Need to talk Brewers to keep my sanity...

I think the offensive moves made by the brewers this year are enough to get them 5 more wins and that should be enough to get them into the playoffs. Topics up for debate include...

1) Eric Gagne - Used to be a dominant closer and had trouble getting back into the spot light. Mental toughness plays a larger role in the effectiveness of a closer than any other position in baseball. Gagne got chucked into the Boston pressure cooker immediately after recovering from injury and understandably had trouble adjusting. I think a lot of closers succeed in Milwaukee because of the lack of pressure put on them by the fans and media. Remember, there was a time when this guy was considered one of the best closers of all time. It would of been nice to keep Cordero around but come on, the Reds just made that impossible. 4 years with a 5th year option on a closer? That was just an impossible offer to match. Good riddance. As for the HGH thing... lets just hope that kind of goes away.

2) Mike Cameron - By far the most interesting move by the Brewers this offseason. Although the guy has to sit out the first 25 games this year because of the roids his presense dramatically changes the Brewers offense and positioning. I watched the Dennis Krause show where he had Doug Melvin as a guest and it was quite insiteful. They discussed this Cameron pick up and brought up some key points. The obvious of course is this puts Bill Hall back into his natural position at third base and moves Brewer phenom Ryan Braun to left field. Bill Hall apologists last year claim that Hall's numbers dropped because he was over concentrating on his defense and not spending enough time addressing his woes at the plate. Hopefully tossing him back to third allows him to focus on his bat. Braun was definetly a defensive liability over at third base and from what I understand, anyone in baseball can play left. With "should be" DHs like Barry Bonds and Manny Ramirez being parked there, I don't see him having any trouble adjusting. It will be nice to see his bat in the Brewer lineup for the entire year. If he puts up numbers remotely close to last year, he'll be a serious MVP contender. And now there's Mike Cameron himself. Heard a few intersting facts about him on this Dennis Krause show. Even though he's getting older, he's still an excellent career centerfielder. He does strike out too much but he will take a lot of pitches. Averages over 4 pitches per at bat. He's got a little power and a good on base percentage. Over the past 3 years, nobody in baseball has made it from first to third more often then Cameron. That means he's not reckless on the base paths -- no easy outs. Finally, he's played a lot of baseball. Always nice to have that experience in the club house especially after losing Jenkins' veteran leadership.

3) Ricky Weeks - I'm gonna have to credit the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal for this knowlege. http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=716113. Interesting exerpts include... "Finally recovered from surgery on his right wrist performed in August 2006, Weeks went on a tear over those final two months. He batted .327 in August, then rediscovered his power stroke in September, with nine home runs and 14 runs batted in... Weeks compiled a .500 on-base percentage in August and .409 OBP in September to finish at .374 for the season. At the end of July, his OBP was a putrid .279, so Weeks bumped it up nearly 100 points in the final two months." So we have reason to be excited here. It seems his lack of production has been attributed to his recovery from that wrist injury and rookie jitters. Considering the possibility of a patient batter like Cameron going in the number 2 spot, Weeks should have a shot at increasing those stolen base numbers as well. We've been told this kid should be a superstar for some time now, this year there are no excuses. Lets see what he can do.

4) Almost wrote this thing without mentioning the Jason Kendall signing. I guess the best thing about signing Jason Kendall is the fact that Estrada is gone. No one could hit a single on the first pitch then get thrown out on the bases better than Estrada. Never worked the count, was never clutch, and apparently he was no fun to have around. According to Melvin, the pitchers love throwing to the guy. He's not the same hitter who used to kill the Brewers back when he was a pirate but I think he'll be a solid player and I'm excited to have him. Also nice to have another veteran in the clubhouse.

5) Last season is behind us. From the players to the managers, the Brewers had no pennant race experience whatsoever. I usually claim that this is the most overrated topic in sports but I think it might be worthy of discussion in this case. I mainly believe this because I don't think Yost could of done a worse job towards the end. From the relentless faith in Turnbow to the beanball wars with Pujols, that was a terrible performance. I can only hope he learned from that mistake. Finally getting close, and getting every possible chance to make it, yet consistently failing... that couldn't of felt good. I hope the players never want to feel that again. Hopefully we can step it up in August and September.

All that should be enough to bump us into the playoffs right? Anyone have an arguement as to why we'd be worse? Is there anything I'm not mentioning? Let me know. GO BREWERS!!!!!!