Believe it or not, baseball season is just around the corner. Milwaukee Brewers pitchers and catchers report to Spring Training today, and Opening Day is just over six weeks out. After one of the most exciting winters in franchise history and with expectations building around the young team, there’s a lot to talk about.

Kyle Lobner covers the Brewers and Wisconsin Timber Rattlers for a variety of publications (including this one), the T-Rats official site, and his daily “Frosty Mug” round-up on his Twitter account every weekday. Before boarding a plane to Florida, Lobner joined Tyler Maas at Milwaukee Record headquarters to talk about Milwaukee’s busy offseason, needs that must be addressed before the regular season, the drastic improvement of the team’s minor league system, and the sport’s economic flaws. They also reminisced about going to minor league games together and dredged up some forgotten prospects from Brewers past (anyone remember Brad Nelson and Eric Arnett?). It should be noted that this episode was recorded before Milwaukee signed Wade Miley to a minor league deal.

This episode is brought to you by Surly Brewing, a Minnesota-based brewery and the official beer of On The Record. Music used in this episode comes courtesy of Piles (“Blue Glue”) and Platinum Boys (“We Don’t Dance (Anymore)”). Subscribe to On The Record via iTunes or Stitcher (for free!).