Chris Hook

[danzig6767]

 

Good point sir.

 

Let me be specific with my terrible assessment of Stearns this year. Roster with too many poor plate discipline hitters with way too high a K rate.

Brewers are second in the NL in walks taken.

 

The problem isn't to much poor plate discipline, it's instead been driving in players on base and that comes from having to many mediocre to low batting average hitters.

 

Drawing walks is a good thing, but at some point those baserunners need to be driven in and the team is 10th in batting average in the NL, even worse with RISP.

[brewmann04]

totally agree the walks are great but why the issue with knocking runners in with men on base which seems to get worse by the year.

[Smichaelis9]

Sort of agree with your assessment of Stearns, but I’d substitute the word rough with terrible.

 

Preseason projected wins...

 

BPro: 88 wins

Vegas: 86.5 wins

538: 86 wins

ZIPS: 85 wins

Current Pace: 84 wins

OOTP: 83 wins

 

With 40 games to go this team is playing right within the range of its most likely outcomes, hard for me to say that Stearns did a terrible job, especially with a quarter of the season as of yet unplayed.

 

Good point sir.

 

Let me be specific with my terrible assessment of Stearns this year. Roster with too many poor plate discipline hitters with way too high a K rate. Too LH hitting dependent. Terrible pen options especially early in the year. Kept saying early on he thought the pen had the right pitchers they’d just have to pitch better. Burnes Peralta in the rotation to start the year. Trades for Freitas > great great trade, but leaves him in AAA all year, even as the team struggles to hit LHP, even as his average has STEADILY CLIMBED to where it’s at .387.

 

Then doesn’t add upgrade at SS, for small salary only, no prospects given up to improve this teams chance at the central title. I’ll stop there.

First of all, I’d have loved to upgrade shortstop at the deadline, I’m with you on that. I’d also like to see Freitas get a chance, but its understandable that he’s not up. He raked in AAA last year too (before the change to MLB balls this year) Pina’s defense is a valuable trait for a backup catcher and Yaz/Braun can fill in at first against lefties. There aren’t unlimited roster spots to carry a guy who’s the third catcher and potential platoon at first base. We already have 5 outfielders up.

 

Second, “terrible pen options heading into the season” is very iffy to me as well. Knebel went down a couple weeks before the season. Even if Jeffress was likely to regress, you can’t blame him for not forseeing this big a dropoff. Guerra had come into the role last year and done well, Claudio started poorly but the pitcher he’s been the last couple months is the guy they thought they were getting. He expected to have Bobby Wahl available, Anderson was doing well in the pen, so much so, that he was the first guy to get a chance to fill in as a starter. The likelihood of both Barnes and Williams being this bad with *that* kind of pure stuff was pretty damn unlikely imo. I believed in Albers being solid, so that also made me feel a bit better about the pen. Did I think it was going to be shutdown? No. Did I think it was going to be a good bullpen? I did yeah. Maybe you didn’t, and if so then you were right I guess (although I’d still say it’s been pretty decent considering the amount of innings it’s had to cover).

 

You can say now that Burnes in the rotation to start the year was a bad idea, but nobody thought he’d be close to this bad. Nobody. Peralta is a fair guy to argue against having a backup plan for (but I think Anderson was that one backup plan). I mean, if you call Rasmussen a future ace, I can’t even imagine what you called Burnes heading into the season. Oh wait apparently we were going to have 3-4 TOR arms heading into the playoffs!

Burnes stuff is ridiculous! I see 3-4 TOR starters by playoff time.

 

Stearns made some mistakes, but you have to look at things rationally too. Can’t just use hindsight and say he’s been terrible when at the time the thought process was totally reasonable.

 

Sorry I sort of ranted there, I really do love how invested you are in the team, and it’s fine to have strong opinions. It just gets old seeing you talk as though you know everything. When you throw a bunch of crap against the wall some of it will stick, so you get a few things right and then you come on here and brag to those who didn’t agree (I was even with you on Grisham, I love the dude, but you can’t actually think people are going to credit you for that). I even know that you’re aware of your hyperbole, but at some point... it’s just too much.

[Brew crew 92]

Stearns not upgrading SS at the deadline is a mistake, but I find it hard to believe he didn’t want to upgrade by spending 1.8 mil. On Galvis, maybe Attanasio said no. If not then it’s a terrible mistake by Stearns.

 

25 man roster too left handed hitting dependent. Period. Terrible mistake. This is on Stearns, not Attanasio.

 

Freitas should have been on this roster instead of Perez. To have a player that’s hitting LHP > .530 not hitting LHP for MKE with all the issues this team has vs lefties is terrible. Arcia the SS, plenty of off days, he’s young, play all the games, no problem. Terrible mistake.

