So whatever happened to that minor league team coming to Waukesha?

I thought about it last evening when I was at Frame Park watching the Badgerland Ski Team perform. There was also a high school baseball game going on and a Christian gathering at the same time.

Needless to say parking was at a premium. And there wasn’t anywhere near the 3,000 that was projected for the new team when they played. At least according to my poor estimating skills.

Not all parking areas were being used. I doubt that lot at the corner of White Rock and Niagara was being used. And there may have been some other places.

But every where else was pretty much full.

So anyway, back to the team. We know that initially the recession kept them from expanding. The team still has a web site, although there is no mention of Waukesha in the Northwoods League’s expansion plans.

And then I thought, “Hey, I bet James has some news,” and sure enough, I found this,

“The plans are on hold until at least 2011. Mayor Larry Nelson said he has conversed with Chad Bauer, who is to build the stadium for a Northwoods League baseball team. Bauer has not secured financing to build the stadium. Even if he does Nelson said the stadium would not be ready for baseball until 2011. The Common Council has to re-approve an agreement with Bauer in order for the stadium to be built.”

So there you have it. Bauer has to come up with financing and Common Council has to re-approve.

I don’t think that will be happening any time soon.

San Diego writers on Hoffman

Both said it was the money. First,

Even after 554 saves, it’s hard to justify paying a pitcher who worked 45 1/3 innings last season nearly 10 percent of a last-place team’s payroll. It would be like using Krugerrands to balance the legs of a wobbly kitchen table, or renting a Porsche to deliver pizza.

Second,

The Padres, under a mandate by owner John Moores to reduce payroll by about 40 percent, did not make another offer to Hoffman. If the 41-year-old pitcher passes a physical next week, the end of his Padres tenure will be official.

And they had a closer in the wings,

Padres manager Bud Black has said that Heath Bell, the team’s eighth-inning specialist, likely would move into the closer’s job in 2009.

He also brings intangibles,

“We are losing a guy that is a professional at a level that is over and above anybody else,” [Padres trainer Todd] Hutcheson said. “I have seen it in this clubhouse, the way he goes about his business and relates to people. We are going to miss him a lot. There is going to be a big void here.”

And

Padres pitcher Chris Young said, …”He set a great example for a lot of people, had a very positive impact on a lot of guys’ careers, whether he knows it or not. He is really going to be genuinely missed.”

Linking to lefties for a change

Because, well, I agreed with them.

Fighting Bob – GarveyBlog (via The Provincial Emails)

Bud–get out of Vegas; hire some people who like fans; jump into the 20th century.

Keith R. Schmitz at folkbum’s rambles and rants

In these days of longer commutes and simmering tempers, nothing seems to set off already-testy motorists like the left-lane camper — the guy or gal who drives in the passing lane and bars faster drivers from easily passing.

CAFFEINATED POLITICS – This guy is hard on conservatives, but he has a bunch of posts on
Blagojevich, including one with the front pages of many newspapers!

Snopes.com can’t determine if this is true or not, but Tim at The Other Side of My Mouth posts a darn funny story that I’ve seen before.

Live blogging the World Series

I gave it a thought, but, one, I have too much to do while it’s on and, two, I didn’t want to subject my Milwaukee readers to it.

Waukesha Carnival

Welcome to this week’s edition, the thirty-eighth dating back to September 16 of last year. This is where I share the links of noteworthy posts of the preceding week. Feel free to share other posts in the comments.

Let’s see what we have locally.

OK, this has nothing to do with the free mug I got at Drinking Right, but those of you who have met or read JJ Gravelle at The Daily Scoff, just knew that he would deal with the New Berlin-Pewaukee urination bruhaha in a tasteful and sensitive way.

Continuing in the sports vein, Dan at Skeptics Anonymous thinks last season was a pretty good one for the Brewers.

Scott Berg at his blog 359 Degrees talks about the Brookfield city Finance Committee meeting.

Josh at Blog Waukesha wonders Is there competition to Kramer? as he blogs on the race for the 97th district of the Wisconsin Assembly.

If you don’t go to Spring City Chronicle for Huckleberry Dumbell’s daily news summaries or his Sunday Scans, you should at least go for his ghost blogging and poetry which he combines here. And it’s annotated!

James Wigderson blogs at Wigderson Library & Pub about his weekly column in the Waukesha Freeman (always worth the 50 cents) where he blogs about free speech.

silent E speaks about a great piece by Michelle Malkin he read concerning Joe the plumber.

Cindy Kilkenny at Fairly Conservative fact checks the factcheckers in her post Why you should never trust CNN.

Alex at Hobo Springs is relieved McCain is finally saying he’s not George Bush.

And Kyle Prast maintains at Practically Speaking that the presidential election is not over yet.

MommaBlogger shares a recipe for Apple Grilled Cheese at Homemaker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

State Sen. Mary Lazich (aide Kevin Fischer?) compares abortion to light bulbs in this post, Pro-choice, but not about light bulbs at Conservatively Speaking.

Similarly, at Common Sense Waukesha, Dean Culver posts his thoughts on Liberal Hypocrites.

Finally, to post only on gloom is just not right. Dad29 cures that with some bank humor.

That concludes this week’s edition. You can always submit your favorite post of the week using this submission form. Or you can e-mail it directly to me at thoughtfulconsevative [at] yahoo [dot] com. Or put it in the comments of this post.

Past and future editions can be found on our here for your perusal.

The Waukesha Carnival 10/5/2008

Welcome to edition 42 of the carnival. For the newbies, a carnival is a round-up of blog posts usually with a theme. A list of carnivals can be found at the blog carnival web site. Blog carnivals usually have posts around a thematic or geographic basis.

This one will have to be quick and dirty, because this post is late and it’s getting late.

Scott Berg has a post on Brookfield’s 2009 budget.

The Asian Badger looks at the Senate version (that eventually became law) of the Bailout Recovery Plan.

State Senator Mary Lazich informs us that the state can’t collect on the breaches of privacy in the Social Security mess.

Dad29 gives us more good news (NOT!) on the likelihood of higher electric bills.

Cindy Kilkenny steps aside and lets Son Number 2 speak.

Alexander reported on the last Blog n Grog. I learned more in that short evening than I had in my whole life previously, it seems.

Kyle Prast keys on Democrats charitable donations and their view of the rich paying more taxes.

Along those lines, silent e has some advice for the governator.

Spring City Chronicle has an exclusive drawing of the proposed baseball park at Frame Park. We find that the proposed name is Larry Nelson Stadium.

Yorick’s Persiflage had a look at the Biden-Palin event.

That’s it for this week. Sorry for the bare bones look.

You can always submit something here. or send it to me at thoughtfulconservative [at] yahoo [dot] com. Past posts can be found here.