Tuesday's Frosty Mug

Have the Brewers started to stock #29 jerseys for fans to buy during the final homestand?

to use an example I’m more familiar with. Tracy used to mangle the lefty/righty platoon pitching issues all the time, and send the wrong guys out to their doom, and yet I find it interesting that it was a Tony LaRussa hack job that provided the fodder for the Grabowski Principle, well-known to Dodger fans in certain locales. The Principle got its genesis in a May 10, 2005 game in St. Louis against Los Angeles in which LaRussa had inserted reliever Kevin Jarvis to protect a 7-3 lead.

Now, Jarvis’ entry into the game was a dubious call in its own right. True, the Cardinals had a four-run lead, and true, the Dodgers weren’t setting the league on fire offensively (they finished 13th in the league in runs scored in 2005). But Jarvis himself was a quadruple-A righty who somehow kept talking his way back to the majors for a 12-year career; his best single-season ERA+ was 97 with Colorado in 2000.

Jarvis plunked the first batter he faced, Ricky Ledee, a decent enough player if you don’t run him out there too much, but it was a Sign. He got the next two batters, a punchless duo in Jason Phillips (the team’s woefully inept starting catcher in the wake of the Paul LoDuca trade) and Oscar Robles (the man who wanted Cesar Izturis’ career, and failed), but both their outs were hard-hit liners right at gloves in the outfield.

That brought up Jason Grabowski to pinch-hit for starter Wilson Alvarez. Grabowski was another quadruple-A type that Jim Tracy fell in love with that year, partly due to necessity; a starting outfield of J.D. Drew, Milton Bradley, and Ricky Ledee is going to have a lot of injury problems. But Grabowski was perhaps uniquely unsuited to a pinch-hitting role among the Dodger players on the bench thanks to a long swing and poor strike zone judgement.

That is, he should have been an easy out. Instead, he picked up his sixth walk of the season, one of ten he would eventually acquire.

Still LaRussa stuck with his reliever.

Disaster predictably struck, as Cesar Izturis hit a two-run single, and the unloved Hee-Seop Choi welted a three-run homer to upend the Cardinals lead and give the Dodgers a 9-7 advantage they held on to for an eventual win.

Give LaRussa this: it was Jarvis’ last appearance with St. Louis.

or is it really bright and sunny today?

(and I’m not even a Brewers fanatic)

It is just a killer to watch a team so close to being really successful be tied to a manager who can’t handle tangible or intangible decisions.

Should they be called Sveum’s Swingers?
Dale’s Dingers?

Tom H. talked to Mark A. after the press conference and he made a remark along the lines of “some players were shown loyalty too long and those players didn’t reciprocate.”

All Doug M. did was praise Yost almost hyperbolically.

Someone said that it had been reported that Cox was livid. Stick him on your staff then Bobby.

Homer thought it was panicy and desperate. Homer is never wrong and it is “the world’s greatest talk show” so the question is closed.

Dan Needles and Drew Olsen, the Bobo and Lil’ Debbull of radio think its stupid, especially the idea of firing a winning manager like Yost based on 14 games. Someone emailed the obvious about 6 years of being a chucklehead and Drew gave a flaccid response but I can’t remember it. Then he went on and on about 14 games again.

I could only take a few minutes of Cliffy, but he thinks that a good manager won’t want to come here now. I guess cruising for 6 years ain’t enough to make it worthwhile, not to mention a couple with a talent packed lineup. Rocket scientist Cliffy also thinks its bad because now things will go from laid back to yelling and that never works. Don’t ask me what the Sam Hill drugs he takes. I think its some sort of head trauma.

Oh, and Adam McC talked to Dale after the presser and he said that the appearance of Robin in Philly was truly a coincidence and he didn’t think that Dale would lie to him. If that’s true, what a wonderful change.

Blame, shame, name, tame, same, fame, maim, etc.