Pressure is on, but Gomez doesn’t feel it
February 28, 2010Some Brewers fans are still sore about the trade that sent popular shortstop J.J. Hardy to the Twins for a center fielder long on potential but short on production. This is nothing new for Carlos Gomez.
Wilson joins camp to help at first base
February 28, 2010The team announced that 23-year-old first baseman Steffan Wilson would immediately join camp to help fill out the first base position.
Steffan Wilson Added to Big League Camp
February 28, 2010Steffan Wilson Added to Big League Camp
Wilson, who looks like Ben Sheets from the side, was drafted out of Harvard in the 28th round of the 2007 draft. He spent last year at Brevard County. He will provide additional depth at first base for the time being.
The End of February Weekend Mug
February 28, 2010
Some things to read while thinking about how good you have it.
As of today, we are only four days away from the start of spring training games! On Thursday, our beloved Brewers will be taking on the San Francisco Giants. Unless, of course, you count intrasquad games, in which case there are only three days left! Adam McCalvy has the spring training pitching rotation for the first few games. Jeff Suppan will be starting that first game against the Giants. I guess he's our ace again. Unless, of course, Ken Macha is doing this just to have Yovani Gallardo starting that crucial March 5 game against Ben Sheets and the A's.
The Brewers had their traditional Arctic Tailgate Fest at Miller Park Saturday as they began selling single-game tickets. This year they were able to sell 95,000 tickets, good for the third most on a single day in franchise history. In addition, four games are officially sold out of individual tickets, which is only the second time the team has had a game other than the home opener sell out on the first day of ticket sales.
There is plenty of news this weekend about any potential Prince Fielder contract, and the Brewers beat reporters have been all over it. McCalvy reports that owner Mark Attanasio is saying that there "is no deadline" for a contract to be agreed upon. Meanwhile Anthony Witrado has Attanasio saying any offer they make to Fielder "won't be for show", as many people claim the Brewers offer to CC Sabathia was. And Tom Haudricourt has been tweeting his heart out about the matter: Fielder says he'll have final call on any contract offer, even with Scott Boras as his agent; Attanasio and GM Doug Melvin had a meeting Saturday, with the "process" of putting together an offer to Prince being a part of it; and Attanasio says that he will be a part of any contract negotiations with the big guy. Nothing really ground-breaking, but it looks like we might be nearing the time that the Brewers finally do put out an offer to the star first baseman.
Meanwhile, the Brewers other superstar, Ryan Braun, has also been a popular subject lately. McCalvy sat down with the left fielder for a discussion on the upcoming season and Brauns "life theories." He also has a role in a new Dick's Sporting Goods commercial (h/t brewerfan). And as part of his spring training preview, Haudricourt profiles Braun's ability to mix his baseball career with his business career. The JS also has the depth chart for left field as well, with no real surprises.
They also have the depth chart for second base, again without any big shockers, along with a story about Rickie Weeks and how he has had to deal with his share of injuries. You know, in case you didn't notice that he hasn't been feeling too healthy in his career.
Rick Peterson and his biomechanics are in the news again as he has been using motion analysis to identify any areas of concern in regards to injuries. Jordan also has a great post up on the subject, along with a link to the same article. Included in that article are pictures of the tools he has been using that are worth checking out. Speaking of pictures, if you haven't already, be sure to check out kirbir's Pictures of the Week, which she has brought back for spring training.
The Brewers announced all 30 spring training games will be broadcast one way or another--either on FSN, through a webcast on Brewers.com, or on the radio.
Around the Majors:
Cardinals: Finally found a home for Felipe Lopez (fanshot)
Mariners: Signed former major Brewers prospect Tom Wilhelmsen
Several baseball scouting agencies are starting a scouting combine, which I would imagine is going to be similar to the NFL's combine, with the inaugural event being slated for August 18-21. There doesn't seem to be a whole lot of information on it, but I have to say that I don't really understand the timing as that leaves a very long time before the next draft. Would it be because they don't want to hold it during the college season?
Ken Rosenthal throws his idea for divisional realignment out for consideration. In his scenario, the Brewers would be in a division with the Cubs, Cardinals, White Sox, and Royals. Does anyone think that divisional realignment will actually happen anytime soon?
And for those of you who aren't well versed in sabermetrics, Graham at Lookout Landing is putting out a series of articles on different sabermetric concepts which I have enjoyed reading. If you have time to kill or a thirst for knowledge, I recommend reading through them all.
If someone could please make sense of this Ozzie Guillen tweet, I would appreciate it.
For those of you interested in joining BrewCrewBall fantasy baseball, please be sure to e-mail me (include your username) saying you'd like to participate by next Friday. Even if you demonstrated interest in the comments of either thread, I would still like if you could email me please, thanks!
A big Happy Birthday to Yovani Gallardo, who turned 24 on Saturday.
That's all for me this weekend, unless you never noticed.
Attanasio hoping for Fielder extension
February 27, 2010Brewers principal owner Mark Attanasio is a big fan of underdogs these days. So what if none of the national scribes are picking the Brewers to win the National League Central?
Brew Beat: Cactus League rotation set
February 27, 2010Fans swarm on first day of ticket sales
February 27, 2010Brewers fans gobbled up more than 95,000 tickets in the first six hours of single-seat sales on Saturday, making it the third-best day of sales in club history.
