Tag Archives: pitches

Lay off Casey McGehee

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Lost in the elation of yesterday's win was a single moment in the game that really pissed me and other like minded Brewers fans off. With the Brewers up five runs in the eighth inning and K-Rod due to bat at the top of the inning the Brewers called upon a pinch hitter. The hitter chosen by Brewers manager Ron Roenicke was Casey McGehee. Casey McGehee took about two pitches before hitting a foul pop-up that the catcher caught for the out. As Casey McGehee headed back to the dugout he was treated to a chorus of boos from the crowd at Miller Park. #areyouseriousbro

I am not here to defend the season of Casey McGehee. A .626 OPS is not good. In fact, it is very bad. He underperformed badly and now he has (seemingly) been replaced in the lineup by Jerry Hairston. If you are one of the people who believes that Casey McGehee is responsible for all of the Brewers losses this season then this is exactly what you wanted to happen. Adding to that, a pinch hit at bat when the Brewers are up five runs in the late innings is exactly the time you should want to see Casey McGehee swing the bat. If he gets a hit, great. If he doesn't, the Brewers are still up five. He was the second bat off the bench after Mark Kotsay. He didn't have anything to do with the game's outcome. He can't ruin anything. He has done nothing to deserve a boo.

Before I dig deeper into this idea of booing someone during a playoff game when your favorite team is in the midst of (possibly) it's greatest run ever, I want to tell you a story. Continue reading »

The Milwaukee Brewers got swept by who!?

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I woke up this morning and I came to a shocking realization.

I realized that:

  • There was 2-4 inches of snow on the ground
  • Livan Hernandez shut down the Brewers offense
  • The Brewers just got swept by the Nationals

What kind of Bizarro World did I just wake up in? What's with all this snow? Where is the global warming when I need it? And really, who loses both ends of a doubleheader? Besides the Brewers like 400 times already. Who's even managing this team, Ned Macha? Seriously, what is going on here?

That being said besides the snow I don't see any reason to panic. Maybe in retrospect I'd prefer Yovani didn't throw 111 pitches in his second start of the season because he hasn't been the same since, but that will work itself out. (Hopefully.) Let's do something that we never do around here and look at the past three days and maybe come to some understanding about how this sweep could happen. Continue reading »

Why do people do the things that they do?

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I had this friend once, we've all had this friend once or twice, that broke up with his girlfriend and it was an ugly breakup. People were put in the middle of things that they wanted no part of, friendships were lost and the whole thing was wholly un-enjoyable for everyone. After things started to blow over he started to call her at bar time, you know what for. This was a terrible decision. Sure, the reason he called her would work out in his favor, but it was the morning and the days after that would be the problem. The same old drama would bring itself back up and they'd have to have a talk. Nobody likes to have talks. I once saw a man jump out of a five story building to avoid having a talk. Still, a week later the same thing would happen all over again. Why?

Prince Fielder likes to swing at high fastballs. He does this a lot. He does this a lot with two strikes on him when you and me and everyone we know know it's coming. Hey Prince, don't swing at this pitch because it's going to be a high fastball and you can't catch up to it! And then he strikes out. This happens all the time. There is no way that the other team doesn't know that he likes to swing at high fastballs because everyone knows he likes to swing at high fastballs and they continue to be thrown at him in these types of situations. Most of the time, he strikes out. Why?

I am a regular attendant of what people like to call "after bars". The period between whenever I arrived at the bar (anywhere from 1PM to 12AM) until the time they close is just not enough for me sometimes and I need to go somewhere that I can drink more. I don't really care where it is; my place, a backyard, a hotel room, a friend of mine who still lives with his parents' basement or anywhere else. Hell, I don't care WHAT it is. I once had an after bar with a bottle of Apple Pucker. I just like to continue drinking with people long after the bar is closed. No matter what I have to do in the morning, I do this. I know it's not smart or necessary, I just do it. Why?

Manny Parra has a problem with pitch counts. It takes him a lot of pitches to get through innings. In his seven starts this season he has never made it past the sixth inning and in every game that he has made it through at least 5 he has thrown over 90 pitches. This isn't efficient. For Manny Parra to give himself and the team the best chance at winning he needs to go deeper into games, but he doesn't. Why? Continue reading »

Rangers series preview: Don’t look now, the Brewers have won 3 of 4!

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June 08, 2010- Milwaukee, WI. Miller Park..Milwaukee Brewers Casey McGehee hit a walk off single, scoring Rickie Weeks and Prince Fielder in the bottom of the 9th inning..Milwaukee Brewers won over the New York Mets 3-2..Mike McGinnis / CSM.And all three wins were of the walk-off variety? Why isn't anyone talking about this? Let's throw in last Saturday's game against the Cardinals where they took them to the 11th inning before losing and the Brewers (not named Randy Wolf) have been playing pretty decent baseball for about a week now. Hart is hitting everything out of the park, Jeff Suppan has left the building, Gallarado can't be touched, Casey McGehee is the most clutch person on the planet and we might actually have a closer (gasp!), this is pretty good times if you ask me. At least compared to what we had before. Then again, I'm an idiot.

Can we beat the Rangers? Of course we can! They are stupid! And Texan! Continue reading »

In defense of Doug Melvin

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I don't know how it happened. I don't know when it happened, but somehow at some point I became a Doug Melvin apologist. I don't think that Doug Melvin should be fired. I think Doug Melvin should be signed to be the team's GM forever. As the Brewers have now lost their last 9 games seemingly everyone is calling for the head of Doug Melvin. I don't agree with them. I looked all over the internet and I could only find one other person who agreed with me, his name is Al. (FYI, We did this before the Brewers won yesterday.) Warning, this be long.

MPD: As of this writing the Brewers have now lost 8 games in a row. Of the eight games I would say that five of the games were lost by the starters and two were lost by the bullpen (with the final game being Sunday's against the Phillies which I would say was lost by one centimeter of Corey Hart's bat.) Now, everyone is calling for people to be fired. Some I agree with (Hoffman), some I could care less about because it won't make a difference (Macha) and the final one, I just don't understand. That final one is Doug Melvin, the mustached general manager. People are saying that because he put the team together that sucks right now that he should be fired for it. It's not just casual fans, it's diehards fans too and the argument is is logical. After all, he is the one who signed Doug Davis, Trevor Hoffman, Jeff Suppan, LaTroy Hawkins and throughout his GM career he's never been good with the pitchers. Those pitchers I mentioned are the ones that have underperformed and someone has to take the blame for them, but to me it shouldn't be Doug Melvin. Everyone who has performed poorly does not have a track record of performing this poorly and you can't blame Doug Melvin for that.

Trevor Hoffman has been awful, but he showed zero signs of decline last season. He is throwing the same pitches at the same speed he always has, but he's missing his spots. Does that mean he is done? Or is it something else?

Doug Davis hasn't been great, but he's also faced some bad luck (.415 BABIP.)

LaTroy Hawkins was hurt.

Claudio Vargas? Well, you can't win em' all.

Todd Coffey has had five bad outings and 15 shutout ones, but he's on pace for a lot of innings right now. That can't be good.

In your opinion Al, what has been wrong with this pitching staff, whose fault is it and what can be done to fix it? Continue reading »