GM Needs New Glasses

Texas Rangers trade for Prince Fielder, one of the great hitters in the game. Ken Sanders once said, ‘He has the fastest hands with the bat I have ever seen. It doesn’t matter how big he gets.”

Seattle Mariners sign Robinson Cano for $240 million, a ten year contract, lifetime subscription to the Nintendo News and a good chunk of Jim C’s ad budget. Sorry, Big Mariner.

Curtis Granderson signs with the cross town rival, New York Mets. He gets $60 million.

Boston Red Sox sign A.J. Pierzynski, an aging catcher but fans feel he looks like Carlton Fisk.

Yankees, in anticipation of losing probable PED offender, Alex Rodriguez, signed Jacoby Ellsbury for $153 million to play centerfield from the hated Red Sox. Yankees hope to save approximately $14 million this year, but not on under the counter drugs. They also signed Brian McCann from Atlanta for $85 million. Yet, they still have no third baseman.

St. Louis signs Jhonny Peraltta, a former suspended PED offender. Unusual move by this squeaky clean franchise with a holier-than-thou image. Of course, this is the home of the ‘Gashouse Gang’.

Detroit signed Joe Nathan, pitcher for the Texas Ranger, for $20 million over 2 years. Now they have the best reliever in baseball to go along with the major’s best starting pitching staff.

Baltimore is thinking about signing John Axford.

Miami signed catcher Jarrod Saltalamacchia for $21 million over three years from the World Champion Boston Red Sox. The team also signed Rafael Furcal, shortstop from the National League Champion St. Louis Cardinals for $3 million.

Houston signs Scot Feldman, a right handed pitcher for 3 years and $30 million.

Washington got a new manager, Matt Williams, perhaps the best third base coach in the game.

The Angels got Don Baylor as their batting coach, perhaps the best batting coach in the game.

The D’Backs lost both Williams and Baylor. They are stuck with one of the best managers in the game, the overwhelming talented first baseman and a solid starting pitcher and a gold glove right fielder.

The Rockies got Justin Morneau for 2 years for a total of $13 million.

Kansas City got the best left handed hitter of left handed pitching in baseball in Nori Aoki. Gives them a tremendous leadoff man who wears opposing pitchers out, often taking them 8-12 pitches into the count and rarely striking out, only 40 times in 2013 out of some 600+ at bats.

Milwaukee got a … pitching reject. Oh, they also are thinking about re-signing Cory Hart who has not played in a year and one-half.

Yet they still have the worst third base coach in the major leagues, a so-so starting rotation, a non-improved bullpen, an aging third baseman, poor throwing catcher, a hopeful prospect in left field, a center fielder who probably had the best season of his career, a GM who inherited a waffle full of young talent when he came into his job (Fielder, Weeks, Hardy, Braun, Hart and Vonnie) but has seen the team fade into another dream sequence of Brewer seasons past, and an owner who allows all of this to happen.

The fans in Milwaukee and Wisconsin are resilient and beyond loyal. They bleed Green & Gold, Cardinal Red & White, Green & Growing and True Blue Brew Crew. They drink beer, eat bratwursts and cheese, send their kids to school and provide plenty of milk, work hard at their jobs, go to Church on Sunday and root for the home teams like no one else. They hate the Bears, White Sox, Cardinals, the carpetbagging Braves, Ohio State and dislike those lovable Cubs. They also dislike Thanksgiving in Detroit. That’s why St. Vincent Lombardi stopped playing the Lions on that day decades ago.

These fans have heroes like few others. Johnny Blood, Don Hutson, Curly Lambeau, Bart Starr, Paul Horning, Jim Taylor, Jerry Kramer, Willie Davis, St. Vincent Lombardi, Reggie White, Bret Favre, Aaron Rodgers, Alan Ameche, Elroy Crazylegs Hirsch, Pat Richter, Barry Alveraz and Ron Dayne in football; Jon McGlocklin, Oscar Robinson, Karem Adbul Jabbar, Larry Costello, Al McGuire, Dean the Dream, Doc Rivers and Bo Ryan in basketball; Warren Spahn, Eddie Mathews, Joe Adcock, Billy Bruton, Johnny Logan,Del Crandall, Henry Aaron, Ken Sanders, Augie Doggie, Bernie Brewer, Jim Gaintner, Robin Yount, Paul Molitor, Rollie Fingers, Vuch, Stormin Gorman, Sixto, Benji, Coop, Ben Sheets, Prince, Nori,  Rickie, Vonnie, Braunschweiger, Jean and Go-Go in baseball.

