I Hope She's Warming Up the Grill Tonight

[RyDogg66]

I hope you are kidding about the steroids and HGH since they have been testing for a few years now.

[jazzytrav]

You should not be "sure", as they say they do not have a dietician on staff:

 

"Some teams have a full-on dietitian on staff, but we just don't," said Tyler Barnes, vice president of communications for the Brewers.

But please tell me that Prince has some sort of personal nutritionist or something...

[jwill535]

I am fully on the mechanics due to weight gain. He is bigger in the rump and legs and possibly in the stomach. When I was 220 I was popping HRs left and right in softball but not at 245 I dont have the same power and my swing feels off, same thing goes with golf.(I know the difference between a Pro and me, just making the comparison.) The inverse is true though too, David Duval lost a ton of weight and it totally threw off his mechanics.

[JJHardy7]

But if in July he is still having a down year power-wise, what is his trade value going to be?

 

It may be more than a "down year" though if it is an issue with his weight and/or conditioning. It's June and Prince is still struggling and there comes a point and time where I don't think "it's early" or those statements apply. Prince simply is a different player up to this point. Part of me thinks Prince may regret accepting (if it was offered) a similar deal that Braun got.

 

Some team may look at least year and give up talent more so related to 2007 Prince more so than what we've seen out of 2008 Prince. If Prince completes a much less powerful year (say 20 - 25 home runs), that essentially kills his value in the off-season. Has his value already been hurt?

[Raw Biz]

I'll agree with the fact that it's a combo of his diet and mechanics. His diet has caused his body to become bigger/flabbier which has affected his mechanics. He may still have power but he isn't making the same solid contact as last year. Regardless of the reason, I think we can all agree that Prince is nowhere near the player we saw last year. Now I didn't expect another 50 home run season but I would say that Prince should have at least double the home runs he has so far and a lot more RBI. Hopefully he can figure whatever is causing this dropoff and fix it.

[ozzybourne]

the brewers will not trade the prince this year--especially with him having an off year and laporte/gamel a year away. they just wont get as much for him.

 

i believe they will trade him after the '09 or '10 season, trying to break the bank for him to an A.L. team where he can play 1b/dh. but for prince's sake, and the brewers, i hope he gets this weight thing under control. then he could make a lot of $$$ doing one of those mike golic/dan marino weight watchers commercials.

[sgtcluels]

If I'm Mark A and DM, I have a potential elite player again who has announced in February that he's become a vegetarian. I don't have a Nutritionist on staff. A little time goes by and your elite player is struggling and the easiest thing to point out as a change is he stopped eating meat. Do you go out and hire a nutritionist for the staff, or consult with one? Damn right I bring someone in. Nutritionist aren't all that expensive, about 40 - 50k a year, that's peanuts. If they didn't hire a nutritionist on their own, then management needs a talking too.

 

We are once again having the tired argument. It's like he killed all your dogs because he decided to stop eating meat.

[logan82]

Holy crap, Prince is way bigger in the 2nd picture. Oh wait, it is a bigger picture.

I bet his wife fired up the grill last night and put on some portabello mushrooms along with some corn and asparagus.

[RU Rah Rah]

Baseball Almanac came up with a graph with all MLB player weights from 1876 to 2007. Most players (about 9,000) were in the 170-200 lb. range. I was especially interested to see the heavy end of the spectrum. There were:

 

-- sixty-three 240-249 pound players

-- twenty-six 250-259 pound players

-- seven 260-269 pound players

-- five 270-279 pound players

-- one 295 pound player

-- one 315 pound player

 

I wouldn't take these numbers as Gospel truth, but they suggest that Prince ranks among the heaviest MLB players ever. That can't be good.

[bcf5575]

one thing that I have noticed is that Prince seems to be swinging REALLY hard lately. Like Jeromy Burntiz hard. almost like he is trying to silence all the the "lack of power" critics by hitting every ball 600 feet.

 

that and I think his head is a mess with this contract stuff.

[Invader3K]

chuckcrim, I'm sorry, but your pics prove absolutely nothing. They are at different angles, and the one is huge compared to the other one.

 

Personally, I am not seeing the huge difference in Prince's phsyique from this year compared to last year. He looks like the same stout barrel of a man he did last year, he's just not hitting as many home runs, so we're all trying to figure out what happened.

 

Oh yeah, he will regret not signing a Braun-esque contract if he doesn't pick things up. His season last year will be viewed as a fluke when he reaches arbitration.

[mothershipconnection]

The issue isn't about him losing muscle, it's about him displaying less power. Let's say that he has the same muscle, but he has added fat on top of it, which could numerous effects. It could slow down his swing, it could lead to quicker fatigue and less stamina, it could slow his speed so that he isn't going to leg out as many doubles, or he sometimes isn't going to score from 1st on a double with two outs in the inning.

 

Agreed, but the common complaint is that he's becoming a wuss because he's not eating meat (protein). I'm totally on board with the argument that he needs to cut calories and trim down the fat, but not the argument that it's because he dropped meat from his diet.

[Raw Biz]

I'm totally on board with the argument that he needs to cut calories and trim down the fat, but not the argument that it's because he dropped meat from his diet.

