Manny Being Manny, Again

I'm getting quite tired of "Manny being Manny". Parra of course, not Ramirez. Today Parra was typical Parra. He was fantastic for 5 innings and ended the game with 8 K's. Pounding the zone throwing strikes and looking like the pitcher we all know he could be. But then as per usual, the 6th inning rolls around and Parra loses it. And as usual, he was THIS close. Had a couple of hitters down 0-2 and was unable to put them away, and since he seems to do this on a very regular basis it still has me wondering if he knows what he is doing on that mound at all times. I truly believe he mentally falls apart when the going gets tough. When it was all said and done Parra did not make it out of the 6th and was tagged for 6 earned runs. With today's loss he is now 3-9 on the year with a 5.67 ERA and a 1.67 WHIP.

I'm really not sure how much more Parra I can take. At some point when does "potential" become "failure" when a player never reaches that "potential"? How much longer can the Brewers give Parra a legit chance to be part of this teams present and future? I don't know the answers but I hope we find them soon. It's only this frustrating because we can all see how good Manny could be. But will he ever let himself be that good? That is the question. During the post game show today Jerry Augustine said something that made sense to me. There really is nothing more Peterson or Macha can say to Manny, he has to do it himself reach down and just get it done. Augie is right.

VFBC Podcast: Starting Rotation Battle

Keith Law Chat ESPN.com 12/3/09

After the Thanksgiving break Keith Law was back with another chat on ESPN.com today. Here are the Brewers related questions/answers. Only two today, Manny Parra possible out of the bullpen? And Keith is not sure if McGehee or Gamel are the answer at 3B in Milwaukee. Ouch.

Dan (Milwaukee)

Do you think Manny Parra would benefit from starting the season in the minors or do you think he will finally put it all together out of Spring Training?

Klaw

(1:03 PM)

I think it's time to think about putting him in the pen.

Dan (Milwaukee)

What do you think of Casey Mcghee? Do you really think he is the Brewers future at third? Is it wise for the Brewers to shop Gamel? What kind of return could he get?

Klaw

(1:09 PM)

I don't think either guy is the future at 3rd. McGehee isn't going to hit enough, and Gamel can't play it.

I could see Parra being a good lefty out of the bullpen, but with his stuff I wouldn't give up on him as a starter and if I did I would trade him before I stuck him in the pen. As for the question on McGehee and Gamel, I like them both. I like Gamel more long term because of his potential with the bat but he has to improve his defense which he has shown signs of, but the jury is still out. It would be interesting to see what McGehee could do starting a full season with a healthy knee, see if 2009 was a fluke or if he is for real. His minor league numbers say it was a fluke. That doesn't mean it was. The Brewers have an interesting situation with those two players.

As I Sit Here Watching Tonight's Game.....

Manny Parra really has not pitched that bad. Sure he walked two run in, but all night he has seemingly got ahead of hitters and is not really having much of a problem getting the first 2 outs. But he is having trouble putting hitters away and closing out innings getting that 3rd out. His fastball has looked very crisp tonight consistently between 93-96 MPH. If he can really find a what his strike out or "put away" pitch is he could really have turned his young career around. I'm just not sure yet what that pitch is? His curve or his split? He really needs to work on making one of those real good to go with his good fastball and change. Sure the 5 runs Parra has given up don't look very good, but he has gone 6 innings with 7 K's and has worked ahead most of the night. All encouraging signs for Manny. As hard as I have been on him at times here, I'm not gonna give up on. In this his fourth start since his Nashville stint you can see improvement and a guy with more confidence. Still just has to refine and work on a few things. And as they say, you can't teach being a lefty who throws in the mid 90's.

Big Homestand Coming Up

Today was as about as heartbreaking a loss as the Brewers have had all season. I couldn't even bare to listen to Lowe's Extra Innings on ESPN 540 or any other sports talk the rest of the day. Being down 5-2, then coming back to take a 7-5 lead, only to have McClung let Pittsburgh tie it 7-7 and then Stetter giving up a walk-off homerun in the 9th. Brewers lose 2 of 3 to the Pirates and end the 7 game road trip 3-4. Had they held that 7-5 lead and taken 2 of 3 from the Pirates a 4-3 road trip would have looked a whole lot healthier for this club. Now the Brewers stand at only one game over .500 at 48-47.

