Day = Ruined

C'mon. There is ZERO justification for this. Brewers, don't even pretend that you have a good reason. He was terrible last year. You opened up "competition" in the spring, he was terrible again. He lost the "competition". And yet he is still going to be trotted out there every five days. For a team that doesn't seem to mind spending some money to stay competitive, they obviously don't mind spending it to lose either.

I realize this was let out this morning. I just didn't have time to read it until now. I'm angry. I have three games scheduled so far this season. I bet he pitches two of them. FUCK.

$12.5 Million Dollar Pitching Machine

I am starting to get frustrated about what I believe is going to happen to the 25 man roster for your 2010 Brewers. While I could be wrong, it looks like the Crew is preparing to send Carlos Villenueva to AAA to start the season, rather than sending Jeff Suppan home. I don't get it. Haven't they seen enough in the past four years to know what you have with Suppan? Haven't they seen enough in the past few weeks? I'm not making the argument that Villa is great. He is decidedly average. But Soup is decidedly terrible. They are wasting a roster spot over money, when the fact remains that they are going to pay him whether he gives up 50 HRs or not. So why guarantee yourself a few losses? What do you have to lose if you are the Brewers? He was part of one of the worst pitching staffs in Major League Baseball last year. This is bordering on insanity. The stats on Soup are just staggering. I'm too lazy to post them here, but last year he was like WORST IN THE LEAGUE in WHIP and ERA among full time starters.

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe they are trying to trade him and that is why it is taking so long. I dunno. But I doubt they are going to cut him at this point, and that is a shame. The Brewers are good enough to compete for the playoffs with a semi-competent pitching staff, but they are not good enough to lose three or four games while giving a guy the chance to pitch his way out of something, that he has been trying to pitch his way out of for two plus seasons.

IN OTHER NEWS

Twinkie forced someone to steal us great tickets to one of the Brewer-Twin games in Minnesota in May. I've never paid more than like $30 for a baseball ticket, and we are paying $62 (regular price) for these. I look forward to a rain out.

-Sports Bottle and our female companions are going to drink ourselves blind in Brew City on Saturday night after I attend the wedding of one of his ex-girlfriends. I wish I could just skip the wedding. Whatever. Me after 60+ hours of work for 8 straight weeks, on like no sleep, plus drinking to get drunk = forgetting things.

My Brain Has Been Violated

I watched the two hour "Lost" premier last night. "Lost" is probably my favorite show, or at least it is in the conversation. It is like watching a movie every week. It is generally amazing. But I am just completely lost on Lost. I just have no idea what the fuck is going on, or what is supposed to be going on, or what is going to happen next. It is just a lot of work to watch the show, even though the two hours went by in what felt like 15 minutes. Has my brain been turned to mush? Shouldn't I appreciate a show that isn't made for total idiots? (See 98% of America?). I guess I'm just frustrated because I know this is the last season and I'm supposed to be getting "answers" to the "questions". I'm just not sure I know what the questions are, or how the answers could possibly satisfy me. The whole two hours last night just seemed like one random occurrence after another, all of which made me say "What the fuck?". I'm not going to give anything away because some may have chosen to DVR, but in one episode we have dealt with: time travel, possible alternate realities, talking to dead people, seeing dead people, Christ figures, raising the dead and transferring of souls. I have this uneasy feeling that we are on a runaway train that is going to come to an abrupt, unsatisfying stop. I don't see any way that the finale isn't going to leave me disappointed. My brain was raped last night. I'm sure my brother has some fascinating theories because he is alot smarter about these kinds of things than I am.

I missed out on one of the best Badger performances ever, the ass kicking of Michigan St. This was mostly due to my decision that the "Lost" premier was slightly more important in the grand scheme of things. That, and by the time I caught up to lost in real time, our fucking DVR was also recording "Teen Mom" (seriously). I followed the score on my BlackBerry, but I missed out. Impressive win though. When Leuer comes back, I would not want to play Bucky.

