Carlos Gomez - Shortstop?

[brewtown82]

I was reading an article this morning that said Carlos Gomez is a former shortstop, and still takes grounders there before every game. Why have we not looked at him to fill in at short every few days, or even on a more permanent basis. He's certainly athletic. With the glut of outfielders on our roster and with the way Gomez has been hitting so far, am I crazy to think he could be our backup SS?

[twofistedslopper]

It would have been interesting to see what they would have done last night if they had only tied the game in the ninth and gone to extras. I believe I heard BA say they likely would have put Ramirez at SS and moved Gamel to 3B, with Ishikawa at 1B (or Kottaras?). That would have been a brutal left side of the infield!

 

I watched a replay of the Dodgers broadcast of the ninth inning last night on mlb.tv to hear their walk-off call. They mentioned Gomez playing short and were wondering if he would be put in if the game went to extras. It was great to hear their announcers praise RR for his bold moves.

 

Anyone listen to the post game last night? I'm sure someone asked Ron what he would have done had the game gone to extra innings.

[brewtown82]

Roenicke confirmed Ramirez would have played short I believe, with Gamel at 3rd. Not sure about first. The Ishikawa prediction is likely right.

[GAME05]

i believe that's what i heard RR say post-game. the local Green Bay guys were ripping him for the move. then they played Ned Yost's post-game presser and paused it every three seconds to insult or laugh at him.

[jerichoholicninja]

Can Carlos Gomez pitch?

[igor67]

Pardon me while I have a small Clancy moment. Let's see what he can do! Bring up another real bat! If his SS defense is only of the won't embarrass variety that would be pretty useful in terms of roster construction (and probably guarantee him a job for 10 more years at least)

[RightFieldCoder]

I think everyone on the field is a former SS at some point. That is where you put your best players in the younger leagues. They then get bumped out of that position when better they play in better leagues with other better SS.

[Yeti73]

I always though Morgan had more of a prototypical infield build, not tall, weak arm...we have great depth in the OF, would be nice to figure out a way to get Aokie, Morgan and Gogo in there. If Gogo starts hitting righties, look out. Let's not forget, the kid is only 26 (he's actually younger than Gamel) and has shown flashes...

[fondybrewfan]

Aram at SS and Gamel at 3B would have been very entertaining to watch. I am glad we won but I would have been curious how bad that infield could have turned out.

 

I am almost positive Gomez could probably play SS better than what Aram could. He strikes me as a guy who could fit in basically anywhere defensively. Just great instincts

[3and2Fastball]

Moving Gomez to SS is just way too "out of the box" and makes way too much sense for the Brewers' front office.

[topper09er]

You only have to deal with this problem if you tie the game in the 9th which was a long shot. Anyone can play SS for a few innings. I much prefer this to the Ken Macha method of assuming your catcher will get injured every game of the season. In this game Macha actually used Randy Wolf to pinch hit with the bases loaded in the bottom of the 10th, tie game 1 out with the backup catcher still on the bench.

[Funketown]

I remember that game topper. Luckily Weeks hit a walk-off single to end it.

 

I've never understood managers not wanting to use their backup catchers to pinch hit in a pinch (wow, that was bad). What are the odds of a catcher getting hurt in however many innings remain in the game? 1%, maybe? The odds on (1) a non-Randy Wolf PH'er not driving in the winning run and (2) given that non-Randy Wolf has not driven in the run, the backup C getting hurt in the next 1-2 innings of extra innings have to be something like 0.1%. If you can't tell, few managerial moves annoyed me more than that one!

[monty57]

Who was the backup catcher in that game? If it was Nieves, I'd have probably used a pitcher as a pinch hitter as well. I'd probably also have used the batboy or a random 13-year-old from the stands over Nieves.

[homer]

You only have to deal with this problem if you tie the game in the 9th which was a long shot. Anyone can play SS for a few innings. I much prefer this to the Ken Macha method of assuming your catcher will get injured every game of the season. In this game Macha actually used Randy Wolf to pinch hit with the bases loaded in the bottom of the 10th, tie game 1 out with the backup catcher still on the bench.

 

 

Yost did that all the time (not pinch hit a pitcher, but leave the backup catcher on the bench). Drove me nuts.

[xisxisxis]

Gomez certainly hits like a good fielding SS. So why not......

[twofistedslopper]

I always though Morgan had more of a prototypical infield build, not tall, weak arm...

 

Hmm, a left-handed infielder not playing 1B. Now that would be interesting...There's a reason lefties don't play 2nd, 3rd, or SS.

[HiAndTight]

Moving Gomez to SS is just way too "out of the box" and makes way too much sense for the Brewers' front office.

 

 

 

Seriously? Good god I get sick of the bashing of the Brewers front office. Does this come from people who are about 17 and don't remember the last 30 years of Brewers baseball?

 

Moving Gomez to SS is interesting...at 6'4, 220, he's obviously pretty big. And the fact that he hasn't played short professionally suggests to me that maybe there is a reason he's not playing there, coupled with the fact that he may be the elite defensive CF'er in MLB.

 

We've taken our payroll from 27 million to 102 million WITH payroll flexibility(according to Melvin recently). We won 96 games last year and won the division. We've made two of the biggest trade in the past 5 years beating out many of the larger market teams.

2 playoff appearances and we're in good shape for a 3rd.

