by Darren Hauck - AP

Jason Kendall's ability to get hit by pitches isn't a good enough reason to bring him back for 2010, at any price.

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All of a sudden, after two years of sticking with Jason Kendall, the Brewers look like they're ready to make a move behind the plate. Frankly, it's about time. Earlier this week, Doug Melvin told Arn Tellem (who represents Jason Kendall) not to expect a $5 million offer to return to the Brewers next season. That's a lot nicer than what I would have said, but I'm ok with any steps taken to imply Kendall won't be starting 130+ games for the Brewers again next season.

At the same time, Jonathan Lucroy is having a very nice run in the AFL after an impressive season in Huntsville (where he hit .267/.380/.417), and Doug Melvin is starting to speak publicly about the possibility that Lucroy could make the jump directly to the big leagues next season. Melvin has compared Lucroy to Russell Martin, Chris Snyder and Kurt Suzuki, who all made the jump directly from AA to the majors at catcher, and did so with some level of success.

Now, it's possible Melvin is just posturing, as he's been known to do in the past: In January, for example, Melvin said the Brewers were out of money, then signed Braden Looper less than two weeks later. It's entirely possible that Melvin is raising the possibility that he'll go forward with the assets he has in an effort to get Kendall to lower his asking price, at which point the two sides will agree to a deal and I will probably vomit. Any to-do list for this offseason should include the following line: "Do not re-sign Jason Kendall, at any price, for any role."

With that said, I'm not sure Jonathan Lucroy is the answer either, at least not yet: He's 23 years old, but he's had just two full seasons as a professional. Yes, he's posted a .380 career minor league OBP, but he's also never played above AA. And while he is hitting pretty well against elite competition in the Arizona Fall League, we have to be careful not to put too much weight into what happens down there: Lucroy is hitting .366/.364/.585, but the AFL is one of the most hitter friendly places on Earth, with a .281/.357/.441 league average. Also, Lucroy's AFL numbers cover all of 42 plate appearances, so there's a sample size issue.

Whether it's just a fad or a new mainstay in social media, Twitter is probably one of the more polarizing services on the Internet. For some, it's an everyday must-check. For others, it's a joke, and its consistent users something to ridicule.

For the uninitiated, Twitter is a social networking service that allows you to send 140 character-or-less "tweets," and subscribe to and follow the tweets of others. At its basic level, it's a tool for feeding people a lot of information they didn't need to know or don't care about (like the results of one's recent trip to the bathroom), but some people use it for more than that, thankfully.

For Brew Crew Ball (@BrewCrewBall), Twitter is a great way to spread the word about new content, interact with Brewer fans and occasionally make fun of the Bucks. I use the BCB Twitter to follow several official Brewer sources, journalists following the team and other Brewer bloggers and fans. It's frequently entertaining, and occasionally a source of breaking news I would not have immediately found elsewhere.

So, if you're thinking of starting a Twitter account, follow the jump for 46 Twitterers (and my recipe blog) to follow to get yourself started. And if you already use Twitter, here's a list of people to be sure you're following:

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More photos » by Kathy Willens - AP

Is CC Sabathia enough to shift the tale of the tape toward the Yankees?

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You're a discerning baseball fan.  You're an intelligent baseball fan. You can seamlessly work 'WAR' and 'wOBA' and 'FIP' into a barroom/restroom debate and impress the pants off of whomever you're talking to.  You're ready to get your last fix of baseball before the long, cold winter of rampant speculation -- followed, of course, by the spring of irrational exuberance -- but, you're wondering: How do the Yankees and Phillies stack up against each other ... in matters beyond the box score?

You're in the right place, friend.  After the jump: Yanks vs. Phils: The Tale of the Tape.  (Note: we're required by federal law to note that this breakdown is for entertainment purposes only.  However, should you choose to use this information in a friendly, handshake wager with an acquaintance: God help you.)

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The standard TV introduction of a player at bat.

I was watching a playoff game the other day and the introduction of a Dodgers hitter caught my eye. The standard AVG/HR/RBI numbers were displayed, but only for the series. I believe it said .222 (2 for 9), 0 HR, 1 RBI. The particulars aren't all that important.

I wondered how many people found that graphic useful. It does give a quick snapshot of that player's performance in the postseason so far, so that's a point in its favor. In fact, that's the probably the point of postseason player graphics. During the season, however, the same AVG/HR/RBI graphic is ubiquitous. Some broadcasts throw a curve and include such new-age stats as OBP, but chances are you're stuck with the good old Triple Crown components.

