Brewers in total panic mode
It’s over for Ned Yost. O-V-E-R.
For the second season in a row, his Brewers plunged into a late-season free fall. Despite the addition of ace pitcher CC Sabathia and veteran leader Ray Durham, Milwaukee staggered down the same road again.
The Brewers brought in Ted Simmons to assist Yost this season as bench coach. Simmons didn’t have the answers either, so he got the boot too.
Dale Sveum and Robin Yount replace Yost and Simmons with less than two weeks left in the season. Here is how Journal-Sentinel columnist Michael Hunt summed up the predicament:
“The only thing that is going to save the Brewers now is for 25 highly paid professionals - you know, the ones who looked like they wanted to be anywhere else than in a pennant race against two grownup teams like Philadelphia and New York - redeeming themselves for such defeatist play with the pressure of 3 million sets of angry eyes on them.”
After dropping $10 million on useless reliever Eric Gagne this season, general manager Doug Melvin could be the next to go if Milwaukee fails to reach postseason play.
MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE
Questions to ponder while the Cardinals gamely cling to their mathematical life:
- Are the Cardinals really counting on Chris Carpenter to return to full strength next season? Or will the front office heed all these warning signs and beef up the rotation?
- Is Seahawks quarterback Matt Hasselbeck ready to get well against the Rams secondary?
- Couldn’t “Larry” Bud Selig find a neutral stadium to make up the Cubs-Astros game?
- Is he officially “all in” for the Cubs this season?
THE HIGH COST OF CELEBRATION
Tipsheet had Eagles receiver DeSean Jackson on its fantasy team, TonyBanksDog. So Tipsheet not happy when Jackson literally threw away a touchdown – and six fantasy points – by discarding the football too soon Monday night.
He flipped the ball behind him as he crossed the goal line, feigning nonchalance over his big catch.
Cowboys coach Wade Phillips challenged the TD and officials ruled the ball dead on the Dallas 1. So his 61-yard TD pass, upon further review, became just a 60-yard reception. The Eagles scored on the next play, so Brian Westbrook got the six points that belonged to Jackson.
WHY TIPSHEET AVOIDS SHEA STADIUM
QUIPS ‘R US
Here is what some of America’s leading sports pundits have been writing:
Dwight Perry, Seattle Times: “Defending Truck Series champion Ron Hornaday will not be penalized, NASCAR announced, despite the driver’s admission that he once used testosterone. Hornaday was told, however, he’d have to quit lifting his truck during tire changes.”
Scott Ostler, San Francisco Chronicle: “Jamie Martin, the 49ers’ newly-signed reserve quarterback, has kept in shape by throwing passes to his 10-year-old son. Says Martin, ‘He can catch the soft ones.’ The kid is currently No. 2 on the 49ers’ depth chart at wide receiver.”
Greg Cote, Miami Herald: “The Tennessee Titans asked police to help locate injured quarterback Vince Young because they feared for his emotional state. It was thought to be the first time cops were looking for an NFL player unrelated to Pacman Jones or a strip club.”
Bill Simmons, ESPN.com: “Hey, I don’t know if you’ve seen Jeff Garcia lately, but he has become Boggs from ‘Shawshank.’ They were dead ringers for years and years, but now, with Garcia’s hairline receding, they might have surpassed Mike Tomlin and Omar Epps as the No. 1 celeb/NFL lookalikes. It’s amazing. Unfortunately, we’ve reached the point of his career that Garcia is being wheeled out on a stretcher as Morgan Freeman says, ‘Last I heard, he was eating meals out of a straw.’”
MEGAPHONE
“We’re in the pennant race? Not really. There are a couple people [that believe it], but the Cubs are in the pennant race, and we’re not. Maybe people feel different, but I feel that way. It was harder for us and we had a tougher season than they had from the beginning. They dominate the league, the division. That’s why Chicago people feel sure about the Cubs going and we’re not.”