 

Barnes T Williams Wilson Petricka was a predictably bad shuttle.

 

I totally bought into the hype surrounding Burnes Peralta Woodruff And Jimmy’s own description of his Breaking stuff being better than ever. And us being given bad information on his surgery, which was described as a tear on the opposite side of the shoulder from a pitcher’s normal labrum injury, and it being potentially less serious. Then in ST Jimmy gets interviewed and describes 4 separate injuries to his shoulder in great detail and at that moment my heart sank. But it was ridiculous to think they would be tor this year anyhow.

 

Maybe I’m being too hard on Stearns, by using the word terrible. Maybe he’s just having a “rough” year.

[yourout]

Stearns not upgrading SS at the deadline is a mistake, but I find it hard to believe he didn’t want to upgrade by spending 1.8 mil. On Galvis, maybe Attanasio said no. If not then it’s a terrible mistake by Stearns.

 

25 man roster too left handed hitting dependent. Period. Terrible mistake. This is on Stearns, not Attanasio.

 

Freitas should have been on this roster instead of Perez. To have a player that’s hitting LHP > .530 not hitting LHP for MKE with all the issues this team has vs lefties is terrible. Arcia the SS, plenty of off days, he’s young, play all the games, no problem. Terrible mistake.

 

Barnes T Williams Wilson Petricka was a predictably bad shuttle.

 

I totally bought into the hype surrounding Burnes Peralta Woodruff And Jimmy’s own description of his Breaking stuff being better than ever. And us being given bad information on his surgery, which was described as a tear on the opposite side of the shoulder from a pitcher’s normal labrum injury, and it being potentially less serious. Then in ST Jimmy gets interviewed and describes 4 separate injuries to his shoulder in great detail and at that moment my heart sank. But it was ridiculous to think they would be tor this year anyhow.

 

Maybe I’m being too hard on Stearns, by using the word terrible. Maybe he’s just having a “rough” year.

 

Your list doesn't include the debacle of the coaching staff changes.

[sveumrules]

Your list doesn't include the debacle of the coaching staff changes.

 

Last year our position players had a 104 wRC+, this year it is 101. On the whole they've been about 3% worse.

 

Last year our pitchers had a 97 FIP-, this year it is 100. On the whole they've also been about 3% worse.

 

Even if that whole 3% decline was somehow entirely attributable to coaching (& not other things like personnel changes, regular year to year variation, etc) it would hardly qualify as a debacle.

[pacopete4]

Stearns not upgrading SS at the deadline is a mistake, but I find it hard to believe he didn’t want to upgrade by spending 1.8 mil. On Galvis, maybe Attanasio said no. If not then it’s a terrible mistake by Stearns.

 

You do know how the waiver wire works right? If not, there’s plenty of sites to educate yourself.

[Brew crew 92]

Stearns not upgrading SS at the deadline is a mistake, but I find it hard to believe he didn’t want to upgrade by spending 1.8 mil. On Galvis, maybe Attanasio said no. If not then it’s a terrible mistake by Stearns.

 

You do know how the waiver wire works right? If not, there’s plenty of sites to educate yourself.

 

Yes, I know how it works. But not talking waiver here. At the trade deadline Stearns could of traded for Galvis for Salary. 1.8 mil. This year, with a reasonable club option at 5.5 with 1 mil. Buyout.

[adambr2]

Peralta may have found something in the bullpen.

 

Morgan Freeman narration: "He had not."

[DHonks]

The only reason we aren’t talking about Peralta’s awful year is because we’re talking about Burnes’ year. Both should start next year in San Antonio

[balsamlaker]

It is amazing to see how many teams have changed hitting coaches in the last two years. One year of sample size for Haines and Hook is too little in my opinion and I am not one that is against change. I can't remember how many years I hoped the Packers would get rid of Capers.

[DuWayne Steurer]

I feel like a lot of the old rules dont really apply. Lots of pitchers and coaches are struggling to adjust to the new homerun environment. Pitch location and sequencing are all messed up because traditionally non power hitters now can hit with power and power hitters are hitting homeruns on pitches that shouldnt be hittable. We saw a ton of that in the Washington series this weekend.

 

It makes every at bat, literalky every pitch a "high stress" pitch knowing that a slap hitting short stop might take a low inside curveball and still hook it inside the foul pole. There's no such thing as mistake pitches anymore as just about anything a batter can reach is able to be hit with power.

 

I dont think Hook is doing a great job, but at the same time, I think I'd at least give him into next year and see if/how he adjusts.