I'm going to go out on a limb and assume we can agree there are better ways to describe a player's offense than using batting average, home runs, and runs batted in. This is hardly a new exercise, but my challenge to you is to create a new player graphic that includes the information you think the average fan watching should have. Your graphic will debut on Opening Day next year, so there isn't time for fans to hit the books over the winter like Ned Yost. As you might expect, there are some ground rules:

1. You must have at least three and at most four statistics. After all, even big HDTV screens can only fit so much.
2. The statistics have to be easily explained and understood just through relatively brief spoken explanation. There isn't time to explain in depth or show formulas. Assume it's a perfect world and all broadcasters are competent enough to explain statistical things.
3. The same categories have to be shown for all players. It would be nice to show speed-oriented stats for fast guys and power-oriented stats for sluggers, but it's not allowed. Life isn't fair and your bosses want you to keep it simple for the production truck.

Will you stick with AVG/HR/RBI because they're widely understood and easy to grasp? Will you shake things up and add a relatively simple stat like OPS even though it has flaws? Will you add something less well known that you really like? Make your case...

More photos » by Jeff Curry - AP

Trevor Hoffman was one of the few Brewers to significantly exceed expectations this season.

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Back in March, I asked you a series of questions related to your expectations for the 2009 Brewers, and collected the results. Today, after spending a few hours gathering, sorting and re-sorting the spreadsheet, I'm prepared to announce the winner. Bear in mind, all scores are out of 30:

And, embarassed as I am to post them, here's the bottom of the standings:

I'm actually pretty impressed that I managed to do this poorly. In a contest where a flipped coin would have (on average) scored about 15, I only managed to get slightly more than half of that, and at least 4 questions less than 50 of the 52 other entries.

The consensus pick was the correct pick in 15 of the 30 questions, but the average score was slightly better than 50%, at 15.98.

So, congratulations to our winner, and to literally everyone else who played for beating me. Follow the jump for a question by question look at the results. Some of the races turned out much closer than any of us likely expected.

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Young Brewers fan in search of reasons to be excited for that elusive "next year."

The first few weeks of the off-season are meant to be a time of eternal Cubs-like optimism that your team will get it together. You’re supposed to be able to dream of the post-season and think of dream trade scenario.

Instead, before the season had even ended, Brewer fans became a pretty dismal, negative, downtrodden mess. Laments about the lack of pitching, how the team wouldn’t be getting any help and how bad 2010 will be are everywhere a Brewer fan looks and it’s starting to get a little disheartening.

Maybe it’s because the season was over long before the final game and fans started looking ahead weeks ago, meaning all the rehashing, contract-analyzing and trade talk came and went before October ever began, but whatever the reason, the post-season’s barely begun and I’m already dreading 2010.

If we can’t even get excited for this team in these first bucolic, starry-eyed, optimistic days of the off-season, what’s the point of even keeping up the fandom? 

Have we become jaded in such a short time?

I’m not trying to be unrealistic – it’s clear the Brewers have a lot of question marks to answer before next season. The FA market looks sparse and with The Mustache saying Prince will more than likely be on next year’s roster, our biggest trade bait is no longer dangling. I get that. I know it appears bleak, but can we maybe wait for a date to be set for pitchers and catchers to report before we resign 2010 to the trash heap?

I need hope, BCB. I need to anticipate next season with something more than apathy and the apparent anger simmering beneath so many fans’ surfaces. 

There have to be positives about 2010, right? Give me something to look forward to!

Here are the best starting pitching performances of 2009 (pending tomorrow's game, of course), sorted by Game Score:

And the ten worst:

Later this week, Manny Parra will make his last start of the 2009 season, giving him one last chance to maintain some momentum heading into the offseason and spring training of 2010. I don't think anyone got the season they were hoping for from Parra, who's spent part of 2009 in AAA due to ineffectiveness, part of it on the shelf with a stiff neck, and the remainder being either infuriatingly inconsistent or simply infuriating.

Nearly every projection for the 2010 Brewer roster includes Parra in the rotation, and certainly, if he can bounce back from a rough season, he would be one reason to predict a major improvement over 2009. The problem is, Manny Parra hasn't just had a bad season, he's had a historically bad season.. Among pitchers who have thrown at least 120 innings, Parra's 6.16 ERA is the third worst in franchise history:

He also has the worst WHIP:

And the third most hits per nine innings:

There are a lot of names on those lists that no one should be proud to be listed next to. Even while playing for a franchise that's had more than it's share of terrible pitching in the past, Parra's 2009 season is arguably one of the worst in franchise history.

Obviously, Parra is still young, left handed, and has tremendous stuff when he's on. But it might be time to stop making excuses for him: He'll be 27 years old in October (he's only ten months younger than Chris Narveson), and if the Brewers are serious about contending in 2010, then they could be seriously hindered by a decision to keep trotting him out there and seeing if he can work through his troubles.

If I ran the Brewer front office, there are several courses of action I'd have to seriously consider taking with him. Follow the jump to read about them.

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