White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen, whining again.
Nice job by MLB, making a team from a devasted city, whose families have no electricity and probably no place to find a decent meal, travel to a ballpark 900 miles away in the Cubs backyard to play a “home” game…
Tim, and Gordo,
Houston and their greedy owner had a chance to reschedule the games between the Cubs and Astros long before it got done. This from Richard Justice, writer for the Houston Chronicle.
“If I’m blaming one person, I’m starting with Drayton McLane. He was desperate to get those three home games against the Cubs and refused to believe the weather reports.
He could have postponed the series Wednesday and still had time to move it to a real neutral site.”
See, Drayton McLane refused to cancel the series against the Cubs early, as he was worried about the almighty dollars and the revenues lost. He wanted to wait it out. There were other venues, but he did not want to move the series too early. Not until Friday did he realize that the games were not going to go on in Houston. MLB was possibly going to reschedule a double header for Sunday, and game on Mon, or make up 1 game later in the year (if needed) but still play the double header. Either way, it was too late! By the time he realized, there were no other real options.
23,000 fans walked up with 24 hours notice for Sun game, and 15,000 for Mon day game. Most from Chicago. Speaks volumes for Cubs fans!!!! A great day of walk up tickets is no more than 10,000 for a normally scheduled game. STL could not have done that…..whatever city they went to, more than likely would have been mostly Cub fans. See, we are everywhere, and passionate, and believe….”It’s gonna happen!!!”
SO get you facts straight…This was not SElig or FOX or MLB, it was Drayton McLane, the same type of greedy owner STL fans can relate to. It’s about their pocket at the end of the day, always!
And here is a link to Chicago Suntimes Chris DeLuca, which is not a Cub friendly paper…
http://www.suntimes.com/sports/deluca/1165552,CST-SPT-deluca16.article
How is it possible that Seattle is a 10 ½ point favorite on Sunday while missing six, count’em, SIX receivers due to injury? My God, have things really gotten THAT bad for the Rams? Is it possible that this is the bottom or do we have farther to fall?
The over/under for false starts on Sunday is 5 with at least 3 by Barron.
For the sake of his family, someone please take the belt and shoelaces away from Linehan. Watching him stand at that podium is about as painful as root canal.
It really is great watching the Brewers cough it up again, isn’t it?
In regard to the Brewers…how does the saying go…”Pride comes before a fall.”
The Brewers showed up the other teams everytime they won, by their untucking shirt display. Whether they meant no harm or not, it rubbed the other clubs wrong. They should have stopped it once it became known to the other clubs it was offensive. They rode a good wave for a good while and now its about to break, crash and fall dumping them all in the surf instead of the promise land. Really, all they accomplished was putting more pressure on themsevles because they became a bully on a block that has other bullies to bout with. Just play hardball and be professional about it.
PS, the video at Shea Stadium is kind of funny, albeit really long……I can’t imagine an usher waiting that long to come take action, lol.
Get lost fukudome. No one in STL wants to hear you whine. Go blog on a cubs site somewhere. 15K walkups? BFD.
Your still calling yourself “fukodome” even though he’s now batting .261 and has played himself out of the starting lineup?
It’s easy now to talk smack when the Cubs are great and the Cards are down, but just like the saying “Pride comes before a fall,” you’re probably just another obnoxious bleacher bum that has done this before but has come out a humiliated knucklehead everytime the Cubs have either choked or finished with a 65-97 record.
The Cubs are where they are in popularity because of their history of failure. Even if they finally do it this year, all I will say is “Once in 100 years? What the heck took you so long?”
Fuku, whether the owner believed the weather reports or not doesn’t matter (but for the record that the first forecasted landfall this year that actually held true for five straight days). The fact is you don’t put the game in the future Chicago suburb of Milwaukee when Houston is playing a “home game”. Pure crap by MLB.
Fortunately the Cubs won’t win the World Series this year, so we don’t have anything to worry about…