This was supposed to be a short week. So why am I looking at my calendar and saying "Really? It's only Thursday?"

Win Expectancy Graph
BR Box Score

Apparently all it took was a Dave Bush meatball for Ryan Church to get his stroke back.

Also yesterday, Angel Salome, Alcides Escobar and Mat Gamel got their first major league at bats. The kids grow up so fast. The Official Site notes that Brad Nelson has the ball from his first big league hit, but not a house to keep it in. Maybe he can borrow Bob Hamelin's house.

CC Sabathia is NL Pitcher of the Month for the second time in two months, but he won't get a belated no-hitter.

Jeremy Jeffress has a new agent, the same guy who represents Taylor Green, Mickey Brantley and a handful of other Brewers. I just spent 5 minutes reading the agent's blog for the first time. Professional isn't the first word that came to mind. But he does claim to know who the PTBNL in the Sabathia trade is, giving him the opportunity to be completely wrong on something he claimed as fact for the third time this season.

Speaking of Brewer minor leaguers, MLB.com's Jonathan Mayo is all over the minor league playoffs, so much so that he blogged about the first six innings of West Virginia's game last night but didn't bother to mention how the game ended. The Power lost game 1 of their series, here's the box score.

Also, Jeff was on the radio last night discussing the Brewers. I haven't had a chance to listen to it yet, but it's Jeff, so at the very least he might introduce you to a hot tennis player you hadn't heard of before.

Only one injury today: Jered Weaver cut his hand on the visiting dugout this week and will have to have his next start pushed back.

Remember when the Brewers dumped Grant Balfour on the Rays for Seth McClung, and the general consensus was happiness to be rid of a guy who was more or less done? Turns out Balfour is pitching pretty well for the Rays, so perhaps the deal worked out for both teams.

Not working out: the 2008 Reds, who were eliminated from postseason contention last night.

The Cubs aren't exactly eliminated, but you might guess they were from the tone of this all caps diatribe re-posted on The Junkball Blues.

More signs pointing to a AAA shakeup: Hot Foot notes that the Indians' decision to leave Buffalo will likely open the door for the Blue Jays to move from Syracuse to Buffalo, leaving the Mets free to move from New Orleans to Syracuse and have their AAA team closer to home. Where this leaves the Zephyrs is unsure, but the music hasn't even started playing yet so the game of musical chairs is far from over.

Oh, and apparently players become more aggressive when wearing black.

Drink up.

The All-Star Futures Game is on ESPN2 at 11:30 AM CT (no, not a misprint), with the pregame show airing an hour beforehand. "Third baseman" Mat Gamel, unequivocally the crown jewel of the system, is the only Milwaukee farmhand playing, thought erstwhile Brewers Matt LaPorta and Will Inman are also both on the US team, as is unsigned 2005 draft pick Jake Arrieta.

Brewers Futures Game alumni include Kyle Peterson (1999), Ben Sheets (2000), Nick Neugebauer (2001), Corey Hart (2002), Bill Hall (2002), J.J. Hardy (2003), Dave Krynzel (2003), Prince Fielder (2004), Rickie Weeks (2004), Hernan Iribarren (2005), Nelson Cruz (2005), Ryan Braun (2006), Yovani Gallardo (2006), and Alcides Escobar (2007).

Current or former Brewers who played on in the game prior to joining the organization include Francisco Cordero (Detroit - 1999), Russell Branyan (Cleveland - 1999), Alex Sanchez (Tampa Bay - 1999), Peter Bergeron (Montreal - 1999), Joe Lawrence (Toronto - 1999), Tomo Ohka (Boston - 1999, 2000), Ryan Anderson (Seattle - 1999, 2000), CC Sabathia (Cleveland - 2000), Eric Munson (Detroit - 2000), Mike Rivera (Detroit - 2001), Grant Balfour (Minnesota - 2001), Lyle Overbay (Arizona - 2002), Brett Evert (Atlanta - 2002), Jorge de la Rosa (Boston - 2002, 2003), Chris Narveson (St. Louis - 2003), Jose Capellan (Atlanta - 2004), and Zach Jackson (Toronto - 2005).

Feel free to use this as a game thead, or just to talk about what a studly slugger Gamel is.

Here's a tradition I'd like to see more of.

Win Expectancy Graph
BR Box Score
BDD Recaps

You can either stop holding your breath, or prepare to hold it for 15 more days: the Brewers' deadline to make a decision on Jeff Weaver has been extended to June 15.

Apparently David Riske has no new structural damage, but is taking longer than expected to recover. That's bad news all around. Of course, Salomon Torres is pretty excited about getting to close games.

So last night the Brewers got 3 hits and won. That's a stark contrast from August 24, 2002, when they got 20 hits and lost, tying the tenth highest hit total in a nine inning loss of all time. Recondite Baseball has the full list at that link. Or, you could stay here and watch me struggle with bad segues and awkward linking.

In the fanposts yesterday, Greg8370 mentioned a report that the Brewers might be looking to move their AA team to the Eastern League, and had been mentioned as a candidate to play home games in Norwich, CT. After a brief search this morning, I found the column mentioning it. Sounds like the Defenders are having some real problems with the Giants organization, mainly tied to the fact that the Giants don't like the ballpark dimensions, and also don't like playing 30-degree home games. I think I'd stick with Huntsville. I emailed the reporter, though, to see where he got the rumor from.

UPDATE: I've been in touch with Joe Perez, the writer from the Norwich Bulletin. You can see our conversation here .

So yesterday afternoon I had a moment to kill, and I got an email from the Brewers. They really wanted me to vote (25 times) to get some Brewers in the starting lineup of the All-Star Game. They've also posted a story about how close Braun is to only being 4 spots back of the leaders. So I sat down with the stats, picked out the best candidate at each position...and didn't vote for a single Brewer. Here's the ballot I clicked and reclicked and submitted 25 times:

AL:
C: Joe Mauer
1B: Kevin Youkilis
2B: Ian Kinsler
3B: Joe Crede
SS: Michael Young
OF: Milton Bradley
OF: Josh Hamilton
OF: Magglio Ordonez
DH: David Ortiz

NL:
C: Brian McCann
1B: Lance Berkman
2B: Dan Uggla
3B: Chipper Jones
SS: Hanley Ramirez
OF: Nate McLouth
OF: Pat Burrell
OF: Adam Dunn

On injuries:

Pirates P Zach Duke will get an extra day before his next start to allow a blister to heal.
Carlos Guillen is battling some hemorrhoids his manager seems a little too eager to talk about.
Marlins P Scott Olsen still isn't getting velocity back after an exceptionally long outing against the Brewers weeks ago.
Troy Percival collapsed falling off the mound last night and has a tight hamstring. Grant Balfour may be called up in his place.
A's OF Ryan Sweeney had to be taken to the hospital for X-rays after fouling a ball off his foot.
Frank Thomas may be headed to the DL after an MRI on his strained right quad revealed major inflammation.
Blue Jays C Gregg Zaun has been placed on the DL with inflammation in his elbow.

Does the price include my computer and rent for mom's basement? The Juiced Sports Blog ranks the 100 most valuable sports blogs.

It didn't crack the top 100, but I think this post is pretty valuable: The Padres recently acquired Cha Seung Baek, and Paul DePodesta discusses the move.

Oh, and a hydrochloric acid spill is a pretty good reason to suspend a game.

Drink up.