forget stuff and I aint as pretty as I used to be but god damn it I'm still standing here and I'm a reliever. As times goes by, as times goes by, they say "he's washed up", "he's finished" , "he's a loser", "he's all through". You know what? The only one that's going to tell me when I'm through doing my thing is you people here.

Brewers Fans

FANS: (Lukewarm applause.)

[Eric Gagne gives up homerun on the first pitch.]

Eric Gagne is back!

ERIC GAGNE: I'm an old broken down piece of meat and I deserve to be all alone, I just don't want you to hate me.

kid-flipping-bird

FANS: BOOOO!

[throw trash]

[riot]

[get really drunk]

[fall asleep]

He’s back!

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Eric Gagne is back!I can honestly say I absolutely did not see this coming. Eric Gagne re-signed with the Brewers today on a minor league deal with incentives. Gagne had an absolutely horrible first half last year leading to the Brewers shutting him down with shoulder problems. When he came back healthy he was good, not $10 million good but valuable. He actually projects about the same or better than David Riske who will make more and not be as hated. I guess "Gagme" just rolls off the tongue easier.

To anyone hating this deal try to remember it could always be worse.

Why We Write: Gorman Thomas

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Gorman ThomasEverything has a reason. The reason for this site is complicated, but can be summed up in this line from a Jim Caple column on Miller Park.

A reporter told me he once called Gorman about nine in the morning to ask a question on a breaking story and began the interview by apologizing for the early call. “I hope I’m not calling too early,” the reporter said. “Oh, that’s OK,” Gorman replied. “I’m just sitting here in front of the TV eating pizza and drinking beer.”

Combine that with stories about him going into the parking lot at County Stadium before and after games to eat brats and drink beer with the fans, how could you not love this guy and the team that gave him a chance?

(Just for fun here's a career comparison:
Gorman Thomas: .225/.324/.448 1339 SOs (13 seasons)
Mike Cameron: .250/.340/.448 1642 SOs (14 seasons)

I'm not arguing that Cameron is more valuable to this team than Gorman was to his, just making the point that Mike Cameron is not the worst CF ever. Which I have heard many times.)

The game has changed and so have the people playing it, but beards and hair like that don't go away. They last forever. Thank you Gorman Thomas for all that you have given us, we wouldn't be writing this if it wasn't for you.

I will now eat pizza and drink beer in front of the TV to honor you.

Who is Telly Hughes?

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FSN-Wisconsin announced it's 2009 Brewers schedule today and conspicuous by his absence was Jeff Cirillo. In his place it seems is Telly Hughes.

Former Brewers first base coach Davey Nelson will provide analysis during Brewers Live before and after the game along with host Craig Coshun and Fox Sports Wisconsin newcomer Telly Hughes.

The question is, who is Telly Hughes? Telly is a former FSN North Reporter. Which means we have stolen someone from our hated AL rivals, the Twins. Talk about interleague intrigue! Not only that, but Telly is a blogger and not a very good one. Here's Telly on the 2007 All-Star game:

Tony made an elementary effort of defending himself by saying he was saving Albert for extra innings. As you can see, the National League never made it there. There is no justification for the 2005 N.L. M.V.P. to be available, in that kind of situation and his own manager doesn't use him. Not cool Tony, not cool.

Not good Telly, not good.

He's not being paid to be a blogger though, he's being bad for hard hitting pre and post-game analysis. Looking around the internet I've found that some Twins fans think he is borderline retarded and not only useless, but terrible at being useless. Just because he didn't understand what his own team's peanut-free promotion meant. I wonder if he was disappointed when he found out FSN was a drug-free workzone despite the lack of free marijuana. On facebook he has two fanclubs (Telly Hughes fanclub and the official Telly Hughes fan club) as well as the "fire telly hughes he's a dumbass" group. The good news is we can count on him for hard hitting questions in his post-game interviews.

As you can tell he's good at asking the tough questions, the questions fans demand answers to like "How did that feel?" and "Did that feel good?" Not only that, but his scouting is spot on. In an important game last summer against the White Sox, Hughes proudly pronounced that there was "no one" the Twins would rather have on the mound in the Dome than Livan Hernandez (his 9 hits and 5 Run, 4 inning outing was clearly an outlier). Jeff who, am I right?

None of this really matters to us, true Brewers fans though. We only want one thing from our pre and post-game analysts. The ability to rap, preferably rap poorly over a Tone Loc beat about St. Louis sports.

Mission accomplished.