Comments on: Fuku, Brewers!

By: Chicago's Best Blogs: The city�s ultimate blog roll: Around Chicago blogs: April 4, 2008

Thu, 17 Apr 2008 02:07:25 +0000

[...] Bad Kermit from Hire Jim Essian! definitely enjoyed Chicago Cubs outfielder Kosuke Fukudome’s opening day home run. Unfortunately, the Cubs ended up [...]

By: Chicago's Best Blogs: The city�s ultimate blog roll

Chicago's Best Blogs: The city�s ultimate blog roll — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 14:18:48 +0000

[...] Bad Kermit from Hire Jim Essian! definitely enjoyed Chicago Cubs outfielder Kosuke Fukudome’s opening day home run. Unfortunately, the Cubs ended up [...]

By: Keghorn

Keghorn — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 22:01:21 +0000

Nobody cares to mention the intentional base on balls to Prince Fielder to get to Ryan Braun? That scenario doesn’t seem to be a winner at any time when you’re facing this lineup. Lou simply blew it.

By: Jim & Bob's Palatial Baseball Blog: Why Bother with Your Best Pitcher?

Jim & Bob's Palatial Baseball Blog: Why Bother with Your Best Pitcher? — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 04:42:19 +0000

[...] A commenter at Hire Jim Essian posits this question about Lou Piniella’s bullpen management in pivotal Game One of the 2008 season:Why did Lou put in Wood in a non-save situation?Well, jiminy jillikers — why would Piniella run Wood out there in the top of the ninth of a 0-0 game? It’s not like it was a key moment of the game or anything!This kind of thinking drives me nuts. Jim and I have talked about this before, but the gist is this — closers should only be used for save situations, preferably only in the ninth inning (maybe the eighth, but only if someone like Albert Pujols is up with the tying run on base).In this situation, the comment is doubly ridiculous. The game was a scoreless tie heading into the top of the ninth — meaning there could be no save situation for Kerry Wood to come in to close.Does that mean that Wood should not have come in? If so, then who pitches the ninth?Theoretically (and practically, if you take into account Wood’s performance at the end of last year), Wood is one of our best relief pitchers — why not use him in that key situation. Marmol had already been used, so who else? Cub Fan is already all over Howry — imagine the whining if Howry came in to start the ninth…So who else should Lou have sent in? Pignatiello? Wuertz? Lieber?If Wood’s going to be the hammer out of the ‘pen, it makes sense to use him in that situation. It didn’t work out this time, but it’s not because Lou used the closer in a non-save situation. Give the Brewers some props, folks…Labels: brewers, cubs [...]

By: Brad D

Brad D — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 03:59:46 +0000

If you were there or know something about it, tell me just what impact the lowered field is going to have?

I heard something about a sudden rise by the bull-pen. I’ll take my answer off the air.

By: Bad Kermit

Bad Kermit — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 16:52:19 +0000

The problem is, that bastard made them REALLY hard to tear up.

Bring gasoline and matches.

By: Reuschel's Jowls

Reuschel's Jowls — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 16:28:47 +0000

They may only be second to Sox fans in that category, but in the “Desperately Trying to Pretend We Followed This Team Before May of 2007, Despite My Obviously Freshly-Minted Throwback Brewers Cap That I Bought Two Weeks Ago,” Milwaukee fans take a back set to no one. Kinda cute, if by “cute,” you actually mean “pathetic.”

By: BigFlax

BigFlax — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 15:51:24 +0000

Yeah, I mean, it’s a loss to the Brewers, which is annoying, because Brewers fans are second only to Sox fans in “desperately trying to make us their biggest rivals even though we already have a much more historic rival serving as our biggest.” But it’s just one loss. We lost on Opening Day last year too. In 2006 we scored 16 runs. How’d that work out? Frankly, the fact that the offense was so anemic yesterday and we still almost won is probably a good sign; the top of the order won’t go 1-for-15 every game.

By: JackB

JackB — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 15:11:40 +0000

I took the day off yesterday so I could watch opening day from the comfort of my couch. I nearly gave the cats heartattacks when Fuku hit the bomb in the 9th. They were peaceably asleep. Stupid cats, that’ll teach you to sleep through a baseball game. It sucked to lose, but holy hell, it’s one game. Why all the panic? There’s 161 of these fuckers left to go. I’m not worried and judging from the comments, no one here is, either. Thank God. People at work today are freaking out. “Wood sucks, Marmol needs to close, blah, blah, blah.” One game, people. Settle down. The only thing I dislike is the Theriot/Soriano 1-2 combination at the top. Shouldn’t at least one of your first two hitters have good on base percentage? Other than that, I’m not concerned. If Pie can’t figure out how to hit, I’m confident Lou will bench him in favor of (gulp) Reed Johnson. Marrioti is already feeling vindicated about Kerry Wood. Again, 1 game. Let’s not forget, Gagne got creamed as well. I have a lot more confidence in Wood recovering then Gagne. If Wood fucks up another 10-12 games, then we have a problem.

By: Andy

Andy — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 14:23:13 +0000

Wood pitched the ninth because I’m sure Lou wanted to get him into the opener, especially with a day off today, and because when you’re the home team, if you get to the ninth tied there isn’t going to be a save, so you’re basically treating every inning like it’s a save situation from there on out. Get ‘em out, get a run, go home. It’s not like he brought him into a game they were up by or down by six runs.

We need to start a trend of gleefully accepting the It’s Gonna Happen signs, then tearing them up right in front of the guy.