There's been some made about Bill Hall's being DFA'd by the Brewers. Isn't he better than Joe Thurston? I'd like to think so but does anyone really realize how bad Hall has been? He's probably more versatile defensively than Thurston -- and has been a plus defender at every position except 2B in his career -- but he's another right handed bat (to go along w/ Greene) and his K rate is 33.6% this year. It was over 30% last year as well and has been at 28% for his career. His other offensive peripherals aren't really that bad but when you only make contact w/ the ball 2/3 of the time, you're not going to be very effective at the plate. His wOBA this year is .270. Thurston's is .294. I know we'd like to find someone who's better than Thurston but I don't really see Bill Hall as being that guy.
I said it in the game thread but Yadi's poor base running really hurt last night -- to the tune of reducing our likelihood of winning by 11.5%. Some have said that he was deked on one of the 2 plays, though there seems to be no consensus on which of the 2 plays he was deked. Tony admitted to the p-d that Oquendo told him to run home on the fly ball where he was thrown out and that Yadi misheard McKay on the single he tried to stretch into a double. Regardless of the fact that he misheard "NO" as being "GO", that play was in front of him and he should have known to stay at first. It's one thing to be slow. It's entirely another to not recognize your speed and run your team into 2 outs. As I said in the game thread -- 11.5% (Yadi's base running blunders) had a much greater impact on the game's outcome than Motte's pitching did. Still, I've said it several times -- it's reasonable to be concerned about our right handed relief.
Boggs, as bad as he was in innings 1-2 last night -- and it was his worst start of the season so far -- was still better than Wellemeyer's been at least half of the time this year. Boggs's game score was 40 last night -- lowest of the season -- and Wellemeyer's only had 1 game score above 40 since June 17. Wellemeyer has only been as good as Boggs was last night once in nearly 2 months and it was Boggs's worst outing of the season. It's almost inarguable that Boggs is a better option than Wellemeyer at this point, though I still wouldn't mind Hawksworth getting a shot.
Finally, the decision to use Rick Ankiel against Arthur Rhodes last night, rather than Khalil Greene, was a horrendous mistake. Rhodes career splits vs. lefties -- .216/.284/.317 -- and Ankiel is poor vs. lefties. There's just no reason to choose Ankiel there when you have Greene available. Yes, it would've burned an extra player but situations don't get much higher leverage than 2 outs, 2 on in the bottom of the 8th in a 2 run game.