SNEAK PEEK: Journal Sentinel 2009 Brewers grades

hail-satan-710567The JSOnline's Brewers season grades are always a lot of fun. In 2008 Gabe Kapler received a better grade than anyone on the offense. In 2007 JJ Hardy, Joe Dillon and Ryan Braun were deemed equal. The thought that goes into these rankings clearly takes at least 5-10 minutes. I have a few sources on the inside of the JSHQ and they were able to give me a few of the grades ahead of their publishing along with some preliminary notes. Not sure if it will be EXACTLY like this on Sunday (or whenever these come out), but I can guarantee it will make the same amount of sense. Hope you enjoy.

Jason Kendall: B- That one time he hit a homerun. Guys loved throwing at him. Also, hit a homerun that other time.

Prince Fielder: C+ If he doesn't tie for RBI lead he is sure B-.Would be higher if team was better. It's his fault for record.

Felipe Lopez: A+++++ If I was GM I'd pay him a million trillion dollars!

JJ Hardy: INCOMPLETE Team is stupid for sending him down.

Alcides Escobar: C+Dazzling defense, but the bat isn't there. Seems like one of the best

Craig Counsell: B- One of the best seasons of his career.

Casey McGehee: C True Rookie of the Year candidate filled the hole at third base adequately.

Rickie Weeks: F- Got hurt. LOPEZZZZZZ!!!!!

Corey Hart: B- Changed his at-bat music later in the season and I really enjoyed it.

Mike Cameron: D He may have been one of the Brewers' best hitters, but he struck out a lot.

Ryan Braun: C- Wasn't as good as I thought he'd be. Would be higher if team did better, it's his fault.

Frank Catalanotto: A One of the lone bright spots.

Jody Gerut: F+

Yovani Gallardo: C- Not enough like CC.

Trevor Hoffman: A+ Best. Free. Agent. Signing. Ever.

Braden Looper: C- Sure, it was the worst season of his career and he led the league in homeruns and earned runs allowed. He had 14 wins! 14!

Jeff Suppan: D+ If he would have pitched better Brewers would have won the World Series.

Manny Parra: Somewhere between B and F.

Dave Bush: D- Bring back Doug Davis.

Mark DiFelice: B Can't imagine where the Brewers would have finished without his 3.66 ERA.

Mitch Stetter: C- His 3.60 ERA was a pleasant surprise.

Claudio Vargas: D- 1.78 ERA with Brewers. Am I supposed to be impressed?

Mike Burns: C Did a good job with what he was asked to do.

Seth McClung: B- "We need to give a good grade to Seth because he's my friend on twitter. -Tom"

Todd Coffey: C+Pitched a lot of games.

The rest: F

What are these people smoking?

Dumb Brewers fan in a Favre Brewers jerseyJust checked out the always enjoyable for all the wrong reasons Anthony Witrado chat from last week and seriously, what is wrong with you people? Are you stoned? I do not like Anthony Witrado, this is well known, but I am starting to think that A-dub is just Charles Manson and the people who participate in these chats are the ones out killing people. Look at some of these questions, it is not pretty.

Q: Michael, Chicago - Thanks for all of your hard work this season Anthony.

Work? He's talking about the time he spends in the mirror adjusting his hat sideways right?

Q: stu pidasso, westallica - hi anthony. just for fun, let's pretend you're doug melvin.

WHY? WHY DO YOU THINK THIS WOULD BE A GOOD IDEA? I've got a better one. Let's pretend you are David Carradine. Here's a belt.

Q: Justink8996 - Do you guys have an update on Alcides "baby mama" drahma? Kinda hard to root for a guy who is a dead beat dad? Guess it would be pretty awkward as a journalist to even ask him about it? "Oh Alcides by the way...." Continue reading »

Who ya got? 2009 MLB Playoffs

Red Sox Yankees BaseballWell, you aren't going to believe this but after last night's loss to the Rockies the Brewers have been eliminated from playoff contention. Even if the planes carrying the Dodgers, Cardinals, Rockies and Phillies crash into eachother the Brewers still won't make the playoffs. Sad, I know.