Just 50 guys who the burgers of Cream City adored in sports, 20 of whom are part of yesterday and today’s Brew Crew. Yet only the last four mentioned are hopefully at the top of their game out of a line-up of 25. Another, Nori Aoki, who only played two years in Milwaukee after years in Japan, became a fan favorite, not because he hit home runs, but because he could hit and stay in the lineup with gripping plays and excitement that reminded more than a few that he was like the ‘Igniter’ of days gone by. He was the best left handed hitter of left handed pitching in baseball. And, he wore opposing pitchers out at the plate. He was just let go for some guy who the GM has had his eye on for a couple of years.

The GM needs a new set of glasses.

Play Ball!

Now I Lay Me Down To Lie

“People think that a liar gains a victory over his victim. What I’ve learned is that a lie is an act of self-abdication, because one surrenders one’s reality to the person to whom one lies, making that person one’s master, condemning oneself from then on to faking the sort of reality that person’s view requires to be faked. The man who lies to the world, is the world’s slave from then on. There are no white lies, there are only blackest of destruction, and a white lie is the blackest of them all.” Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

Ryan Braun will never be admitted to the Hall Of Fame. The reason is simple: he is stained forever by the lie. As Buster Olney of ESPN The Magazine stated, “He is the Lance Armstrong of baseball”.

In a town that adores their local sport heroes, Milwaukee is tied to those who perform in an honest, workman like manner. Bart Starr, Jerry Kramer, Reggie White, Johnny Mac, Johnny Logan, Del Crandall, Andy Pafko, Henry Aaron, Robin Yount…need we say more?

It is a town that does not take kindly to those who misrepresent themselves. See how long Braun’s restaurant stays in business with him as the face of the business.

Looking back, the guy who reminds many of Joe DiMaggio on the field is now nothing more than Oscar ‘Happy’ Felsch.

When asked if he would be back next season as a Brewer, Milwaukee General Manager, Doug Melvin, said, “That’s a long time away”. Now don’t most Brewer fans wish the team should have signed Prince Fielder to a long-term contract rather than Braun?

Many have brought up ideas  on how he can turn positive favor back his way. One of my best friends suggested that he go to Miller Park, go to the middle of the field and take questions from every fan who has a question and answer every one of them in all honesty. No press allowed.

Another thought would be to have him go, during his separation from the game over the next six months, to Haiti and work with those who need a helping hand. His agents at CAA must have Sean Penn’s number. While he works with the poor, with no press, he will give an exclusive to Bryant Gumble in February 2014 where he answers every question. Then he should shock the baseball world by telling Gumble that he will ask the Brewers for a one year sabbatical as he has found his real calling in helping others and wishes to become a monk, doing good work for those who need help the most. Brother Braun will become, once again, the center of discussion but this time it will be all about how he can come back to baseball after missing the better part of a year and one-half. You can hear talk radio now.

But reality must set in. If there is an Oakland Raiders of baseball, he should be traded there. He would be a perfect fit in the Yankees lineup. Or better yet, the Dodgers. It’s his hometown and they relish celeb garbage better than most. After all, it is LaLa land. They believe Kim Kardashian…no matter what she says.

On October 2, 1919, The Philadelphia Bulletin published a poem which would quickly prove to be ironic:                                                                                                                            “Still it really doesn’t matter, After all, who wins the flag.                                                          Good clean sport is what we’re after, And we aim to make our brag.                                        To each near or distant nation Wherein shines the sporting sun                                              That of all our games gymnastic Baseball is the cleanest one!”

It is 2013 AB, After Braun.

Brewer fans…get use to it.

Now, let’s Play Ball!

Get Up. You Can’t Be That Tired!

Baseball must be an easy sport to play. Most of the time the players are just casually milling about on the field waiting for the next pitch. You play catch before the inning starts. Nothing too strenuous. There is an eight-in-nine chance that you will not be involved in the next play. You get to sit down when it is your team’s time to bat. The game lasts only a couple of hours a day, far less than playing a round of golf on even the busiest courses. Sure, you have to grab a bat and walk up to the on deck circle after coming from your comfy position in the dugout. You take a couple of swings. And when it is your turn to hit, you walk up to the batter’s box, take your position with a couple of practice swings and zero in on the pitcher…particularly the throwing hand of the pitcher. From that moment the game either speeds up enormously or slows down incredibly depending upon your comfort zone at that time as the stars line up with the movement of the earth and your familiarity with the pitcher. As Yogi said, “Baseball is ninety percent mental. The other half is physical.”