 

 

And yet it's just CONSTANTLY bashing the Brewers front office. And this one is for NOT moving Gomez to SS because it "makes too much sense." Twins must have a terrible FO as well...

 

If your argument was only we should TRY him there, then I'd be fine with it. Of course, it's possible they have tried him there. We don't know.

 

Anyway, sorry for the rant, but can we give Mark A, Melvin, Sied, and the rest of our guys some credit for giving us a competitive team year in and year.

[twofistedslopper]

Couldn't agree more, HiAndTight. I can't understand why people are constantly bashing Melvin and Co. He and Attanasio have taken the team from perennial bottom feeders to contenders in a pretty short amount of time. They continue to stretch payroll in order to put a solid team on the field. They should be praised for the talent they've acquired and the moves they've made; signing Braun long-term; signing Aramis; trading for guys like CC, Greinke, Marcum, and K-Rod.

 

Could we just stop finding ways to complain about Melvin and the front office and enjoy the success we've had in recent years.

[Dragonbait]

[sarcasm]I suppose they'd rather have Hendry running the show[/sarcasm]

[TooLiveBrew]

And yet it's just CONSTANTLY bashing the Brewers front office. And this one is for NOT moving Gomez to SS because it "makes too much sense." Twins must have a terrible FO as well...

No, it's not constant bashing. And furthermore, if anyone wants to complain about Melvin & Co. lacking creativity, I won't begrudge him/her. That, to me, is Melvin's biggest weakness as a GM.

 

Of course people give the front office & ownership credit, to say anything else is just ignoring plenty of posts here.

[HiAndTight]

And yet it's just CONSTANTLY bashing the Brewers front office. And this one is for NOT moving Gomez to SS because it "makes too much sense." Twins must have a terrible FO as well...

No, it's not constant bashing. And furthermore, if anyone wants to complain about Melvin & Co. lacking creativity, I won't begrudge him/her. That, to me, is Melvin's biggest weakness as a GM.

 

Of course people give the front office & ownership credit, to say anything else is just ignoring plenty of posts here.

 

 

Honestly? That's what you took from that? A argument in semantics? It's daily. It's pretty damn often for a FO that's done what ours has done.

 

 

And in this case it's because...AGAIN, saying Carlos Gomez to SS "just makes too much sense," sounds like someone just plays too many video games.

[TooLiveBrew]

No, I didn't take an argument in semantics. I took it as you bagging on posters for no good reason, complete with condescension ranging from "how old are you?" to "you're just a video game nerd".

[3and2Fastball]

oops I apologize, I should have made it clear that I meant that in a humorous way. Should have put that in Blue

 

Moving Gomez to SS is just way too "out of the box" and makes way too much sense for the Brewers' front office.

 

Is that better?

[HiAndTight]

No, I didn't take an argument in semantics. I took it as you bagging on posters for no good reason, complete with condescension ranging from "how old are you?" to "you're just a video game nerd".

 

 

Ok, fine, you didn't take an argument in semantics. You took something that was obviously hyperbole and made it literal.

Obviously the bashing of the Brewers FO isn't "non-stop," ie, every single post, every single day. But it is extremely regular and often times without merit.

 

Look at the minor league forums, the transaction forum and the major league forums, and it's all about how the Brewers are incompetent drafting, ie, people unhappy with last years draft because we apparently went with guys who have low ceilings but high floors(not how I'd describe our two first rounders) and our general inability to develop pitching despite the fact we've got more pitching in our system than we've had in a long-long time.

 

How we handle injuries, every move RR makes, etc..etc..

 

Now it "just makes too much sense," to move Carlos Gomez to SS so the Brewers FO won't do it. Really? It's SO obvious a move it makes TOO much sense?

 

Second, I never called anyone a video game nerd. That's just fantasy. I said that it wasn't a video game and you can't just move a CF'er who's never played SS professionally to SS.

 

I mean, is that really just soooo incredibly obvious that it makes the Brewers FO stupid for not doing it? Nevermind, we don't know if they've tried or not. It's very possible, they have tried and just haven't had ANY level of success..which you'd expect for a kid who hasn't played SS since he was about 15 years old and has been an elite defensive Cf'er since then.

 

FINALLY, the comment about how long have you been watching the Brewers has to do with the opinion of the FO and nothing more. How someone could have sat through the last 30 years of the Brewers puzzling front office moves and sit back and bicker and complain about every little move, even the most inconsequential ones or the most illogical ones is beyond me. And it's daily on every forum.

 

Nobody's saying that they're flawless. I thought the Lawrie trade was just beyond terrible at the time and you can only imagine my opinion of it right now. But there always has been this group mentality that if you don't just go along with the line of thinking of the majority, you kinda get swarmed from every different angle. Which is why I generally don't say anything. But I mean, c'mon, bashing the Brewers for not playing Gomez at SS? That to me is kinda taking it over the top.

[3and2Fastball]

I will say this though: If Carlos Gomez was capable of playing SS, I'd rather have him at SS vs RHP than Izturis. So in essence if Gomez was capable of being a utility infielder as well as a platoon CF it would be a nice way to free up a roster spot for someone more valuable than Izturis. I recognize that is a big "if" though. Apparently Gomez does take infield ground-balls frequently at practices (of his own doing, he just loves the game, he also has begged Roenicke to let him pitch sometime, too)