Anyways I just found out that the playoffs still happen if the Brewers don't make it and despite the Brewers not being in contention they will still hold a "World Series". I am interested in this and plan to watch these "playoffs" until their logical conclusion which I assume is called the "championship", I don't know I'm new to this whole baseball thing. I only started watching the Brewers last year. Since the Brewers aren't involved I thought we should figure out who we all want to root for and pretend that we were fans of this team for the next six months until the playoffs end. So let's get down to it. Continue reading »

Calling for the head of Ken Macha

ken machaI am not a person who blames a manager for the success of a team. The job of a manager isn't that hard and in the grand scheme of things he doesn't really have a huge effect on the team's results. It's not like people are sitting around saying "he batted Cameron fifth and Hart sixth, if he had just flip flopped them we wouldn't have lost 14-6 to the Nationals!" there is really only so much the guy can do. All he can really do is pencil people in and hope they do the job.

I don't blame Macha for this season. I blame injuries for this season. I can't think of one game that Macha has either won or lost. He is a basic, by the book manager and not all that different than Ned Yost. Before this week I really had no reason or desire to care if he was the team's manager or not. Now? Fire him.

Fire him, fire him, fire him, fire him. Continue reading »

Please shut up about Prince’s walk off celebration

This season the Brewers have been surrounded by controversy. Whether it was the Cardinals hating their untucking, the Pirates hating Ryan Braun, Bob Brenly hating Ryan Braun, Jason Kendall and Dave Kerwin, The Happy Douchebag against the Marlins or whatever other ridiculous controversy we've seen this season, it's always been something. There's always something going on. Well, this latest one is the last straw. The latest one stems from Prince Fielder's AWESOME walk off home run celebration. I wrote a few weeks ago that some of our favorite moments this season hadn't even happened yet. Well, guess what? This was one of them. Let's watch it again.

Watching it again I see nothing but pure joy. This has been a hard season for the team and for the fans. This was a moment to be happy, a moment to think of better times. The Brewers weren't rubbing it in the Giants faces, they were celebrating their own accomplishment and they did it in a cool way. What's wrong with that? A lot apparently.

"I did laugh. I did think it was funny. It was very creative," Hunter said. "But it's a little strong for baseball, because you could have a 90-mph fastball coming at you the next day. You've got to have toughness and heart to do that. It's not for me. If someone did that against us and we played them again, trust me, he'd get crushed, and we'd try to fight him."

Really Torii Hunter? You're going to fight someone over that? You're going to fight PRINCE FIELDER of all people? Are you that guy who freaks out at me for bumping into him? Or are you just talking? Maybe you're just talking. Afterall, he just saw this on TV. Surely, the Giants couldn't be that upset about this.

Pitching coach Dave Righetti stared so hard at Fielder as he gave a post-game interview I kept waiting for Prince's head to explode.

Well, I guess that's to be expected. I know that whenever I am mad I stare at someone intensely for ten minutes. Surely, the Brewers own manager "gets it". Right Ken?

"I was shocked, standing there"

Oh, I guess not. Is there somebody out there that can look at this thing reasonably? Anybody? How about you weird old man?

"I'm as old school as anybody but there's nothing wrong with that," said reliever David Weathers. "You've got to have some fun. I've seen a lot worse things go on than that.

"We're just trying to have some fun. It's not disrespect for the other team. It's not about them. It's about us."

I'm just going to skip over the 200 other columnists who complained about this too because what Weathers says is right. It's FUN. They want to enjoy their jobs. They want to savor their victories and really, what's wrong with that? It's not about the Giants and it's stupid for them to think that it is. This is about a silver lining on a crappy season. So can we please stop being mock offended every time the Brewers do something interesting? It's getting old. Prince's celebration needs to be what it's meant to be, a lasting image and memory for Brewers fans. Seriously, make this a shirt already.

prince fielder