2011 September callups -- Latest: Mike Fiers' contract purchased

[Raw Biz]

It's got to be about chemistry. The chemistry seems to be at an all-time high now. If you have too many guys sitting on the bench not playing (and murmuring that they should be playing), it can be a negative.

I'm sure that's what Roenicke (and maybe Melvin) are thinking. But I don't think it really matters. I highly doubt Gamel would come up and start complaining and become a cancer. He would probably love the chance to just be part of this playoff clinching stretch. And it's not like he's some kid or something. He's only a year younger than Fielder and older than Lucroy/Yo.

[packfan79]

The guy is almost certainly the everyday first baseman next year all he did was hit .300 in AAA with 28 bombs and he can't get called up to be a left handed bat off the bench. I understand Kotsay is a veteran and all but what more does that guy have to do to get a shot?

[pogokat]

My guess is that they hate Mat Gamel...seriously...they want nothing to do with him in the majors...

 

I think it's pretty clear he isn't replacing Prince next year

[SoCal Brew Crew Fan]

They really don't need Gamel right now. He won't be on the playoff roster anyway. I think it's also safe to say many of the coaches just don't like the guy...right or wrong, it just is. Why mess with the chemistry.

 

What they need might be another arm or two as LouisEly mentioned to help line up the starters for the playoffs and in case they get a deep extra inning game. I would have like to have seen something beyond Dillard. Struggling to even get guys time to pitch may change the final week of the season if the pitchers are limited.

[TooLiveBrew]

My guess is that they hate Mat Gamel...seriously...they want nothing to do with him in the majors...

 

I think it's pretty clear he isn't replacing Prince next year

I think this is becoming more & more obvious. Maybe "hate" is too strong, but I don't think Gamel's going to be manning 1B next season anymore.

 

You're playing to win, Ron? And you leave the best LH bat in the minors... IN the minors? Idiotic.

[jjfanec]

Really? Yuni can't play SS but he's been in the bigs for years. Gamel got hurt (you might argue it was his fault for not staying in shape) in spring training and when he came back, Macha never played him. Maybe screwed is a little harsh but he really could've been on the team for the last 3 years, in at least some capacity. But the organization chose to give him consistent playing time since he was blocked.

If anything, it's really nobody's fault since guys were blocking him wherever he could conceivably play. But for you to act like it's his own fault (even partly) because he couldn't stick at 3rd and was blocked at 3 other positions is just asinine. By the time Gamel got healthy in 09, McGehee had a hold of the starting job. So even if he was good enough at 3rd, Macha probably wouldn't have played him since McGehee was there.

 

I didnt mean to make it sound like he is fully to blame but I dont think

it is asinine to say he is partly to blame since he couldnt cut it at

3B and according to some came into camp out of shape and got hurt. You

can disagree with me. Thats fine.

 

All that said I have no clue why he did not get called up to be a lefty

bat off the bench. It makes me wonder what they are thinking at 1B for the future.

If not Gamel then who? They put Casey there in the 9th the other night

but I hope that is not the way we were going

[danzig6767]

It's got to be about chemistry. The chemistry seems to be at an all-time high now. If you have too many guys sitting on the bench not playing (and murmuring that they should be playing), it can be a negative.

I'm sure that's what Roenicke (and maybe Melvin) are thinking. But I don't think it really matters. I highly doubt Gamel would come up and start complaining and become a cancer. He would probably love the chance to just be part of this playoff clinching stretch. And it's not like he's some kid or something. He's only a year younger than Fielder and older than Lucroy/Yo.

Yea, i can't envision any chance that Gamel would be some unhappy grouch if he came up and rarely got in games except for some random pinch hitting opportunities. Pretty much any guy toiling around in the minors would be thrilled at the chance to travel around with the big league club, even more so with a team 10 games ahead in first place.

 

Plus, even though the division race is over, being able to stay ahead of Arizona is far from being decided. If Gamel was able to get a key pinch hit or two which helped decide a game instead of say Counsell being forced to hit and in turn it helped keep the Brewers away from opening the playoffs in Philadelphia, his being up would be well worth it.

 

I guess i can understand not wanting to call up an extremely excessive number of guys, but Gamel and one more pitcher wouldn't be that excessive. The roster would only be at 30 players. I have to assume that Gamel is very disappointed over this. He moved positions yet again for the organization and had a fine season in AAA, i'd guess he thought it was fairly certain he'd be one of those called up.

[JohnBriggs12]

Count me in as one who does not understand why Gamel is not up. This does not seem to bode well for him replacing Prince but maybe I am reading too much into this. But if not Game then who is playing 1B next year? Casey?

