A’s sign Ace

Examiner reaction on A’s signing former Brewers right-hand pitching ace.

Take my Ace… please!

The idea of Ben Sheets on the Chicago Cubs is almost as hilarious as a good Henny Youngman one-liner.

Look, I love Ben Sheets. I love having Ben Sheets on my team. I love introducing him by his full name: “Olympic Gold Medalist Ben Sheets.” But he’s never going to pitch for the Brewers again, and of course, if he’s pitching for the Cubs in 2010, we won’t wish him well.

Sheets is trying to get number-one Ace money (something like two years guaranteed for $10-$12 million per year) after sitting out for a year with an injury. The pitcher-poor market just might grant him that money. Six to ten teams appear interested in watching his Tuesday throwing session, and there’s no indication that includes the Brewers. Conventional wisdom holds only from one of the four teams that throws money around — the Yankees, Red Sox, Cubs and Mets — could land Sheets. There are probably hard feelings after he turned down the Brewers offer of arbitration, and the questions of whether the Brewers would pay for his elbow surgery just so he could possibly finish the 2009 season with the Texas Rangers.

Sheets hasn’t pitched in a year, but the hot rumor this week is the Cubs want him.

On the four-letter leader, The Krukster summed the situation up pretty well. The Cubs, along with many other teams, would be excited to land Sheets on a one-year deal. The 2008 version of Ben Sheets was an unstoppable All-Star, and he pitched 31 starts with a second-best five complete games.

But then, there was that fateful Saturday afternoon. The Brewers needed a win and a Mets loss to clinch their first playoff berth in 26 years. Ben Sheets came out after two-and-a-third, later saying, “I got a broke arm, I got a broke arm.” And here’s what I wrote:

With the Brewers losing 0-4, were treated to three innings of no-hit ball by Dave Bush. This was day, Sept. 27, 2008, when we wished Dave Bush had started instead of Ben Sheets.

I’m not saying Sheets isn’t a gamer. He is, and Milwaukee fans love him for that. What I am saying is that in the 2008 playoffs, when he represented half of the most terrifying pitching duo in baseball, through no fault of his own (except maybe his hard-on for complete games), he wasn’t there. They had to go with C.C. on three days rest, and Suppan because we paid him, and not Gallardo and Parra, because they were hot but unproven, and C.C. again on three days rest.

A Cubs rotation of Carlos Zambrano, Ted Lilly, Ben Sheets, Ryan Dempster and Randy Wells would be formidable, possibly the best in baseball. But Lilly is coming back from an injury and could miss April, Wells could suffer a “sophomore slump,” Dempster could play himself out of starting roll, and Zambrano has been hurt (and is a mad man).

The Cubs could join the Cardinals on the shortlist of playoff hopefuls by signing Sheets. One team could easily grab the division, and the other the Wild Card, leaving the Brewers out of luck. But if the Cubs do make it to the playoffs, it’s easy to imagine a scenario in which Lilly is eminently hittable, Dempster is shaky after temporarily losing his spot to Samardzija or Silva late in the season, Zambrano is pressing after coming back from a minor injury, Wells is pitching as well as he can for a second-year student and Sheets is hurt — again.

This may be a Brewers fan sticking voodoo pins in a Cubs doll, but it’s not hard to imagine the Cubs signing Sheets, having the best pitching staff by far at the All-Star break, and going on to get swept in the playoffs — again.

Pastime Post

Here’s a very good post from a very good blog, Pastime Post, detailing the 1975 All-Star Game held at Milwaukee County Stadium.

Here’s a Brewers-centric excerpt:

The venue was Milwaukee’s County Stadium, which was a timely selection to host the All-Star game. The year before, Hank Aaron hit homerun number 715. This was the first of two years Aaron spent with the Brewers, to wind up his distinguished career.

… When it came time for Hank Aaron to be announced, they replayed Aaron’s 715th homerun, and the home town fans became hysterical. This was Aaron’s 24th All-Star game, which tied him with Willie Mays and Stan Musial, for playing in the most All-Star games in history: twenty-four. The extremely long standing ovation was well deserved by the classy, humble, and talented Aaron.

And here’s a little bit about firstbasemen George Scott:

When George Scott of the Brewers entered the game, the crowd responded with a loud applause. Earlier, they booed Gene Tenace because the fans thought that the Boomer should have been the starting firstbaseman. Scott was a colorful fellow. He called his black glove, “Black Beauty,” and when he was asked what his necklace was made out of, he said, “secondbasemens’ teeth.”