Every player on the field is an exceptional athlete. They are one of only 800 people on the planet to be able to play in ‘The Show’ at one time. For the record, that is one of eight hundred out of 7.013 billion people on the planet.

The mind races faster. On Friday night for five hours and four minutes, the struggling Milwaukee Brewers and Chicago Cubs (both entered the game with identical 13 wins and 18 losses) held one of their ‘big rival’ marathons. The Brewers used 22 players out of 25 men on their roster. They even used one of their starting pitcher to pinch hit, Zack Greinke. Only Vonnie Gallardo, Shaun Marcum (who starts on Saturday) and Marco Estrada (who pitched the game before) were not used. If further pinch hitters had to be used, there is no doubt that Gallardo and Marcum could have been used as both are also good hitting pitchers.

There were a lot of Brewers in the ballpark on this night as the Cubs manager, Dale Sveum, along with former Brewer pitcher and now Cubs pitching coach, Chris Bosio, former Brewer rookie of the year, Cubs third base coach Pat Listach and former Brewer infielder and now Cubs bench coach, Jamie Quirk. Add to this, former Brewer manager, Del Crandall at 81 years of age was there as he was honored in the stadium as he was inducted as a member of the The Milwaukee Braves Hall of Fame earlier in day.

The Cubs used 21 of their players including all of the position players.The two clubs had only pitchers that were not used. This game, more than most, gave new meaning to Abbott and Costello’s “Who’s on first, What’s on second. I don’t know’s on third. Why’s in left. Because is in center. Certainly is the catcher. I don’t give a darn is at short. Tomorrow is the pitcher.”

Cory Hart for the Brewers had 7 at bats, the last gave every one of the 40,097 a chance to go home as it was a single in the bottom of the 13th inning which gave the home team a victory with the bases loaded. Mark Concannon, the Brewers television field announcer interviewed the winning team’s hero for the night, Hart, with “Good morning.” It was after midnight.

Saturday’s game was scheduled to start at 12:05P (CST) to accommodate the FOX Game of the Week schedule.

The game was over. Players rushed through the clubhouse, showered and left to travel home and grab some sleep. Milwaukee’s not tough to get around at 1A in the morning. They were all capable of being home at 1:30A. Say it took a little while to get to sleep at about 2A. Many get to the ballpark four hours before game time. That means they had to get up at 7A and in the clubhouse at 8A. Routine time is at hand followed by batting practice for the home team. Gates open two hours before the game so it is time to go back to the clubhouse and begin the preparation for tendencies of the opposing pitcher and hitters. Interviews for local radio and FOX television along with welcome back home hugs and hand shakes for Darren Sutton, the former Brewer television announcer and now the television voice of the Arizona Diamondbacks, will be covering the national telecast. Visit to the training room is scheduled. Stretching comes next. The pains and bruises from the night before are nagging, especially for Rickie Weeks and Ryan Braun, both of whom were hit by pitcher Lendy Castillo in the bottom of the 13th. Week’s had x-rays earlier in the morning on his wrist which proved negative. There were no broken bones. That could have added him to the sideline along with two others in the infield. Only Ramirez stands alone as the only infielder not to be on the DL for the season for the heroes of the Cream City nine.

There is a chance of rain for Saturday with a high of 60 degrees. The roof is open and the crowd has gathered. The heroes have been on the field warming up. It’s time for that leisurely athletic endeavor for another day. Jogging onto the field to take their positions, Marcum takes the rubber and the game begins all over again, 0-0. A clean slate. All is right with the world. Batter comes to the plate. And the umpire yells,

“Play Ball”.

I Saw Jackie Play

One of my childhood hero’s was a Southern Californian who won major letters in four sports: track, football basketball and baseball at UCLA. From the first time I had heard his name, and the exploits  about him from my grandfather, Jackie was a magnet for my attention. The first time I saw him was on television, on the Mutual Television Network from Ebbets Field, there he was at second base. I couldn’t believe my eyes.

I had to see him in person.