 

You aren't reading enough into this. Prince will be playing 1B for the Brewers next season.

[craigharmann]

Count me in as one who does not understand why Gamel is not up. This does not seem to bode well for him replacing Prince but maybe I am reading too much into this. But if not Game then who is playing 1B next year? Casey?

 

You aren't reading enough into this. Prince will be playing 1B for the Brewers next season.

 

 

It definitely has to make you wonder!!

[Invader3K]

You do have to wonder. I wonder if Gamel is being "punished" for some infraction in the minors, or if the organization doesn't see him as a long term piece at this point.

[1992casey]

Not calling up a player who's had such a good year seems really odd to me. It occurred to me that the Brewers might be considering service time, but with a full month of September 2011 playing time, Mat would still only have about 2 years and 80 days after the 2012 season. That wouldn't be enough to kick in super-two.

 

While it's certainly possible that team chemistry could be a consideration, I can't imagine a September callup complaining about a lack of playing time, especially when he has a well established starter ahead of him. Going along for the ride in a pennant race ought to be plenty.

 

While it's certainly possible that the Brewers feel that Prince will be with next year's team, let's not use this thread to debate the pluses and minuses of re-signing him. There are a couple of active topics already discussing it.

[monty57]

If it's all about chemistry, then won't team chemistry matter next year? Would the negative effect of having one additional player sitting on the bench this year outweigh the negative effect of having your potential starting 2012 1B upset with the organization? I hope he is in the Brewers' future plans, and I hope this move doesn't make him do whatever he can to "demand" a trade (since he can't actually demand a trade). We heard how much it would hurt the chemistry to have Green anywhere near Milwaukee, but that doesn't seem to be much of a problem.

 

I think a lot of this has to do with a comment I made in a different thread. Roenicke has a weird methodology of valuation, and part of it seems to be that he doesn't care about what a player does before he sees him. Roenicke didn't give a rat's behind about Taylor Green, and continually trotted McGehee out no matter how bad he was, because he was "his only option." He then didn't play Green for about a week. Then, Green got a couple of hits, and now he's getting starts and seems to be our #1 pinch hitter. Not because of his Fielder-esque AAA season, but because he went 3-for-3 in his first few MLB PAs. If he had gone 0-for-3 I have little doubt that he'd ride the pine the rest of the year. Now he could probably go 0-for-20 and he'd still get starts. Gamel also had a tremendous AAA season (and has continually proven he can hit in the minors), but he didn't hit well when Roenicke gave him a few PAs earlier this season. Therefore, he has no chance of helping this Brewers team.

 

I know calling players up, etc should be on Melvin, but I think Roenicke has a lot of say on who's on the 25-man. There have been a lot of examples which would seem to illustrate this point, and even Bill and Brian have made numerous comments to the likes of "Roenicke doesn't want him sent down," "Roenicke wants him up."

[kilgore37]

With a lead this big I kinda wish they'd move Narvason to the bullpen now so he's use to getting warmed up everyday and give Fiers and Wily a couple of starts.

[monty57]

I think we still need to maintain continuity of what got us here. Putting Narveson in the bullpen and giving a bunch of kids a bunch of starts could backfire on us, either through complacency or just simply throwing players "off." However, I don't see the harm of bringing up Gamel, maybe another bullpen arm in case of extra inning games, and maybe a starter who could get one start to line up the playoff rotation.

[JohnBriggs12]

With a lead this big I kinda wish they'd move Narvason to the bullpen now so he's use to getting warmed up everyday and give Fiers and Wily a couple of starts.

Narveson's a big reason the team is where it is. There aren't many teams out there that are 5 games over .500 in games started by their 5th starter. He's also 4-1 with a 3.05 ERA in the 2nd half. He not only deserves to continue starting and put up some numbers, he needs to stay sharp in case he's needed in the postseason, not only to relieve but to start in case of something happening to one of the other starters. Also I don't expect them to use him in a loogy role in the playoffs. They've been on this tear with no lefty in the pen. His value will be to rescue a starter struggling early, particularly against a lefty dominated team like the Phils. In fact, it will be interesting to see how he fares on Thursday against the Phillies. A solid outing and maybe you think about starting two lefties against them. His lone start against them this year wasn't bad (6 IP, 4 H, 3ER).

[CheezWizHed]

I'm a little late to the party, but the Brewers handling of Gamel does make you wonder:

1) Your planned replacement for Prince at 1B isn't put on the 25-man to make him eligible for the playoffs.

2) Now he isn't even called up when he has no where else to play and no (legit) reason to keep him away.

 

That's two big strikes and has to make you wonder about next year...