Welcome to the division, Matt… yeesh, bleh

Examiner story on Cardinals’ signing of Matt Holliday.

Brewery tour 2.0

Posh Tosh and I took my parents and P-House to the Lakefront Brewery Tour a few Fridays ago. We were on one of the later tours, and maybe running late, and the tour guide skipped over the story of The Chalet.

Stuck on some of the machinery like small forklifts and conveyor belts, was this Cyanide & Happiness comic.

The pitching pick-ups the Brewers passed on

The Brewers roster, and in particular, it’s pitching staff was decimated this year by injuries and ineffectiveness. 

 

True Brewers fans perhaps wouldn’t be as disappointed — and haters seem as prescient — if a crystal ball could have foretold the travails of Weeks, Suppan, Bush, Parra, McClung, Hardy, Hart and Hall. 

 

But around midseason, when it was apparent the Brew Crew was motley, there were some former big-name pitchers available for little. The acquisition of one of these players could have slowed the team’s slide to the middle, or at least shown fans management was still desperate to win now. 

 

These are the types of players you pass on when you’re not in contention. 

sportscentr:

winstonwolfe:

soupsoup:

hotfoot:

The Brewers’ unique celebration after Fielder’s walk off HR.

Ho-Ly shit. I am not exactly a baseball purist and certainly appreciate how the game has evolved, yet this move was absolutely ridiculous and reeks of poor sportsmanship. Home run celebrations have slowly gotten out of hand and this one is the topper. It’s considered tasteless, in baseball terms, to point in the dugout after a HR. His untucking of the jersey uni while running the bases made no sense and then to have a premeditated & choreographed team celebration, with a player striking a, “look at me” pose at home plate, is fuckin’ stupid.

That type of move gets you a penalty in the NFL or a fine in the NBA. Hopefully it gets Fielder drilled with a 92 MPH fastball in the ribs &, not just by the Giants next time they play. I hope Chris Carpenter of the Cards puts Fielder on his ass tomorrow.

Fielder should get drilled, and afterward, the Cardinals should do a choreographed celebration where they mime rolling dice, in honor of Cecil Fielder’s multimillion-dollar gambling losses.  Also, for a player and a teamwho get insanely angry about getting plunked, Prince Fielder doesn’t seem too concerned about provoking more beanballs.

In conclusion, Ken Macha is a horrible manager.

B-b-b-buuuuullshit. The untucking of the jersey has been going on ever since Mike Cameron came to Milwaukee from San Diego and is a tribute to his father. The untucking of the shirt signifies a days work done. The most play the untucking got in the national media was when the Cardinals were whining about it like little bitches, as they lost 10 of 15 games against the Brewers last year. 

Comparing this celebration to the NFL is “fuckin’ stupid.” That type of move does get you a penalty in the NFL, and that’s “fuckin’ stupid.” It’s why NFL stands for N.o F.un L.eague. Look, a lot of Brewers fans are Packers fans, and were subject to Randy Moss’ moon as the Vikings rolled at Lambeau in 2005. And we loved it. Should he have gotten a $10,000 fine? No. He should have gotten a gold fucking star. That was fucking hilarious, possibly the highlight of Green Bay’s season. Let footballers perform whatever touchdown celebration they want — and only throw the flag if it’s lame. Joe Horn’s cell phone and Chad née Johnson’s signs were lame, and it should cost their team 15 yards on the ensuing kickoff, and maybe a fine. But T.O.’s popcorn… that was pretty cool, especially in slo-mo. No flag. 

“Act like you’ve been there before?” Fuck that. Act like this might be the last time you’re there — because it might be. You might suffer brain damage and degenerative brain diseases for all those wicked awesome hits you took over the course of your career. Go ahead, go nuts, go ape-shit. 

Look, all this bullshit is entertainment. For my money, I expect a little choreography with my superhuman displays of athleticism. If these players were all respectful and deferent because they had to be, then guess what? It would be like I was paying to watch somebody do my fucking job. 

Baseball purist? Yeah, you’re probably right. We’re probably just “poor paste-eating slobs who don’t appreciate baseball the way [you] do because we don’t have full-body orgasms whenever a guy named Skip moves the runners over.” 

