Friday's Frosty Mug

Some things to read while searching for the right note.

The managerial search was quiet for a day yesterday, but this Tom Haudricourt post included a few relatively important tidbits:

• The team reportedly was not in touch with Bobby Valentine yesterday.
• Bob Melvin's name is starting to come up as a candidate for the Mets' job. (Jon Heyman also noted this.)
• Ron Roenicke is probably the least likely candidate at this point.

Haudricourt also tweeted that Joey Cora was impressive in interviews, for whatever that's worth.

If the rumors were true and the Brewers really are planning on hiring Valentine, there's an outside chance they could announce it today while the World Series is on a travel day. It seems more likely, though, that they'll wait until the series is over.

We've suspected this for a while now, but it's more or less officially confirmed: The Brewers won't be receiving any draft pick compensation for their free agents this winter. The Elias rankings are out and Trevor Hoffman (Type B) is the only Brewer free agent listed (FanShot). The Brewers are unlikely to offer Hoffman arbitration, and he's moderately unlikely to play next season.

It's worth noting that, for the most part, the Brewers have done a very good job over the last decade with the money they've spent in the draft. MLB Trade Rumors has a look at the top five amateur signing bonuses in club history: Now that Mark Rogers debuted this season all five have made the majors, four are still in the organization and three are franchise cornerstones.

Of course, many of the team's free agent signings haven't been nearly as successful. The team could be reaching a turning point there, though: Adam Rubin of ESPN New York had a post yesterday looking at players the Mets could possibly acquire in a swap of bad contracts, and there wasn't a single Brewer listed as a possibility.

The Brewer bats still weren't the problem this season. R.J. Anderson of Bloomberg Sports has the Brewer offense's Season in Review.

In the minors:

• Minor League Baseball Prospects has unveiled their annual ranking of the top 2000 minor league performances this season, ranked by performance relative to age. Brett Lawrie cracked the top five at #4, eleven other Brewers (Caleb Gindl, Lee Haydel, Zach Braddock, Zelous Wheeler, Mat Gamel, Erik Komatsu, Cody Scarpetta, Jeremy Jeffress, Taylor Green, Martin Maldonado and Jake Odorizzi) are ranked in the top 400, and 41 more players appear somewhere between #401 and 2000.
• Caleb Gindl is still a pretty fascinating prospect for me. He doesn't look the part of a major leaguer but he's hit everywhere he's gone, including in each of his first eight games in the AFL. Not bad for a guy who a scout compared to a Smurf.
• Gindl's AFL teammate, Eric Farris, is also off to a pretty solid start for Surprise. With that said, Keith Law says he doesn't profile as either an everyday player or a utility guy in the majors.
• It's new logo season, and Wisconsin has decided to jump in. They're planning on updating their look for the 2011 season and unveiling three new logos. The current logo and color scheme have been in place since the team moved to Fox Cities Stadium and became the Timber Rattlers in 1995.

Got a few bucks burning a hole in your pocket? The Brewers Bar has a look at some obscure Brewer items available on Ebay. I'll admit it: I bid on one of them. If you've got a lot of cash on hand, you might be interested in knowing that Jimmy Kimmel's auction of Doug Melvin's signed bobblehead is up to $2650, and runs through Sunday.

Of course, you could also spend that money on a new BCB T-shirt. Or a lot of them. They make excellent Christmas gifts.

Speaking of money, the Brewers announced yesterday that they raised $3 million for the Brewers Community Foundation this season.

Around baseball:

Phillies: Jamie Moyer, third baseman Greg Dobbs and catcher Paul Hoover have all rejected outright assignments to the minors and are now free agents.

Here's a transaction that didn't happen, but might have been the offseason's most fascinating if it did: The Marlins and White Sox reportedly discussed a deal that would have sent stud outfielder Mike Stanton to Chicago in exchange for manager Ozzie Guillen.

I had some other things going on last night so I didn't start watching the game until sometime in the seventh inning. I turned it on and, within one batter, Tim McCarver's rant on pitch counts prompted me to turn the sound off. The Golden Sombrero is nominating McCarver for the position of "Baseball's Worst Announcer," and I think there's a case to be made.

Over the last couple of years I've been saddened to read of the decline of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, which appears to have lost its direction a bit when Buck O'Neil passed away. Joe Posnanski was one of the Museum's most ardent supporters for quite some time, and has a great post on what the museum used to be, what went wrong and the possibility that it will bounce back under new leadership.

On this day in 2002 the Brewers hired Ned Yost to be the 15th manager in franchise history. At 457-502, Yost is the organization's second winningest manager.

Happy birthday today to:

• 2005-06 Brewer Dana Eveland, who turns 27.
• 2007 Nashville Sound R.A. Dickey, who turns 36.
• 1990 Brewer Narciso Elvira, who turns 43.

Speaking of birthdays, Wezen-ball has revisited last season's post on the best players born on your birthday, and expanded each list to a top five.

Now, if you'll excuse me, my scent isn't quite right.

Drink up.