There were a lot of different reactions to the results of Corey Hart's arbitration hearing. Some were happy, some were mad, some people went to see The Blind Side with their family to celebrate (okay, that was probably only Corey himself) and others didn't really care. When the news first broke we wrote on our twitter "Its good to see the arbitration process is as broken as the rest of baseball's salary issues." and then "It's not that I don't like Corey or think he doesn't deserve it. I just dislike the notion of getting worse and getting paid more." The thing is he was going to be getting a raise no matter who won, so there is really no need to get upset about it. Whether he "deserves" it or not, he was going to get over four million dollars. I don't see why I should be upset that he's going to get an extra $600k or whatever it is. It's not like that $600k difference is going to stop us from doing much of anything (and if it stops us from signing Corey Patterson to a minor league deal, even better). The thing is, this is a silly thing to get upset about. It'd be like a guy who blogs about pizza getting upset over spending Valentine's Day alone. Corey Hart was going to be on the 2010 Brewers either way. That small salary boost shouldn't make a difference in the way you feel about him. Corey Hart is apparently worried about that though, saying as much to Brew Beat and I have to say he pretty much nails it. Continue reading
Tag Archives: Baseball
Calm down McClung Nation
After reading this great interview at Right Field Bleachers with Seth McClung and reading the comments of my last post I felt the need to address McClung Nation. Seeing as this was the only blog name dropped in the article.
Seth McClung is "just a guy that’s very fortunate to play baseball". He's genuine, he's down to earth, he's a good person. He's what we'd all like to think we'd be like if we played baseball. He's not Ryan Braun who, based on reactions we've gotten in the past year, is a douchebag that you wouldn't want anything to do with if he couldn't hit a baseball. He's not Alcides Escobar who from all accounts abandoned his wife and daughter and he's not Trevor Hoffman, a first ballot Hall of Famer who has played since some of you were born and made millions of dollars. Seth McClung was someone we could all relate to as a human being and that's pretty cool. I believe all of these things and I think Seth was a pretty cool guy during his time in Milwaukee. He really tried to connect with the fans and his twitter was always entertaining, be it for the things he said or the way he spelled them.
(Speaking of twitter, this line in the interview was kind of bullshit. "I apologize to whoever Miller Park Drunk is about my misspelling things on there. I’m sorry that you don’t understand that 140 characters is usually 140 characters and I don’t really have a great spell check on my phone, but I hope everybody enjoyed it as much as I did and I enjoyed the fans. It was just my way of connecting." I do understand the character limit and that doesn't really make up for the fact that honored isn't spelled honerred and memory isn't spelled memorey (via) and a thousand other examples I could come up with if the account still existed. Either way, I was just making a joke and his spelling had no effect on my feelings towards him as a person or a player. So you're bad at spelling, who cares? There's no need for excuses. I'm bad at writing a blog. It doesn't matter. We're both good guys.)
Seth, along with his so-called doppleganger Todd Coffey, ranks highly on my 2009 Brewers I'd like to drink with and that's just about the highest compliment that I can give to someone. I liked him on the team which is more than I can say about a lot of players. However, this statement just isn't really true: Continue reading
Retro Weekends are going to be awesome
I love Retro Friday at Miller Park. Some out there will rail against it saying that we need to leave the past in the past and that the team needs to forge it's own identity and blah blah blah, to which I say screw off. Saying we should get rid of the ball and glove logo is like saying we should get rid of the American flag. You know who wants to get rid of the American flag? Terrorists.
Luckily for us and the safety of our nation, the Brewers agree with me. In fact they are taking retro Fridays into the future for their 40th anniversary and turning them into four retro weekends. Let me tell you, they sound AWESOME. Continue reading
Tuesday's Nippy Beaker
Here's some things to read while watching Avatar porn (SFW).
Jody Gerut, Rickie Weeks and Carlos Gomez have all agreed to deals avoiding arbitration leaving Dave Bush, Carlos Villanueva, Todd Coffey and Corey Hart as the only ones remaining unsigned. I imagine Corey Hart is going to act like a punk like he did last year.
Speaking of Corey Hart, Sandra Bullock captured the Golden Globe for best actress for her role in "The Blind Side". When reached for comment Corey said that movie was "gooder than grits." I haven't seen it because I've been too busy with the site, but maybe some day. I have seen this trailer for the A-Team though which looks quite good.
The Brewers don't play the Twins in Minnesota until May, but I just might have to make the trip up there. Why? Target Field will offer walleye on a stick. Personally, I'm more of a pork chop on a stick kind of guy. I still say they should have put a roof on that place.
Speaking of roofs, popular Milwaukee restaurant Pizza Man had it's roof and the rest of it burn down. (h/t Doctors of Za)
Here's a story for everyone who has ever complained about the wait for the bathroom at Miller Park. It could be worse, you could be a ball boy at the Australian Open and pee yourself.
Around baseball:
- Mets induct two cocaine addicts to their Hall of Fame. Sounds about right.
- An earthquake caused a major tragedy in Haiti, but can't stop Jimmy Rollins' wedding.
- Do Lenny Dykstra stories ever get old? I say no.
- Charlie Manuel lost a ton of weight. Maybe I should diet....nah.
- From now on Jack Z will be known as Daddy WARbucks. That's a lot easier to spell than Zduriencik.
Looking for a new favorite player after the departures of Seth McClung, Mike Cameron and JJ Hardy? You could always join Zaunbie Nation. WARNING: Canadian rock gods Rush will start playing. Prepare to rock out.
Meanwhile, Al's Ramblings takes a break from dissing the left, making fun of old media and fantasizing about Meghan McCain to express how much he misses Seth McClung. I do too.
On this day in history Jeff Juden was born. Also, Sargent Slaughter defeated the Ultimate Warrior for the WWF title under circumstances that I would call nefarious.
Oh, and I knew there was a reason I didn't do John Cena impressions.
That's all I have for today, unless you're looking for a lesson in ownage by Jack Bauer.
Drink up.
MPD Movie Review: Sugar
Sometimes I will read a synopsis of a movie or see a trailer for a movie and decide that I am going to love it before I even see it. I like good movies. I like baseball. So when I heard about the movie "Sugar" I was really, really excited about it. Here's the synopsis:
Miguel Santos, a.k.a Azucar, a Dominican pitcher from San Pedro de Macoris, struggles to make it to the big leagues and pull himself and his family out of poverty. Playing professionally at the Kansas City Knights baseball academy, Miguel finally gets his break at age 19 when he advances to the United States' minor league system. Miguel travels from his tight knit community in the Dominican Republic to a small town in Iowa, corn country, where he and a couple other Latin American teammates are the only Spanish-speaking people in the vicinity.
That sounds pretty cool, right? Add an estranged wife and child and you could call it "The Alcides Escobar Story". The movie got great reviews, scoring 93% on Rotten Tomatoes and was called the best sports movie of 2009 by Bill Simmons. I had to see this movie, right?
Well, I did and I HATED it. (spoilers ahead) Continue reading