Wednesday's Frosty Mug

Some things to read while becoming more attractive.

You can scratch one name off the list for the Brewers' managerial vacancy: The team announced yesterday that Don Money and his staff will return to Nashville next season, and Money will not be considered for a promotion at this time. Money has spent 13 seasons climbing the organizational ladder with the Brewers, including the last two in Nashville.

But, of course, whenever one door closes another one opens. The Baltimore Sun is reporting that Juan Samuel, who served briefly as the interim manager of the Orioles this season, is expected to interview for the Brewers job. The article also mentions that he has interest in the Pirates opening, and Yahoo is reporting he's also interviewing in Seattle and possibly Toronto.

Even after scratching Money off the list, my list of potential managerial candidates is at 29. I'm hoping to start handicapping the list sometime next week, assuming The Brewers Bar's Craigslist ad doesn't add any more nominees. In the meantime, you'll have to settle for knowing that View From Bernie's Chalet is rooting for Rays bench coach Dave Martinez, and @MkeBrewerGal is strongly opposed to Eric Wedge.

Ever wondered what it's like to move out of a major league clubhouse? Seth McClung has you covered in his most recent blog. He also responded to some reaction to his argument that the Brewers can and should sign Prince Fielder to a long term deal. Never one to be outdone, Jim Breen of Bernie's Crew has a reaction to the reaction.

Plunk Everyone continues to recognize the Brewers' unlikely 2010 season: Rickie Weeks, Prince Fielder, Yovani Gallardo and Joe Inglett all appear in their 2010 Awards for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of HBP.

Brian Anderson will call game one of the Phillies-Reds series today for TBS. Michael Hiestand of USA Today has a look at Anderson and the broadcasting career that's brought him to this point. I didn't realize until reading that story that Bob Costas recommended Anderson to the Brewers before the 2007 season.

Elsewhere in "long and winding road" stories, MLB FanHouse has a video feature on John Axford.

In the minors:

• Brewerfan.net is covering the eight Brewer prospects participating in the Pan American Games, including pitchers Andre Lamontagne, Nick Bucci and Hiram Burgos and infielder Taylor Green.
• The 2011 draft order has been finalized, and the Brewers will draft #12 and 15 in the first round.

They'd better make those first round picks count, because they won't be seeing any compensation picks this year: MLB Trade Rumors has the Elias rankings for this offseason, and the only Brewer free agent to qualify for Type B status is Trevor Hoffman. Hoffman will likely retire, but the Brewers are unlikely to risk having him accept arbitration if he decides to play next season.

It's a bad news/good news day for the Brewers financially: Attendance took a pretty significant hit in 2010, with the Brewers seeing the sixth highest percentage loss in baseball at 8.53%. The good news is also pretty good, though: As Jack Moore of Disciples of Uecker points out, the Brewers are officially done paying Jeff Suppan and Bill Hall to play elsewhere.

Actually, here's some more bad news: A recent Sports Illustrated poll showed that most major league players aren't interested in coming to the midwest: When players were asked which other team they'd like to play for, the Brewers, Indians, Tigers, Royals, Twins and Cardinals combined to get just 9% of the vote.

No transactions today.

With the postseason starting today, it's good to know that three prominent umpires won't be the big story this week: Hardball Talk notes that Phil Cuzzi, Joe West and Bob Davidson aren't on any of the crews for the divisional series.

Baseball had some moderately interesting pennant races in 2010, but Rowland's Office notes that they could have been better: If baseball went back to the old two-division format, the NL West would have had four 90-win teams.

Meanwhile, file this note under "Year of the Pitcher:" 2.6% of all games this season ended 1-0, the highest percentage since 1992.

It's a slow news day today, but I'm not sure it's ever a slow enough news day to justify reading poetry based on Jose Canseco's Twitter feed.

Happy birthday today to:

• 1998-03 Brewer Valerio de los Santos, who turns 38.
• Seattle Pilot Jerry Stephenson, who would have turned 67.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm abandoning hope for humanity.

Drink up.