My Dad took my brother (Mike) and I to Milwaukee County Stadium sitting in the then left field bleachers down the third base line. We were in the 8th row, even with Sid Gordon of the Braves playing in left field. The view was made memorable with all eyes on the hero of the Braves, Eddie Mathews, playing at third. After the pitcher finished up his practice throws, Crandall threw it to Mathews who threw it to Logan who threw it to Dittmar and then to Adcock as they whipped the ball around the infield and gave it back to the pitcher.

Then HE came up to bat. At age 32, Jackie Robinson made $38,000 in 1953, $3,000 less than he made the previous year although he was an All-Star and easily one of the biggest draws in all of baseball. That salary would be equivalent to $326,475.51 today (less than the Major League minimum but huge by 1953 standards. Bobby Schantz, star pitcher of the Philadelphia A’s made $24,000 that year. The youngster, Mickey Mantle of the Yankees made $17,500 while Yogi Berra made $36,000. Stan Musial was one of the tops with $80,000.) The world was not equal in those days. But, an average house cost $9,550. A gallon of gas cost $0.20; average cost of a new car was $1,650 and the average salary in America was $4,000. You get the idea. Times were different.

So much for the ‘stuff’ of the day’. Today was baseball. A game with the Milwaukee Braves and the Brooklyn Dodgers was about to begin. Jackie Robinson was the lead off batter and was at the plate facing Johnny Antonelli. As I remember it, he walked, stole second, went to third on a ground out and then the picture I hoped for was directly in my view. Eddie at third. Jackie bopping up and down, faking to steal home then back to third. He caused havoc on the base paths. Eddie really didn’t know what to do. Should he play his usual position at third with a right-handed batter at the plate or should he stay nearer the bag to keep Jackie close. Everyone was confused, except Jackie. The left-handed pitcher was clearly upset by this force of nature at third. Then bang! Like a shot Jackie stole home. In an instant, THE moment was over.

“Did you see that? Did you see that?”, I repeatedly asked anyone who was near.  Old white men in the crowd complained that Robinson was cheating. “You don’t go jumping all around when you’re on base.”, they would say, complaining that the home team just didn’t stand a chance against the Robinson led Dodgers. “But did you see that?”, I asked my Dad and Mom, who were smiling at the event they just witnessed. My Grandma and Grandpa were smiling as well as my Grandma plainly stated, “That was Jackie Robinson.”

What a statement. It shot through my bones as it was the projectile fact fired from the canon of all that was truthful, my Grandmother’s wisdom.

Then, as if a blessing had occurred, Jackie Robinson came out and played left field, right in front of us. I could nearly reach out and touch him, he seemed that close. He had come up a second baseman, but now the Dodgers played Junior Gilliam at second. There he was. Right in front of me…now in left field, Jackie Robinson. His cleats looked big league. They were polished. His away flannels were baggy looking. But there he was, looking intense, flipping the ball back and forth to “Duke” Snider in Center before the beginning of the bottom of the first.

“That’s Jackie.”, I kept thinking to myself. I was clearly living an out-of-body experience. For the rest of the game, Jackie Robinson and I were one in thought and into the game. There he was. Right in front of me bigger than life. No. It was life itself. There was Jackie Robinson. What a day.

But for all that happened that day, my Grandmother’s comment kept replaying in my mind. Nothing else was so clear on that day. Nothing was so vivid in my mind as we drove home, back to Beloit. Nothing else mattered even though the Braves lost another to their rivals, the Dodgers, in that first year of Major League baseball in Milwaukee. Jackie has stolen 17 bases that season and I had just seen two of them.

I had seen Jackie Robinson play baseball.

That next week was a dream as I retold the story what seemed like a hundred times to friends and acquaintances. During that week, I went to the corner store on Hackett a little more than a block from our home on Lincoln, and bought a pack of baseball cards. This time they were Topps, not Bowman. Bowman were my favorite but I wanted to try my hand with Topps. After I got back home and gave the groceries to my Mom, I went out on the back steps and carefully, separated the wax paper covering the pack of cards without tearing the wrapper, slowly pealing back the covering to see what treasures were inside.

And there, on top of the pack was #1 for the 1953 Topps series, Jackie Robinson.

I was now the luckiest kid in the world.

I took out that card today and looked at it again. Today Major League baseball honored this man with every player wearing his number, “42″, on their uniform.

There he was again, right in front of me. I saw Jackie play…again. This time, it was as bright a memory as when we were heading home to Beloit so very long ago.