That brings us to this very important seven game homestand starting Friday night. Three against the Braves and four against the worst team in MLB the Nationals. I'm not gonna say that a bad homestand here at the end of July could make or break the season, but it almost could. If they lose four or more of these seven games they could find themselves in some trouble. The key is to start it off right, the new and improved Manny Parra goes Friday against Javier Vazquez and our ace Yovani Gallardo goes Saturday against Braves young stud Tommy Hanson. It is still up in the air as to who will start Sunday, it is Mike Burns spot but thankfully Melvin and Macha will meet before then to figure out what to do with that spot since Burns has not been very good, actually he pretty much sucks and has shown me why he has been a life AAAA player.

If Parra and Gallardo can go out and have stellar starts to kick off the homestand and the Brewers provide them with some runs I think this could be a special homestand that could propel a hot streak, I just have a hunch. At the beginning of the season Gallardo and Parra were going to be counted on as key pieces to the Brewers success or lack of in 2009, it's only fitting then that they make the first two starts of this big homestand that could swing 2009 in either direction.

Been To Long

Been almost a month and a half since I posted here in VFBC. Things have gotten busy with house hunting with the wife and just the general busyness of summer and 4th of July weekend. Also I got really enamored in Twitter and just posting 140 character blogs. But the shine of Twitter has kind of worn off and I would much rather revive VFBC and be able to share longer thoughts. Anyway.....

All-Star break is just about over and the Brewers begin the second half tomorrow in Cincinnati for a four game series. As it stands the Brewers are 2.5 games back of the Cardinals for the NL Central and 4 games back of the Giants in the Wild Card. June was a pretty awful month and so far July has not been much better. But, the Brewers are still in it and have a chance. And really they have not showed a consistent offense all season, Hardy nor Hart has gone on any kind of hot streak yet, Parra came back pitched great in his one start before the All-Star break and Dave Bush is coming off the DL on the 20th. I picked the Brewers in my preseason predictions to win the Wild Card, and I still believe they can or maybe more likely win the division. But I don't think they should make a trade to do this.

Last year we gave up a bunch of good prospects most notable Matt LaPorta and Michael Brantley, but we did it for a true difference maker in CC Sabathia who helped us break a 26 year long playoff drought. There is really no Sabathia out there to trade for this season (maybe Halladay, but no way he could live up to or do what CC did. No one will ever do that again). There are guys like Doug Davis and Jarrod Washburn, who are nice pitchers but really no better then what we have. And since it is a sellers market you would have to overpay in trade to get a guy like that. And I personally don't want to see a Gamel, Escobar, Lawrie, Cain or Salome traded for a pitcher of that caliber.

I think the Brewers go with what they got and see what happens. Getting Parra and Bush back could be like making a deal. If Parra can pitch anywhere close to the way he did against St. Louis in his comeback start he would be huge. Now I'm not saying Parra can go out and pitch 7 scoreless every start with 7 K's and 1 BB, but I think he figured something out and should be more consistent. As for Bush, you just hope you get the Dave Bush of April/May pre getting hit on a line drive off the bat of Hanley Ramirez. Bush looked very solid and was consistent the first two months of the season and was a big part of the Brewers early success. If these two can bring it, get what you expect from Looper and Suppan and if Gallardo continues to look like an ace this team can get back to October without over trading for a middle of the road pitcher.

Second half of 2009 here we come, hopefully it is a fun and joyful ride like the second half of 2008. If we don't make it, I just want to see them in contention the whole way.

Parra Not Going To Nashville, Insanity

Even though Manny Parra has pretty much sucked all of this 2009 season, and is making Jeff Suppan look like Cy Young, the Brewers have no plans to demote him to Nashville for even a little bit. I have to say I STRONGLY disagree with GM Doug Melvin on this. I don't disagree with Doug to often, I trust in him and feels he almost always does what is right for the club. But this has be scratching my head. Parra is now 3-7 on the season after last nights massacre in which Parra surrendered 11 hits and 10 earned runs in just 4 innings of work. His ERA is 6.75 and he has an astronomical WHIP of 1.83, that is just not acceptable for a starter on a team with a chance to win their division.

