Top of the 9th, 2 outs, bases loaded. You're down by 1, and RHP Ryan Dempster just walked in a run. Kevin Mench is up to bat, with Geoff Jenkins, Craig Counsell, and Johnny Estrada on the bench. How do these four players hit against righties?

Who does Ned choose? #1. Congratulations Ned, you just gave us the WORST chance to win. Seriously, you said at the beginning of the season that it was going to be Mench vs lefties and Jenkins vs righties. Yet, in possibly the most important game of the season, you let the .250 OBP guy hit? Great, thanks.

Is there some rule in baseball that says a team can only use their best setup men in the 7th or 8th inning? I wouldn't think so, but watching the Brewers blow yet another lead in the 6th inning last night at Colorado got me wondering.

Chris Capuano had a nice outing going through 5 innings. He had given up 3 hits and 3 walks, but no runs. With the Brewers up 3-0, I was beginning to feel optimistic. The Rockies' half of the 6th inning started with a Troy Tulowitzki solo home run, followed by three straight singles. At this point, it was 3-2 with runners on first and second, nobody out.

Am I the only one who thinks that this is potentially the most critical spot in the game, where you absolutely must get out of the inning without any further damage? Carlos Villanueva has been good most of the season, but has been our worst reliever over the past month. Why would you put your worst bullpen option in the game in such a critical situation? We have three hard-throwing short relievers who are paid to come in and put out fires. Why couldn't we put in Scott Linebrink or Derrick Turnbow to get out of this jam, and then let Villanueva try to work out of his funk against the bottom of the order in the 7th? Is this really the best we can do?

Every inning counts equally. Runs scored in the 9th don't count any more than runs scored in the 6th. Why, then, do we have to save our best pitchers for the later innings? Maybe we need to start sending relievers to the All-Star game based on the number of holds instead of the number of saves. Or even get rid of the save altogether. If Ned sends Turnbow out in the 6th, and he blows it, fine - we simply weren't good enough, and I can accept that. As it was, Ned didn't put out the best players that give us the best chance to win, and we lost.

Doug Melvin denied that the Brewers are trading for Cincinnati outfielder Adam Dunn. I'm pretty sure this means that the trade is a done deal.

That's two starts in a row where Ned got pissed. Chris Capuano was pulled from last night's loss to Colorado after allowing 5 earned runs in 3+ innings. His ERA has jumped up to 5.16, a pretty big disappointment after a fantastic 2006 season where he seemed to have reinvented himself, cutting his walk rate nearly in half.

Capuano's walk rate is the obvious reason for this sudden drop in form. But, his current rate of 3.95 BB/9 is actually pretty close to his career norms prior to 2006. Capuano was effective in 2004 and 2005 with a BB/9 in the 3.5 - 4.0 range, so why can't he be effective now?

Comparing Capuano's '07 season to '04 and '05, the biggest difference I see is the number of hits allowed. Pitchers don't really have a whole lot of control over this - obviously a harder-hit ball is more likely to be a hit, but the total number of hits allowed has a lot to do with defense and plain luck. Is it Capuano's fault if a a bloop single ("Brady Clark hits") happens to fall just past the reach of the second baseman? This season, Capuano has a .315 BABIP, which is a bit higher than average.

Let's adjust that. Capuano has allowed 90 hits this season. Say his BABIP was .290, a number generally considered to be close to Major League average. All of a sudden, his H/9 is right around 9, almost exactly in line with where it was in '04 and '05.

OK, so if Capuano's luck evens out over rest of the season, he'll be back to where he was in '05. Cool, I think we can live with that. But why can't he be more like he was last year? It's entirely possible that '06 was a career year and he was playing over his head. But, that walk rate was almost half what it was every other year of his career. There has to be some explanation.

I did notice one other thing that seemed a bit odd. His '06 7.08 K/9, even though it was still respectable, was the lowest it has been since his rookie year with Arizona. This season, he's sitting at 7.68, highest since '04 (incidently, his next-worst season). It's not a huge jump, but it's still surprising to see that he's performing so much worse overall despite striking out more batters. Maybe he's trying harder (perhaps too hard) to strike people out. Maybe he needs to trust his defense to get hitters out for him. I'm very reluctant to consider an improved K rate to be a bad thing, but maybe its an indication of the type of pitcher Chris Capuano is.

My belief is that Chris Capuano didn't suddenly become bad pitcher - he's still at least a solid middle-of-the-rotation guy. I'm usually pretty big on low walk rates (which explains why I like Ben Sheets and Dave Bush so much), and last season he was fantastic. I'm no pitching coach, but anything he can do to bring that walk rate back down would be a positive. He's good enough pitcher that whatever he does, the strikeouts will come, as evidenced by his '06 rate.

With the Brewers impressive 24-10 start to the season, there has been quite a bit of excitement about the team. Nationally, there has still been some skepticism. Now, when you haven't had a winning season in 15 years, and haven't made the postseason in 25, some of that has to be expected. What has surprised me is the seemingly widespread perception that the National League Central is a weak division. Could this really be true? I didn't think so. After all, this is the division with the defending world champions, the team with the best record in baseball, the biggest off-season free agent spenders, and a team that was in the World Series only two years ago.

The Cardinals, Cubs, Astros and Brewers were all considered to be playoff contenders. The Reds and Pirates have a few more holes, but most people expected them to be competitive as well. That doesn't sound like a weak division, but things don't always play out like they should. So, how have they performed on the field? Here are the current division standings, with each team's record against other divisions:

Not too many games have been played yet, but things look about where I would expect them. The top teams are over .500 and the bottom teams are a bit under .500. Combined, this gives us a 21-21 record in non-divisional games. Not really much of a sample, but .500 record against teams from other, supposedly stronger divisions isn't too bad. Let's see how the NL Central's non-divisional record stacks up with the rest of baseball:

So, if you go purely by wins and losses (and why not?), the NL Central is right in the middle. Unlike the divisions behind them in these standings, the NL Central does not have a terrible team dragging them down. The current last-place team, Cincinnati, is tied with Colorado for the best record of any last-place team.

I'll admit that it's still early in the season, but so far, the teams of the NL Central as a whole have been better than a lot of people give them credit for. The Brewers probably won't be a .700 team all season, but the Cardinals haven't played their best yet, the Cubs are just starting to play up to their potential, and the Astros will probably contend for a playoff spot, just as they have for the past 6 years.