ONE OTHER RANDOM THOUGHT

I've heard that the NCAA is more than seriously considering expanding the basketball tourney to 96 teams, and spreading out coverage to cable as well. I'm really not sure how I feel about this. On one hand, if it ain't broke don't fix it. I think it is perfect right now. On the other hand, you can't ever have too much of a good thing. I fear it will turn getting to the "Big Dance" into making a "Bowl Game". Unless you really suck balls, you would get in. I guess it would allow more teams to win, but unless they place some kind of rules on qualification (nobody under .500 in conference unless you are a conference champion) then what is the point? Is it just an excuse to make sure that a shitty UNC team can go 7-9 in a pretty tough ACC and get in? Or is it to not fuck over deserving mid-majors that win 25 games and get left out? I'm leaning towards staying the course (except for changing the play-in game to be for a 12 seed between the last two in) until I see some other details. Also, how strange would the tourney on TNT be???

A Begrudging Spygate Post

The last thing I really want to write about is "Spygate". I think it is played out, and is now being driven by the media. But there is one aspect of this that really, really, pisses me off. That aspect is Senator Arlen Specter. The guy just won't let it die.

The NFL talked to this Matt Walsh guy, and they were satisfied that he apparently lied to someone about having this Super Bowl tape. And they were satisfied that even if the Pats didn't tell them the whole truth, there wasn't much else there, and the punishment (which was unprecedented) was good enough. Goodell even admitted that the Hoodie lied to him, but he knew it and took that into account when administering the punishment.

So why does Specter feel the need to puff up his chest and demand some ridiculous investigation? Why the fuck should the government care this much about what is going on in the NFL? Specter keeps threatening to remove the NFL's antitrust exemption. This is a stupid threat to make for a number of reasons. The antitrust exemption is basically in place to allow the league as a whole to pool their interests to negotiate TV deals. This is what basically keeps smaller teams afloat, because TV money is where the majority of NFL revenue comes from. If the exemption was repealed, individual teams would have to negotiate their own TV deals, and there would be basically 32 different TV deals. At some point (even though the Packers are extremely popular) small market teams would be forced out of business, because larger markets would get bigger TV deals because they have more people in their markets. The other effect is that the exemption makes it extremely difficult for a competing league because it essentially prevents the networks that carry NFL to carry the new league. In this day and age, this probably isn't that important because there are enough networks (cable and otherwise) that could carry the competition. And anyone starting a league would be insane to try to compete with the NFL anyway. This is a super simplified explanation, and although I once took a class, I am far from an expert on this issue. My point is that this would be a stupid way to deal with this "issue" and a complete overreaction.

Specter is demanding a "Mitchell Report" investigation of this "issue". What did the Mitchell Report exactly accomplish? All it did was out a few people, and make a few legitimate suggestions. It by no means scratched the surface of the steroids problem, and Mitchell had very little power to do a full investigation.

What would a similar report accomplish here? I think it is pretty clear that the Pats cheated. They admit as much, the NFL has punished them. How much it may have affected games is debatable, but no sort of investigation would garner anything that could fix that debate. So an investigation would probably gather a whole bunch of people who may know something, but also may have motive to make things up. In the end, we will be right where we started, we'll have a whole bunch more accusations (maybe even involving more teams taping) and we still won't be able to change anything. And then we'll have a bill for a couple of million dollars that is going to end up on our tax bill.

Does the average fan feel so upset about this that they think the government should step in to get to the bottom of this? Absolutely not. Most people probably hate the Pats a little more, most wouldn't care if Belicheat was given the needle or Brady has his balls cut off, but most realize that continued speculation isn't going to change the outcome of games played 7 years ago. Most people are not effected enough that they consider the NFL to be "fixed" (see NBA) or would stop watching it.

You know what I bet most taxpayers would rather have investigated by the government? Well, probably a lot of things. How about we start by figuring out why it costs me twice as fucking much to fill up my car with gas as it did two years ago? How about we figure out why we could fly a fucking spaceship to the moon in the 1960's, but conveniently nobody can build a car to run on anything but gas and oil? How about we figure out why so few people can afford health care? How about we investigate why Republicans care so much about gay people getting married? Of all things this guy should be worrying about, and making threats about, he chooses this???

