Ray King for Andrew Lefave (WV)

[TooLiveBrew]

hawing, everything in that post made me laugh. Nice!

[Blazer25]

Isn't there a poster with the handle "RayKing'sForemanGrill"? He should be doing backflips at this point.

 

Welcome back Ray...please don't eat JJ Hardy...we need him.

[mothershipconnection]

"First, it's a shock," King said on a conference call with Washington reporters. "You see the whole trade deadline come and go and you are thinking, 'OK, finish with this team.' You want to finish with respect -- for yourself and the organization. But anytime you get a phone call from the general manager's secretary, it's not good.

 

"I have a chance to go to Milwaukee. I understand they are a game and a half out, and they are trying to compete and try to get into the playoffs. That team hasn't been there since 1982. ... Sometimes things happen for a reason, and sometimes they don't."

 

King's quote is a little weird. Is he ticked about being traded? I don't get the last sentence, as it could be seen either as "a reason" for him coming here or alluding to "a reason" the team has sucked.

[SoCalBrewfan]

the ptbnl is gonna be someone ike kenny holmberg...or a low level starting pitcher...i wouldnt expect it to be anyone of great value

Seems to me they usually agree to a list of four or five guys, and then give the other team some time to make a choice. I'd guess an A-ball pitcher, or maybe one of the lo-A outfielders?

[mls4]

The best part about this trade is that after the season there's a strong possibility King will be traded for Wes Helms...

[thablingster]

"First, it's a shock," King said on a conference call with Washington reporters. "You see the whole trade deadline come and go and you are thinking, 'OK, finish with this team.' You want to finish with respect -- for yourself and the organization. But anytime you get a phone call from the general manager's secretary, it's not good.

 

"I have a chance to go to Milwaukee. I understand they are a game and a half out, and they are trying to compete and try to get into the playoffs. That team hasn't been there since 1982. ... Sometimes things happen for a reason, and sometimes they don't."

 

King's quote is a little weird. Is he ticked about being traded? I don't get the last sentence, as it could be seen either as "a reason" for him coming here or alluding to "a reason" the team has sucked.

I think possibly the "sometimes they don't" thing means that King probably was expecting to be traded to another contender before the August 31st deadline, but him being able to come back to help the Brewers make their playoff run is the reason for him not being traded to a different team. So "sometimes they don't" could be "I didn't get traded (things don't happen for a reason), but now I get to help Milwaukee win (which is good?)"

 

[TracyThom]

the ptbnl is gonna be someone ike kenny holmberg...or a low level starting pitcher...i wouldnt expect it to be anyone of great value

 

After the Linebrink trade, I wouldn't be surprised if the PTBNL was Darren Ford.

[JJHardy7]

I don't think the AAA playoff mean nothing...they still have to fill out the roster somehow, but I do understand they need to call them up.

 

This thread led me to a few questions...

 

It seems here that most believe Vinny Rottino is the catcher to fill in for Miller and Estrada...Vinny (according to baseball cube) has played 2 innings at catcher in the bigs. Do the Brewers see him as a candidate?

 

Also, is everyone aware of the season Rivera is having? He has decent power numbers in AAA, but his avg and obp % is awful for a player who did perform well last year with the Brewers.

[crewcrazy]

I was never a huge Rivera fan, even when it looked like he was doing so well last year. I always kind of thought of him as a AAAA player, and it seemed to me last year that most of his HR and RBI came when the Crew was already losing by a large margin (I could be wrong on that...I don't have time to look at his splits right now). His defense isn't the greatest, either, but at least he shouldn't let every leadoff walk or single become a double like Estrada does.

[MillerParkSouth]

If Ray King actually eats Greg Aquino whole before the playoffs start, can he pitch for him?

 

http://static.yuku.com//domainskins/bypass/img/smileys/roll.gif If I can figure out how to do a signature, can I use this? That is hilarious! Anyways, it's good to see that DM is at least trying to do something to shore up a very suspect pen.

[MNBrew]

According to the Transactions column in this morning's Minneapolis StarTribune, the Brewers designated Dennis Sarfate for assignment. Haven't seen it anywhere else, but stuff that shows up that spot in print I've never seen turn out to be incorrect.

 

Personally, I don't think Dennis was ever a great prospect, so even if he's only plateaued (sp?), I do see it as a good sign that we have that much more talent now ahead of him on the organizational depth chart. Who knows? Maybe he'll turn out to be the PTBNL.

