We've burned through a full quarter of the baseball season. Through ups, downs, and mediocrity, here are a few things we've learned:
Power Outage: Other than Braun and Hart, the offense as a whole is very disappointing. 12th in the NL is runs, 13th in OPS, 13 in Total Bases, 12th in drawing walks, and 14th in Slugging Percentage. Three regulars (Cameron, Hall, and Weeks) are still batting sub Mendoza.
D-Fense: The defense is much improved with the 3rd fewest errors (22) in the NL. 5th in fielding percentage. And, heck, 4 of those errors are by the Big Boy at first.
Best Free Agent Pickup Ever: Jason Kendall actually can throw runners out. Nailing guys at a 40% clip in '08, after a disastrous '07 (around an abysmal 10%). Contrary to what Rock and Brian say on TV, Kendall is NOT the best free agent pickup in baseball history....but he's been solid. His .366 OBP leads all regulars.
Sheeter: Ben Sheets still knows how to miss starts, although its only been 1 so far.
Ouch I: Bad things happen when legs twist like this.
Ouch II:The Cubs are no joke.
Ouch III: The Gagne signing hasn't worked out as planned. Ned Yost talking on the first pregame chat of the year when asked if they'll miss Cordero: "No, we're not gonna miss a beat with Gagne in there." Oops.
No Meat: Buck up to the Prime Quarter there, Big Fella...and don't leave until you've polished off half a cow.
Mmmmm...Soup: You know what you're getting with Jeffrey Scott Suppan. Career ERA: 4.61. 2008 ERA: 4.63. 2007 ERA: 4.62.
Anybody want to go on record with predicted Brewer win totals?
6 comments:
I said 88 wins at the beginning of the year, meaning they'd have to go 68-53 the rest of the way. Don't think that's gonna happen...
The Crew is 103-100 since opening day '07, which is basically .500. This year so far they're essentially .500. Everything looks like this team isn't much better than a .500 team.
Revised now I'll say...83 wins again this year, and anything less ought to ged Ned fired wether it's directly his fault or not. They still have the #1 strength of schedule so far according to ESPN, so hopefully they get hot against the Pirates, Reds, Nationals, and teams like that from here on out and win more than that. Too bad they seem to play down to their competition more often than not. Things could get ugly if they drop a 3-7 road trip this week.
The Cubs had a run where they won 14 of 17, The Astros had a run where they won 12 of 15, St. Louis had a run where they won 11 of 15, and even Pittsburgh is currently in a 10 of 15 and 8 of their last 10 run. Everyone keeps saying our bats will heat up, but so far it's all of the other teams that are doing it better than us. I don't want to keep hearing "it's early" mid June.
I'm not wavering. http://wisconsinsportsblogs.
blogspot.com/2008/03/
2008-milwaukee-brewers-preview.html
91 wins. What the hell.
i said 85 to start the season and will reduce it by 10 percent.
so: 76.5.
Cubs are playing over their heads and are taking advantage of a very easy schedule during the first quarter with lots of home games and games against awful teams, while the Brewers have played a lot of road games and games against tough opponents. That will all even itself out over time.
It's just a matter of getting Prince going and maybe any 2 of the Hardy/Hall/Weeks/Cameron group and they will hopefully start scoring enough runs that the pen doesn't blow as many games.
Still I don't see them finishing above .500 as I think we may be sellers at the trade deadline.
i have no idea if the cubs will stay on this 100-win pace. the starting pitching makes me nervous, though the bullpen has been outstanding (until howry today)...
that said, anonymous (if that's his real name) keeps saying the cubs are playing over their heads - including after they had lost four series in a row. that didn't make any sense then and it doesn't make any sense now.
yes, they've beaten up on the pirates, but they've also played the cardinals, diamondbacks (sweep, by the way), phillies, houston and mets. each and every one of those teams have better records than the brewers, who the cubs also have played. so, having a better record than the brewers makes a team "awful"? not only that, the pirates are just half a game behind the brewers and the reds are 1.5 back of them - another two teams the cubs have played.
so ... keep saying they're playing over their heads, which may or may not be true, but at least try to use some facts to back it up.
AP - The Brewers did start the year winning 6 of 8 and just had a 4 of 5 streak...so they have had a couple little runs.
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