With yesterday's win, we crept up to a 89-win pace, at least with rounding.  (It's 88.53, if you're keeping score at home.)  Since the Cubs and Cards are playing this weekend, we were bound to gain ground on somebody; as it stands right now, we're one game out of the wild card, and if the Cubs hold on to an early lead, that could be down to a half-game by the time the first pitch is thrown at Miller Park.

The matchup is Dave Bush vs. Paul Maholm.  At the macro level, that seems to tilt in the Pirates favor--Maholm's ERA is nearly a full run lower than Bush's.  On the other hand, Maholm is a lefty, as as team we OPS about 50 points higher against southpaws.  (For his part, Maholm has an even more dramatic split, and he can expect to see Prince plus a bunch of righties in the lineup tonight.)  Bush, as you probably know, has been considerably better at home, with an ERA of 3.18 at Miller Park.  (Amazingly, that makes his home ERA fourth best among the current starting five.)

Game time is 6:05 CT, and here's the BR Game Preview.

Go Brewers!

For those of you not well-versed in Latin, a calix is a cup, and I've been waiting to use this title ever since Callix Crabbe was returned to us. Anyway, onto the links.

If you were stuck "watching" last night's loss on Gameday, I think this picture pretty well sums up the game last night. A play that could have resulted in no runs instead resulted in two, and that was the end of that. Check out AZ Snakepit's game recap if you want the enemy's perspective.

On the C.C. Sabathia trade front, Buster Olney still has the Brewers as the favorites to land the big left-hander. Tribe Report takes a look at possibility, along with that of Sabathia going to the Rays, whom Olney has second in the sweepstakes. For some reason, TR seems to think that Fielder is the Indians' likely focus (check out the lonely-looking picture they've got of him--practically screams "trade me"). Then, in a shocking move for a blog, they overstep their bounds and decide to handicap the race with actual numbers, instead of simply relying on Olney's firsthand insight (bookmark this and show it to me later when I tell you that access is overrated). They have the Brewers' chances at 5%, for whatever it's worth.

Speaking of access, here's super-insider Joe Morgan's super-informed opinion on whether the Brewers will re-sign Ben Sheets:

It depends on what they want to spend, and if they are worried about the inuuries. But [Sunday] night he looked great. Because of injuries, he has not been able to come close to 20 wins, and he has had physical problems, so it comes down to how confident they are about hi health. But having said that, they need to keep him, because when healthy he is a great pitcher.

See, you just can't get that kind of info watching from the sidelines, guys.

Speaking of Joe, the Wisconsin Sports Bar takes a look at the phenomenon of JoeBaiting and its horrifying hilarious consequences.

In other snowclonic Fire-the-X news, Fire Jim Bowden is a little concerned about how the Nats are evaluating pitchers. Makes me glad that we only have Fire Ned Yost and that firedougmelvin.com is not extant (until today, when it will no doubt become a FJM redirect).

Pay attention if you like to express your opinion: not only can you vote for Ryan Braun to eclipse Kosuke Fukudome (whom he trails by only 33,000 votes) for the third starting outfield spot in the All-Star game, but you can also vote for whether or not he'll do it.

Touring the NL Central, the Pirates became the third team in the division to hit a pitcher eighth this year when Paul Maholm batted ahead of Jack Wilson; as Hyzdu Headquarters points out, only two months ago Pirates manager John Russell said he wouldn't ever do it. Cubs, Astros, Reds: who'll be the next to take up this fun and exciting new fad? Well okay, probably not the Reds.

MLB Trade Rumors (where everything is true) put together an all-free agent lineup projected to score over six runs a game, and only spent $51.7M (over half on Alex Rodriguez) doing it. So what if they don't have a pitching staff or a bench?

Over at Recondite Baseball, TheJay takes a look at the five-and-ten rule, including a handy catalog of which players qualify or are about to (I can't believe Curt Schilling has been on the Red Sox for almost five years already). Unsurprisingly, the Brewers have no one on the list.

Finally, and I'm including this purely to irritate Jeff, the Brewers' TV ratings bested Wimbeldon's, along with everything else, including the NBA draft. Note: though Bob Wolfley's byline is on this article, I'm pretty sure it was penned by a ghostwriter after Wolfley dropped dead when presented with proof that people actually care about the Brewers/baseball in general, as there's nary a sarcastic shot at what pathetic losers they are.

So, if you're scoring at home, or even if you're in your mother's basement, that's Anti-MSM 2, Pro-MSM 1 in a huge upset. I can't wait to see what they have for me tomorrow.

Bonus non-baseball link!

Queen Elizabeth has 10 times the lifespan of workers and lays up to 2,000 eggs a day.

It's Manny Parra vs. Paul Maholm.  Here's the BR Game Preview.  Game time is 6:05 CT.

For all the struggles the Brewers have had against Pittsburgh, we did win the series (handily, I might add) last year.  Whatever else you think about the Pirates, or the Brewers right now, this certainly isn't the same challenge as a weekend at Fenway.

Go Brewers!