The Brewers and Biomechanics
February 27, 2010
There was a story in Sports Illustrated this week about how Jack Zduriencik and the Mariners were using the undervalued asset of defense to build a better team, expanding on the concept of Moneyball, which is finding an undervalued commodity and exploiting the inefficiency in the market. Former Brewer scout Tony Blengino made a lot of comments in that that article, at one point he made the accurate observation that eventually teams will learn how to value defense properly through Hit F/x and analyzation of UZR and defensive statistics, and then teams will move on in an attempt to find the next inefficiency, which is the concept of Moneyball.
He made this interesting comment: "A team that figures out how to get 250 innings out of a starter, for example, is going to have a huge advantage. Who knows what the next inefficiency in the marketplace is going to be."
Of course, I want the Brewers to be a leader at any potential innovation that would create an advantage. As an analyst that is what I most want to see for the Brewers, finding an inefficiency that allows them to win more, and win more efficiently. That's why that quote, along with what I've seen from the Brewers in terms of biomechanics research, is really exciting.
I know next to nothing about biomechanics. I have read a decent amount of information from people who do know a lot about biomechanics (I highly recommend reading this piece right here, and the comments). There's an untapped world out there and I am excited to see the Brewers at least making an investment in this field to see if even a small advantage can be gained. Graham's post at Lookout Landing deals mostly with the notion of predicting pitcher injuries, and though I'm not familiar with other possible applications, I would think that there are possible benefits to maximizing velocity, break, and delivery consistency through advanced analyzation of pitching motions.
I have to think that Rick Petersen is a big part of this new emphasis the Brewers seem to be placing on pitching motions this spring. But there's plenty of evidence that there's been a strong system in place for some time now, based on this McCalvy post that says the Brewers have been interested in biomechanics for at least five years and have been analyzing minor league pitchers with an advanced system for about that long, noting that Gallardo has gone through the described process five times now.
I've been conditioned to be skeptical of any miracle pitching fix or claim that injuries can be predicted by examining a motion. The only reliable predictor of future pitching injuries, at this point, is past pitching injuries. But I have to believe that only good can come from doing extra work and trying to take advantage of a field that has generally not been seized by major league teams yet. It's neat to be considered the leader at something, and even if no notable results come from this new program and emphasis on mechanics, it shows that the Brewers are willing to step out of the crowd and take the lead on something new. There's no downside to that.
First and Second Base Projection Results
February 27, 2010
I didn't have time to average out the projections from first and second base until now, so I'm going to work an extra post into the projection series here. We're not projecting anyone today, that will pick up again on Monday. But I'll share the results for Prince Fielder, Rickie Weeks, and Joe Inglett here.
Prince Fielder
BCB Community Projection: .295/.398/.586
CHONE: .294/.387/.577
ZiPS: .277/.383/.552
We're a little optimistic, but understandably so. It's actually a lot more reasonable of a projection than I had thought it would be. It should be noted that I threw out about 5-10 of the 160 projections submitted due to absurd numbers, I didn't keep a projection with a slugging percentage over .800 (or 19). We also project Prince for 97% of the playing time at first.
Rickie Weeks
BCB Community Projection: .265/.355/.451
CHONE: .262/.368/.449
ZiPS: .240/.345/.419
We're pretty well in line on this one. There's a lot of variability in these individual projections on the high and low side but in the end they average out to a line comparable to the CHONE and ZiPS projections. For playing time, our average projected for Weeks is 76%. We project Counsell for 13%, Inglett for 7%, and 4% for other players.
Joe Inglett
BCB Community Projection: .268/.334/.380
CHONE: .278/.341/.386
ZiPS: .273/.333/.375
Not much of a surprise here. This line fits in almost exactly with the two systems. As noted before, Joe is projected for 7% of the time at second base, which includes the zeros submitted by people who don't think he will make the team.
Kirbir’s Pictures of the Week
February 27, 2010For those of you new to the site, this post is what it sounds like - a fun collection of Brewers pictures from the past week. Also, I'm always open to fun pictures from other BCB members, so keep your cameras handy!
Spring training finally started this week, after a long and semi-eventful off-season. The Brewers lost some, won some, and we saw the first arbitration for the Brewers this millennium.
For the first pictures from spring training, follow the jump!
All pictures are taken from Yahoo!
Bullpen catcher Marcus Hanel shows off his ball handling skills.
Not to be outdone, Jeff Suppan shows off what he did during the off-season.
Rickie Weeks shows that he's anxious to get back in the game FINALLY.
Manny Parra gets some instruction from pitching coach Rick Peterson.
Yovani Gallardo warms up what could be the Brewers most important pitching arm this season.
Gregg Zaun tries to be GRIT-y, but we'll see if he's a fitting replacement for Jason Kendall.
Dave Bush works on getting back into shape after injuring his arm last May.
New additions Scott Schoenewies and Randy Wolf warm up together. Too bad JJ Hardy isn't around to help.
Casey " McGiggles" McGehee talks baseball with buddies Willie Randolph and Matt Gamel.
Carlos Villanueva tries out for the Brewers production of A Chorus Line.
And, of course, what would sports be without the wave? Mitch Stetter, Tim Dillard, and Manny Parra hope we never find out.
All in all, this season looks to be a promising one, at least in pictures. This season also makes me a little nervous. It'll be interesting to see how both Rickie Weeks and Dave Bush perform after their arm injuries last season. And it could possibly be the final season the Brewers have Prince Fielder.
In a change from last season, PotW will be posted on Saturday mornings - just in time for cartoons right? If you do want to send in pictures, just make sure to email them to be by Friday nights.
Have a great weekend!