Wednesday's Frosty Mug

Some things to read while coming through on your promises.

Kyle’s off celebrating his birthday (at least that’s what he told me -- for all we know he’s personally hunting down every Bernie Hoarder), so I’m pinch-hitting for him this morning.

We start with last night’s game, which saw the Brewers jump out to an early 2-0 lead thanks to another home run from Corey Hart. After hitting 4 home runs in 5 at-bats, ESPN’s Steve Berthiaume thinks it’s time to retire the "Sunglasses at Night" jokes. No word on "Never Surrender" jokes.

The lead wouldn’t last long, though, as the Nats came back to score 6 straight unanswered runs. After Chris Narveson was chased early, the bullpen was able to keep the Washington offense in check while Jonathan Lucroy and Rickie Weeks led the comeback. After the game, Ron Roenicke had a lot of good things to say about Lucroy. The win was the Brewers’ 8th straight at Miller Park, their longest home winning streak since 1995.

More from last night's game:

• At the Journal-Sentinel, Todd Rosiak notes that the Brewers are 3 games over .500 for the first time since July 2009.

• Adam McCalvy says the Brewers want Lucroy to focus on his defense, but he keeps producing with the bat.

• The Bucky Channel recapped the unlikely comeback, and as always, summed up the game in Haiku form.

• The Nats Enquirer wonders why Washington didn’t go with Todd Coffey or Drew Storen in the 8th instead of Henry Rodriguez.

• If you thought Brandon Boggs running over Wilson Ramos for the go-ahead run in the 8th inning was reminiscent of Nyjer Morgan, it looks like Plush approves.

• Who doesn't love weird trivia? Adam McCalvy notes that Ryan Braun’s ejection in the third inning was just the second of his career. Coincidentally, both have come against the Nationals.

The Brewers' win last night helped distract us all from yesterday morning's big talking point -- BernieGate. Plenty of people had a lot to say about what's clearly the biggest scandal in Milwaukee history.

• MLBlog writer mccarpie hopes the Brewers consider doing the event again, only with a bit more planning.

• Wisconsin Sports Tap shares their early-morning experience, playing by the rules and coming up empty. They propose a few ideas on how to fix the event if it’s done again in the future.

• BernieGate even got some national attention on Yahoo!’s Big League Stew, who gave a shoutout to Kyle’s post on his experience, as well as Miller Park Drunk’s.

• John Axford also shared his disappointment. Are you happy now, people? You made the mustache frown.

In other Brewers news:

Nyjer Morgan played his first rehab game in Arizona yesterday, and tweeted his stats. I think all athletes should do this, especially Jose Bautista (@joeybats19). "Yeah, I hit another 3 bombs today. Meh."

If you didn’t get your fill of Danny Ray Herrera analysis the other day, Jack Moore chimes in at Disciples of Uecker, and hopes this claim works as well as the last reliever claim the Brewers made from Cincinnati (Todd Coffey). I also wrote up the move at The Brewers Bar, comparing Herrera’s potential as a LOOGY to Mitch Stetter and Zach Braddock.

Over at Pocket Doppler, A Simple Kind of Fan feels we can draw some conclusions about the 2011 Brewers now that we’re nearly through ⅓ of the season.

The big news for stat geeks like me yesterday was FanGraphs adding Ultimate Base Running (UBR) to their WAR calculations. For an explanation of the stat, you can read David Appelman’s announcement at FanGraphs.

Toby Harrmann of Brewerfan.net has a new blog called "You Know, And That" (awesome name for a blog) and goes over the Brewers’ "UBR-bad" numbers.

Rob Neyer points out the 5 best and worst baserunners according to UBR since 2008, and I’m sure you’re all shocked to find out that Prince Fielder rates as the worst.

Bernie Miklasz of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch wonders if the Brewers are a bigger threat to the Cardinals than the Reds, considering Milwaukee and Cincinnati have been going in opposite directions lately.

Jim Bowden has a list of five teams that could be sellers this July, and his list includes two NL Central teams. One is probably obvious, the other not so much.

In minor league injury news, D’Vontrey Richardson is back on the DL after starting the season there, and in a move that probably surprises no one, Mark Rogers was also put on Brevard County’s DL with an unkown injury. Rough year.

Doug Melvin remembers Macho Man Randy Savage as a minor league baseball player. In fact, Melvin thinks he remembers giving up a home run to Randy Poffo before he was a Mega Power.

A quick look around the league:

• Former Brewer Jorge de la Rosa suffered a complete tear of his ulnar collateral ligament yesterday, and will need Tommy John surgery. JDLR was in the first year of a two-year deal worth $21.5 million guaranteed, with a player option for a third year that pushed the value of the deal to $32.5 million.

• Another member of last winter’s free agent class is having elbow troubles -- Rafael Soriano is headed to see Dr. James Andrews, and already has an extensive list of elbow injuries in the past. He’s on year one of a three-year, $35 million contract.

• Say what you want about Barry Bonds, but it seems like he’s always had a good relationship with Giants fans (probably the only people in the world still in his corner). Bonds is now donating money to a college fund for Bryan Stow’s two young children. Stow is the Giants fan who was beaten into a coma outside Dodger Stadium earlier this year.

• Remember when Ken Macha was fired by Oakland for being a poor communicator (before he was fired by the Brewers for being a poor communicator)? It looks like his replacement in Oakland, Bob Geren, is hearing the same complaints. Brian Fuentes is apparently upset with the A’s manager for putting him in the closer’s role without telling him.

• If you’re wondering where Adam LaRoche has been in this series against Washington, it looks like he won’t be playing for a very long time -- he has a "large" tear in his labrum, and some tearing in his rotator cuff.

That's all I've got for you today -- feel free to add more links in the comments if I left anything out. If you haven't already, feel free to check out my stuff at The Brewers Bar. I'm also on Twitter and Facebook.

Drink up.