A great pitchers' duel turned into a rout in the blink of an eye today.  LA torched Ben Sheets for six of the quickest runs you'll ever see in the top of the seventh, the final three scoring on a home run by former Brewer catcher Gary Bennett.  I was just in the middle of discussing Bennett and his lack of power when he caught a hanging curve and lifted it out of Miller Park to left.  So much for his .118 slugging percentage.  The Dodgers went on to take the game 7-2 to win the series two games to one.

  It was a real honor to have the great Bobby "Shot Heard Round The World" Thomson in our booth today at Miller Park.  I taped an interview with Bobby in which I asked him about the home run, of course, as well as eliciting comments from him about Miller Park, Ted Williams, and more.  You will hear that interview in the next few days on our Jockey Pregame Show.  The former NY Giant great also visited with Ueck during our game broadcast.  Mr. Thomson is 84 now and looks good.  He lives in Savannah, Georgia, and says he doesn't watch too much baseball anymore but he does root for the Red Sox, mainly because he dislikes the Yankees so much.  Andy Pafko is also here.  Pafko was in left field for the Dodgers that day and watched Thomson's historic home run off Ralph Branca fly into the stands behind him.  Incidentally, Thomson says he has no idea what ever became of that baseball and as far as he knows it is not saved anywhere.  Can you imagine how much that ball would be worth?  The Milwaukee Braves Historical Association is honoring Thomson this evening at Potawatomi Bingo Casino in the Northern Lights Theater.  If we weren't heading to Boston, I'd be heading down to listen to all the stories that will be told tonight.

  The news of Ryan Braun's new contract was greeted with enthusiasm from all quarters today.  8 years and 45 million bucks may seem like a lot, but by today's standards it has a chance to save the Brewers significant dollars in the long term.  Braun looks like a sure bet for shrewd GM Doug Melvin, and hopefully his signing will further encourage some of the other young stars to ink longterm deals to become fixtures for this franchise.  The "Brauntasaurus" will definitely be a star in Milwaukee for a long time.  I know I wasn't the slightest bit surprised to see him homer a couple of hours after signing the deal.  As an unfailingly polite and cheerful young man, Braun is an easy player for whom to root.

  Brewers' owner Mark Attanasio and wife Debbie arrived in Milwaukee and took in the finale today.  They will travel on the team charter to Boston for the Red Sox interleague series.  Attanasio grew up a huge Yankee fan in Brooklyn so I have no doubts that he wants to see the Brewers show well at Fenway this weekend.  After a disappointing end to the homestand, the Brewers are back under .500 again and once again are under pressure in the Central as they cross the quarter pole as a fourth place team trying to stave off the fifth place Pirates.  A three game series in Pittsburgh follows the Boston contests.

 

  Listen to the joy in the voice of Eric Gagne after last night's save. 
 

  We are having a technical issue which is preventing me from conducting our Tuesday night in-game chat, unfortunately.  If we get it straightened out soon I will answer as many questions as I can.

  Best wishes to our good friend Rob Edwards, the Brewers' PA announcer at Miller Park, who had a heart attack earlier today and is headed for bypass surgery tomorrow.  Please say a prayer for Rob.
 

  Derrick Turnbow issued three walks in 1/3 of an inning in his Nashville debut last night.  It will be interesting to see how this goes for Derrick.

  It is close to surreal seeing Joe Torre in a Dodger uniform.

  Had a good chat with Jeff Suppan prior to tonight's game.  You can listen HERE.

  Bob Uecker and Ned Yost caught up prior to game one also.  Here it is for you.  NED
 

 We'll link the audio from the Ned Yost Show today shortly, but as you will hear on our Jockey Pregame Show shortly, Eric Gagne has been removed as the Brewers' closer for the time being and Yost will use a committee to close out games.  Gagne will get a mental break and then hopefully will pitch his way back into the role.

 Also, Tony Gwynn Jr. is batting second today as Mike Cameron gets a day off.  Gwynn has put together some nice at-bats in his limited exposure so far this season and we'll see if he can provide a spark to a sputtering offense.

Here's the audio from the pregame show, listen here.

You can listen to my post game interview Ryan Braun, my weekly rewind and postgame on the SportsBubbler.com podcast page. 


 

  I know the feeling is of general disappointment among the Brewers' fans right now after a tough loss on Saturday afternoon (and early evening), but you have to admit that the first two games of this series with the red-hot Cardinals have been highly entertaining.  The Brewers are in a stretch of bad ball right now, falling short in both hitting and pitching, but they are scratching and clawing to try to snag some wins along the way.  Today, they had a hold of one but had it snatched back by the division leaders in the ninth.

  It is hard to feel optimistic when you have lost 7 of 8 but as long as it doesn't run much deeper, this will end up being chalked up as one of the many downslopes that all teams suffer through over the 162-game rollercoaster.  With two more to go against Tony LaRussa and then three coming against Joe Torre and the Dodgers, the Brewers are definitely under some pressure.  The bats need to get the runs-faucet opened up quickly so that the offense can buy some time for the pitching to figure out how to fix its own challenges.  All this while the Brewers eye a pending Boston-start to another ten-day roadtrip beginning Friday night.  Reversing this downward trend is not going to happen easily.

Hopefully, a pleasant surprise is in store, and wishes for a nice Mother's Day win over the Cardinals will come true.

Happy Mother's Day