[djoctagone]

as i posted yesterday, the transaction involving dennis sarfate is confirmed here:

 

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/transactions

 

and here:

 

http://milwaukee.brewers.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20070904&content_id=2188345&vkey=news_mil&fext=.jsp&c_id=mil

[pogokat]

dennis can't be the ptbnl because hee was on the 40 man...if the deal was for dennis, they would have just passed him through waivers and traded him, right?

[RayKingsForemanGrill]

Is it wrong that I am overjoyed that my username and Ray King jersey now have more meaning than ever!?

[MNBrew]

Or is it possible that since Sarfate's being DFA, assuming he clears waivers, once he's outrighted, that they could still trade him? Maybe not the most likely scenario, but still possible?

[SeriesFinale]

RayKingsForemanGrill wrote:

---

"Is it wrong that I am overjoyed that my username and Ray King jersey now have more meaning than ever!?"

 

Heck no, Ray Ray was always a favorite of mine during the really dark years and I'm glad to have him back for what will hopefully be an entertaining and successful September.

[brettac1]

I have a picture with Ray King from when I was young, I think. I'll have to try and dig that up.

[endaround]

Pretty sure that Sarfate would be a minor league free agent if not on the 40 man-so he's not the PTBNL now

[mannyduke]

Is it wrong that I am overjoyed that my username and Ray King jersey now have more meaning than ever!?

Not at all. This is your day! I hope you enjoy it.

 

[jaybird2001wi]

I have a few good and bad moments with Ray King as a Brewer. During autograph Friday at County Stadium, I asked him what his favorite pitch was and he sarcastically said, "My favorite pitch is strike 1." I thought it was a joke and asked him again and he laughed at me and then the usher who was with him laughed with him.

A cool memory was at Wrigley Field and me and my buddies shouted for him during batting practice and he stopped and chatted with us and gave the Cubs fans the shaft and told the Cub fans, "These guys are from Milwaukee, I gotta talk to them."

[biedergb]

AAA playoffs mean exactly nothing. Rivera as a 4th C, especially if Miller is not 100%, is infinitely more important than a minor league game.

 

Al- I wasn't saying that Rivera needs to be sent down to help out with the playoffs. You stated that their season is about to end, which it is not, they hopefully have a lot of games to play. And once Miller is 100%, then maybe let Rivera get in some game action in the AAA playoffs.

[djoctagone]

i'm trying to find the story online to confirm it, but on his first day as a brewer, did not ray king end up helping stranded motorists en route to miller park?

[AJAY]

From JS ONLINE . . .

 

When the Brewers were in Washington back on July 6-8, Ray King stopped and visited with reporters in front of the Brewers dugout and hinted he'd love to get dealt to the Brewers, who were way out in front of the NL Central at the time.

 

King suggested reporters bring his name up to Brewers GM Doug Melvin. I passed that conversation along to Melvin at some point after the all-star break. He kind of laughed it off.

 

Not so any more.

 

King came to the Brewers Tuesday in a trade with the Nationals for a player to be named, and he's glad to be here.

 

Although he's not playoff eligible, he figures it wasn't as though he was playoff eligible in Washington, as the Nationals are going nowhere. But he'd sure love to help make the Brewers playoff eligible.

 

"I tell everybody I owe it to this organization for giving me my opportunity," King said. "I came over here in 2000 and Davey Lopes pretty much gave me my opportunity to pitch and it kind of got me going. It's fun, great city, I love the people here and the organization was good to me and I lived here year-round. So the situation's fun and to be able to come back now, I can't put it into words."

[jaybird2001wi]

dj, I did a net search on Ray King's story of assisting stranded motorists by Miller Park. I found one link from the Wisconsin State Journal, but the story is so old it is now being hosted by an online subscription service that requires you to pay to view the archived article.

[Fatter than Joey]

I wondered why he was used last night --

 

I sort of thought he was supposed to be a LOOGY and not a mop-up guy. He gets hit pretty hard by RHers.

 

Ray King is a known commodity -- maybe he needed to get one under his belt or something, but I would have rather seen Aquino/McClung/Stetters out there with a 10+ run lead and save King for Griffey and Dunn this weekend. -- I am sure he will be ready to go on Friday, but I hope this mop-up duty is a one time thing.