Former Brewers skinflint Bud Selig made yet another faux pas when he sent the Astros to play the Division Champion Cubs in a "neutral" facility, our own Miller Park. Selig was trying to rectify the situation caused by Hurricane Ike, which prevented games from being played at Minute Maid Park in Houston. After his questionable decision to call a tie in the Milwaukee All-Star Game, Selig made more than a few enemies among MLB fans. Since the Cubs won both of those games at Miller Park, there have been...

The Observers prepared for their weekly get-together with intense workouts of their channel-changing fingers. Three hours of bouncing between the Packers’ game in Detroit and the Brewers’ continuing meltdown in Philadelphia made their mission clear: Look on the bright side by avoiding all mention of baseball.

I recently finished a book on Ted Williams, one of the purest hitters in Major League history. The book, Reflections on a Splendid Life, was written by Lawrence Baldassaro, a local professor and baseball wordsmith. Williams ended up with a .344 career batting average and remains the only player to hit more than .400 in a single season. In a scenario Hollywood couldn't plausibly create, Williams was offered the chance to sit out the last home games with Red Sox in 1941 to preserve the average.

There wasn't a whole lot of middle-ground when it came to emotions regarding Brewers former manager Ned Yost. You either liked him, or you really loathed the guy. Regardless of how you felt, you can't deny the man stuck to his guns and never apologized for his work or motives, even as the door was hitting him on the way out.

MELVIN: “I’m offering you a chance to manage in the Bigs!” SVEUM: “Hang on will ya? I got a guy on the other line about some white-walls.”

Before getting together this time, the Observers split their forces. Frank was at Miller Park for the Brewers’ series finale against San Diego while Artie, battling some kind of creeping croup, remained at Central Command to monitor Brett Favre’s regular-season debut with the New York Jets.

If these two ever had a child together, I'd want to be the adoptive father. Brewers' superstar recently shot a commercial for a Remington hair-care product in Brookfield with supermodel Marisa Miller. The set: the baseball field behind Brookfield East High School. The stars: Braun and Miller. What's it like to be approached for a television commercial, especially with all the ribbing that goes on among players? "There's been a little jealousy," Braun joked in the clubhouse recently, "It was a good time."

CC Sabathia threw a wicked breaking pitch at the Observers. Hours after they left their home bench—encouraged by an unappreciative panhandler—the Brewers’ hefty lefty shut out Pittsburgh on one hit. Then the Brewers lobbied Major League Baseball to erase the hit, which involved Sabathia’s barehanded muff of a roller, and change it to an error.

It still felt like summer when the Observers met on their favorite park bench to chat. But the NFL and NCAA say it’s football time, so the Observers got to the main task of pundits: making predictions and hoping no one remembers them when they prove wrong. Frank: The Packers were 1-3 in the preseason, but this is what matters...

I just don't understand the appeal. NASCAR espouses roots in the Southeastern United States, and it's grown to become the second-most popular professional sport in terms of television ratings in the U.S., ranking behind the NFL.