I would agree and say I’d like to see Carpenter throw at Fielder tomorrow, but given his results against the Brewers in the last few years, I don’t know if he can spare the base runners.

In conclusion, Tony La Russa is overrated and falls asleep at the wheel drunk like a worthless old man. 

P.S. I’ll tell ya another thing: their beer sucks!

Red Birds beat Brewers; Brewers sell 3 million tickets

The Worst Day Since Yesterday

“Well, I know I miss more than hit…” 

The latest sweep at the hands of a sub-.500 team from the Brewers own division was particularly painful. On Tuesday, the Brewers skulked through the entire game and then decided to put together a rally to tie the game in the bottom of the ninth. P-House was at the game (“Uecker seats, baby!!”) It was a thrilling comeback, reminiscent of the late-inning explosives of last year. I got a text from Posh Tosh, as the top of the Brewers order put together four singles and a walk.

Um are you watching the game?! I was just about to go to sleep but its too exciting…!

They were closing the gap. In Miller Park, the Brewers faithful stood up and cheered, even when Counsell failed to score from second on Prince Fielder’s single. Prince was waving him home his entire way to first base and started fuh-reaking out when he didn’t get the RBI. But now Casey McGehee has singled in the tying run, and people in bars across Milwaukee were remembering what it feels like to walk off with a win. 

But it didn’t happen. Braun tried to score, feebly, from third on a medium depth fly ball from Cameron, and we were off to extra innings. Posh Tosh went to bed. 

I already know what’s going to happen. They’re going to come all the way back and get you so excited, but then they’re go through a couple of boring extra innings where they can’t score, and eventually a relief pitcher, who had been doing a pretty good job, can’t hold off the other team. 

Uh… yeah, that’s pretty much exactly what happened. And then, it happened again the next night, except they were sitting on a slim lead and let it trickle away. 

Yesterday, I went to the game with P-House and our Dad. We were going to buy Uecker Seats, but then a man came up to us and handed over two tickets, saying “They’re free. No catch.” We turned to get back in line to buy a third ticket so we could walk around Miller Park together, and an usher-parking lot attendant type approached us. “Need any tickets? Here take these,” he said. “It’s pretty bad when you can’t even give them away.”

When Prince Fielder walked to the plate in the first inning, he brought burgeoning superstardom. “Look at all the flashes from cameras,” P-House said. “Every time he swings.”

There was proof every time he swings could be a hallmark moment, because he crushed a home run, and he shadow boxed with Braun and the Brewers had a four-run lead. Which we knew wouldn’t hold, and it didn’t.

The Crew has the Pirates in town this weekend  — the team that swept them in Pittsburgh early next week, despite being nearly 20 games below .500 — and then September, which is so packed with playoff teams it’s hardly worth repeating. Brewers fans thought last September’s swoon was bad, but this year it could be like a firing squad.  

 

 

 

 

Milwaukee Hosts Gay Softball World Series

The Brewers are coming back to Milwaukee to play their only two divisional rivals with worse records than their own before starting a September schedule backloaded with playoff teams. 

Eight of the final nine series are against teams with a better record than the Crew thus far, and the way the Cardinals have played lately, the boys could finish out of first place by dozens of games. 

But the Brewers’ season isn’t the only one limping to an end, or charging to the finish, depending on your perspective. Starting Monday, Milwaukee will host the North American Gay Amateur Athletic Association Fest 2009, which includes the Gay Softball World Series. As many as 200 teams and 4,000 people are expected to visit town for the festivities, according to the event’s Web site.

Apparently, organized gay softball in Milwaukee dates to 1977, and it first hosted the Gay World Series in 1979, according to the event’s Web site. Games will be played at Wirth Park in Brookfield, Wilson Park in Milwaukee, New International Sports Park in Sturtevant, and the Doc Gonring Athletic Complex in West Bend — which is the scene of my playoff softball glory last year, getting like, seven put-outs as shortstop and going 5-for-5 against Papa John’s Pizza before getting walloped by Bender’s Sports Pub. 

The opening ceremonies of the weekend will be at the Summerfest grounds and the closing ceremonies at the Harley Davidson Museum. The players and teams who are eliminated before the final day of play and championship round will even get to go on a “Loser” Cruise (re: booze cruise). 

It looks like these competitors will feel right at home in good old Brew City.