At some point, Roger Goodell is going to tell Specter to get bent. To this point they have gone out of their way to at least give the appearance they are cooperating. But I don't believe Specter has the power to unilaterally remove any antitrust exemption. And he'll have to be re-elected at some point, and I imagine his constituents are going to be sick of hearing about this while they are eating Macaroni and Cheese for dinner 4 days a week. Roger is a bad man, and if anyone has as much ability to make someones life as uncomfortable as a Senator could, I believe it is Goodell.

Do I think the NFL probably knows more than they are saying? Yes. Do I think the Pats do too? Yes. Do I think the other 31 teams probably know some things? Yes. The question is, WHO GIVES A SHIT?????

I implore the people of Pennsylvania to use their vote whenever this idiot comes up for re-election, to vote for whomever is running against him.

Seriously. This has to stop.

Seriously.

A couple of things from yesterday's Brewer abortion.

- They will never be as good as the Cardinals until Yost is gone. La Russa can make the tough decisions like telling his closer of 5 years to have a seat when he isn't performing. Yost can't do that for whatever reason. Also, I don't know what the fuck happened in the 8th inning with Hall. It seems that Kendall missed the sign. Hindsight is 20/20, and if that worked, we would all be talking about what a great move it was. Still, things like this tend to happen way too often with this team, and not just with Kendall.

- Officially, Gagne sucks. Here is what he had to say yesterday, with a typical response from our faithful leader:

"I don't deserve that ninth inning right now. It's pretty simple," Gagne
said.

The beleaguered reliever was slumped in his locker room chair with his
eyes closed for several minutes before putting his hands on his head. After a
clubhouse official asked if he wanted to talk, he told reporters he doesn't need
a "mental break" like Cardinals counterpart Jason Isringhausen asked for on Friday night.

"I don't need breaks. I need to keep going out there. I need results," said Gagne, who has a major league-leading five blown saves along with Isringhausen. "I get myself in a situation, in a jam, every single time I'm out there. You can't pitch like
that."

"I am never nervous in that situation. I love that situation. I have been
blessed with that opportunity a lot since I've been here and have been fortunate
to come through in a lot of the situations I've been in," Ludwick said. "I feel
like that's what baseball is all about -- that situation, being in that moment."

Gagne said his struggles have been embarrassing for him.
"Every time we get a little momentum, I come out there and kill that rally," Gagne said. "It's a matter of going out there and executing your pitches -- not thinking results -- and I'm thinking results. I'm going out there thinking three outs before I
can even get one."

"Closing is an emotional job," Gagne said. "It's a roller coaster. You do
good, you're a hero. You do bad, you're a zero."

Brewers manager Ned Yost refused to pull Gagne from the closer's role immediately after the game.
"I don't sit here and make decisions five minutes after a tough loss. I'll sit and
think," Yost said. "You guys have known me long enough, I take a long time to
analyze things and give everybody the benefit of the doubt and try to make the
right decision."

- The only bright side yesterday was Braun getting 3 hits, including two doubles. Of course he couldn't get a hit with the bases loaded.

Those cocksuckers got me back into it after the big win Friday, looked good (although they still didn't actually drive in any runs) coming back. Only to have Gagne choke on it. They are so frustrating. Oh, and I called it yesterday, didn't I?

Great Symbolism

Billy Hall's at-bat in the bottom of the 9th pretty fairly symbolizes the Brewer's entire season so far. Bases loaded, two outs, Marlins bring in their closer. Billy Hall softly lines the first fucking pitch to RF. Ball game. Way to work the count Billy. Its crazy to think that perhaps someone that just came out of the bullpen may not have it that night, and may have difficulties throwing strikes...

Congrats to the Twinkies for breaking up that no-no last night. At least you had that moral victory. More than I can say for the Crew.