[Bernman23]

Roenicke criticized Gamel's MLB performance to the media to defend the decision of keeping Green in Nashville and in turn protecting his boy McGehee. So I can understand why they think promoting Mat now could be threatening to team chemistry. Managers just shouldn't throw players under the bus like that publicly and Mat could feel betrayed. That dynamic reduces the chances he'll be the replacement for Prince next season because in all likelihood Roenicke will still be at the helm. In fiercely protecting team chemistry and success now Roenicke sacrifices it for the future.

[bigredrobbo]

All this speculation about what, on the surface, looks like a huge snub, makes me wonder if there's been an issue at AAA that the Brewers don't want to announce. Maybe he ticked off Prince or Braun the last time he was up, maybe he laughed at DM's mustache.Either way, they had to know that by NOT bringing him up, they leave themselves open to a ton of questions. Just seems like an unwanted distraction they could have avoided. If he's not a part of the future, bring him up and show him the pine for 3 weeks. If he is, bring him up for the experience. Not bringing him up seems like option Z at this stage.

[Ennder]

This isn't some huge snub to me. Same thing as the Cardinals not bringing up Stavinoha or a bunch of other teams not bringing up guys with big years in AAA. If the guys aren't going to play there is no reason to bring them up.

[fondybrewfan]

There is a Jsonline blog posting which explains the Gamel snub. In short they don't want to bring him up just to bring him up. He won't get any starts at 1B and Green, Counsell, and Kotsay are all available for left handed pinch hitting duty now. Melvin felt that rewarding Gamel for a good season wasn't realistic because they would have had to brought up a bunch more guys who were having good seasons to sit around and do nothing. Seems like a logical reason to me. No doubt in my mind that Gamel would be up if he had better results in MLB though.

[brwrsfan]

I fail to see how having another left-handed power bat on the bench, if only to have as PH option is a bad thing. Gamel's power bat would be the best on the bench by far...that's useful.

[kramnoj]

One of the things that Roenicke talked about in the post game conference last night was that extra players disrupts the routine of things like batting practice. Now, I've never been involved in a big league club. It seems easy to me to say just start BP earlier to let the extra guys get their cuts in and then the rest of the team can do BP like they normally do. But since I've never been involved in a big league club, I don't know what is preventing the team from doing that. Maybe there's a whole routine to gameday, and things like starting BP 15-30 minutes disrupts that, and the value of bringing up extra guys that aren't going to see much time isn't worth the disruption to the norm.

[Raw Biz]

This isn't some huge snub to me. Same thing as the Cardinals not bringing up Stavinoha or a bunch of other teams not bringing up guys with big years in AAA. If the guys aren't going to play there is no reason to bring them up.

Except Gamel is (or should be) considered a big piece of the future. I think not bringing him up will do more harm than good. Like someone said, the guy's switched positions and spent years at AAA when he probably would've already been in the bigs with just about any other team. Even if you don't want to reward all the players with good years, I think Gamel is the most important, especially if you're planning on him being a part of the future. My take on it is he is no longer considered part of the future, at least not as a member of the team.

If I were Gamel, I would request a trade. And then I would do everything I could to stick it to Melvin & Co. As much credit as I give Melvin for getting us where we are now, I really think he's dropped the ball on Gamel. After they handed McGehee the starting 3B job in 09, they should've had Gamel split time between 1B, 3B, and the OF. Then he would've been more valuable to this team and could've got at least a couple of starts a week, as well as being the #1 PH. And if they knew he was never in their future plans, he should've been traded for someone who would be. At 26 with no long-term major league experience, his trade value is a lot lower than it would've been at 24/25.

[monty57]

Even if you don't want to reward all the players with good years, I think Gamel is the most important, especially if you're planning on him being a part of the future.

 

Exactly. Who cares if Almonte and Boggs are upset with the Brewers. They can find another team to play AAA with. If Gamel is indeed part of the future, then we should care about his feelings toward the organization.

[fondybrewfan]

Even if you don't want to reward all the players with good years, I think Gamel is the most important, especially if you're planning on him being a part of the future.

 

Exactly. Who cares if Almonte and Boggs are upset with the Brewers. They can find another team to play AAA with. If Gamel is indeed part of the future, then we should care about his feelings toward the organization.

They were thinking more along the lines of Fiers, Gindl, and Peralta as guys who they would have to bring up along with Gamel. I don't know that Almonte or Boggs would have ever been considered.

 

Gamel maybe would provide the most power of any guys capable of pinch hitting; but it would be a major question mark if he would actually be able to succeed at it. RR sure as heck wouln't pinch hit Gamel with the game on the line thats for sure.