I'm not saying demote him for the season and I'm not even saying I have totally lost confidence in Parra someday being a good starting pitcher. (although, I could easily see him as the next Ben Hendrickson. A guy who is a stud in AAA and shows a ton of promise but can't get it done in the bigs) What I am saying is Parra should go down to AAA Nashville for at least a few starts, maybe even a month to work on whatever it is physically and mentally that is not allowing him to get it done, we all know he has the "stuff" but the results are just not there, at all. It worked for Dave Bush last season, he went down for just one start because of Gallardo's injury was right back up and was money the rest of the season and has been great so far this season. Besides Parra going down to work on his game, perhaps it would be a humbling experience for a young pitcher that nothing in this game is guaranteed and you have to produce.

It Might Be Time For Manny Parra To Take A Trip To Nashville

Lets face it, Manny Parra's first three starts have been pretty awful. His second he only gave up 3 runs in 6 innings, but his first and third starts just plain terrible, going 4.1 and 4 respectively. I really thought this would be Manny's break out season, that he would really show everyone that he can be the strong #2 we need behind ace Yovani Gallardo. Well so far Parra has been not even close. In is three starts he has 9 walks and he seems to have pretty much no control whatsoever of his fastball. He seems to be able to throw his off speed stuff for strikes but just struggles to no end to get his fastball over to get ahead in the count. Is it physical? Or mental? I'm not really sure.

What I'm getting at is if Manny has another bad starts or two, it may be time to send him down to AAA Nashville to get himself right. It worked last season for Dave Bush, maybe it would work for Manny as well. The questions is who takes his spot in the rotation for a turn or two? Conventional wisdom says Seth McClung, but if Macha wants a lefty to replace him how about calling up Chase Wright from Nashville for a shot? He can't be any worse then Manny has been, can he?

News And Notes 3/13/09 Edition

Nice to see Yovani get back on track today vs the Royals. After getting rocked last week Sunday against them today we saw the Yo we are all expecting and in short time have gotten accustom to. 4 innings, 2 hits, 0 runs, 5 K's and 0 BB's. I still believe his shelling last week was mostly due to some "squeezing" if you will by that days home plate ump and it was all kind of set off my that miss play by Weeks at 2B screwing up the DP ball.

In my 25 man roster projection a did a few days ago I was under the impression Looper would open the season on the DL. That is not the case anymore as they now think he will be fine and will actually make his first Brewers start at the Home Opener vs the hated rivals from the south on April 10th, great news. And with that I have a change to my projected roster. Move Looper to the starting rotation McClung to the pen and Julio off the club. DiFelice has looked too good this spring and in the WBC for Italy to not make the team, he needs to stay. And I still would stick with Coffey over Morlan.

Duffy, Nelson and McGehee continue to play well and it seems more likely everyday that they will all make the club and join Counsell and Rivera on the Crew's bench in 2009. If Nixon and Lamb can't find other gigs I would love to have them in AAA for insurance, but right now I can't take either over any of the previous three I mentioned.

A couple days ago Manny Parra threw another 4 scoreless innings. Call me crazy and maybe having wishful thinking but maybe "it" finally clicked for Parra. We have all been told and have seen at times last year the great "stuff" he possesses. And I know it's just spring training games but dude has been dealing. With having four pitches to be able to throw if he continues to pound the zone and not walk guys he could be very special just like Gallardo. I heard someone the other day refer to Gallardo as a "bulldog" and Parra as a "poodle" but maybe Manny is getting that "bulldog" in him.

Jeff Suppan, well he still sucks. And that is all I'm gonna say. Actually I'm gonna say right now that I'm probably going to dread watching every single game he starts this season. He if officially the $42 mill mistake. My luck is every game I attend at Miller Park this season he will happen to be the starting pitcher. And then I will puke each time I see his +5 ERA on the scoreboard and awful WHIP.

Sunday night is my fantasy league's draft. I'm picking 11th out of 12. Kind of sucks, but then I also have the second pick in round two. I have my eye on a few guys that might be available at 11. Let me know your thoughts if you have any, also who I might want to take in round 2. I'm thinking one of the top pitchers, Santana or Lincecum.