 

I definitely agree here. Prince can eat whatever he wants, so long as he maintains the right balance in his diet and stays healthy and keeps the same figure/composition that he was at last year. I think the problem is that he hasn't been able to do this. He might not be eating meat but that doesn't necessarily mean he's eating healthy. I've mentioned it before and I know I'll take a lot of crap for saying it again but I've heard a guy who works in the clubhouse say Prince doesn't eat very healthy (lots of doritos, cheese, Ranch dressing etc.). If he doesn't want to eat meat, fine, but he needs to start eating healthier one way or another.

[jeffy]

Part of me thinks Prince may regret not accepting (if it was offered) a similar deal that Braun got.

 

 

Yes, I think Braun made a good decision for himself in realizing that projected future mega-contracts are not a sure thing for anyone. Not sure why more of these guys are not smart enough to realize that. Also not sure why they can not understand that, as Braun said, "there is not a lot I can not buy with $45 million". I thought the same thing when Ben Sheets signed several years ago, even before his subsequent injury. He (Sheets) was set for life (barring being a complete financial idiot) as of his signing in 2005, yet he now can still go out and get even bigger bucks this time around.

 

(I modified your quote by adding the "not" that you obviously intended)

[Gopher74]

Holy crap, Prince is way bigger in the 2nd picture. Oh wait, it is a bigger picture.

Yea, I'd like to see two pictures in which he's got the same basic pose so that they're not mis-leading.

 

I thought when I said same pose that it was just taken for granted that it's going to be misleading if you not only have a different pose, but you have one picture about 4 times bigger than the other.

 

I don't think Prince is any bigger than last year. He looks almost identical. But people are going to look for the reason and because Prince is a big guy to begin with, it's automatically going to be his size.

[MillerParkSouth]

I haven't read this thread, but I just took a look at some stats and saw that Prince only has 5 RBI in the month of May! There are players that get that in 1 game! David Wright had 4 last night alone. I realized he's been pretty bad this year, but that is alarming!

[jwill535]

I haven't read this thread, but I just took a look at some stats and saw that Prince only has 5 RBI in the month of May! There are players that get that in 1 game! David Wright had 4 last night alone. I realized he's been pretty bad this year, but that is alarming!

RBI are contingent on people getting on base ahead of you. If you have Weeks and Cameron in front of you, there aren't alot of chances for RBI.

 

[fondybrewfan]

I haven't read this thread, but I just took a look at some stats and saw that Prince only has 5 RBI in the month of May! There are players that get that in 1 game! David Wright had 4 last night alone. I realized he's been pretty bad this year, but that is alarming!

RBI are contingent on people getting on base ahead of you. If you have Weeks and Cameron in front of you, there aren't alot of chances for RBI.

 

 

Even despite that, he should have more than 5 RBI's this month. Rickie has 11 RBI's and has the pitchers spot and Jason Kendall batting in front of him. Kendall has a whopping .315 OBP in May, which is pretty comparable to what Rickie has had for the month. I can remember Price failing in a lot of RBI opportunities thus far this month. He is only batting .250 with RISP and only .167 with RISP/2 Outs, that just isn't very good at all. Hart and Braun are way above those averages.

[MillerParkSouth]

well if he'd be hitting home runs at his normal clip, he'd probably have more than 5 rbi this month simply by driving himself in.

[Invader3K]

I agree with Gopher. All the statements about "Prince is clearly bigger than last year", seem to be based on personal opinion. I think he looks about the same, personally. No one has offered any serious concrete evidence that he is significantly bigger, or has lost muscle mass, put on fat, etc. No one really knows how he's eating, either. I know someone posted that they "know someone in the locker room" who said Prince eats salads with lots of cheese and Doritos and junk, but that's about it. Not exactly concrete evidence, IMHO.

[bklynbrewcrew]

Like I said in an earlier post the differences were startling when I was watching the Brewers play the pirates on fsn pittsburgh. They were showing several Fielder HRs from last year at PNC park and after seeing those clips followed by seeing Prince this year the differences are very extreme. I wish I could post those images but trust me my eyes are not deceiving me. Prince looked big and muscular last year but not obese by any stretch. This year he looks much much larger and I really believe that his lack of conditioning is the reason why he is struggling so much.

[JJHardy7]

(I modified your quote by adding the "not" that you obviously intended)

 

Thanks...using the word "not" is how I intended to do it. Part of me just wonders why Prince would not sign a similar extension (again assuming it was offered) given his father's history (got bigger and bigger) and now possibly what appears to possibly be his conditioning. If anything, you think he'd jump at the money should his body get to big to be a major league 1B.

[Gopher74]

I wish I could post those images but trust me my eyes are not deceiving me.

How do you know? If they were deceiving you...you'd be deceived. Nobody who's deceived knows they're deceived otherwise they wouldn't be deceived, right? But basically you're saying that my eyes are deceiving me. Are you that confident you have better eyesight? I'm just saying that I need to see definitive proof. And even that will leave a lot of room for interpretation.

 

[LetsGoBrewCrew]

Was it just me or did the HR he just hit seem like it was gonna go 15 miles.... but didn't get far up the bleachers at all? I think a lot of his power is gone, but his muscle isn't. I don't know if I'm drawing too fine of a line here, but there is no doubt he can 'muscle' a ball out of a ballpark, but his natural power is gone. Mechanics, diet, whatever, something is gone. I wonder if even just a little meat would help get that something back. Even if its not a lot, enough to get some extra power back in the big bat.

[TooLiveBrew]

I thought he absolutely mashed that ball to get it to go out to RF. Wasn't the pitch an outer-half breaking ball?