2022 Brewers Offense

[BuckyBrewer61]

6 hours ago, BuckyBrewer61 said:

One day later...and the Brewers offense now ranks #4 in all of MLB in runs per game.

 

EDIT: Whoops you already pointed that out.  Oh well I'm leaving it here because it's astounding and awesome.

6 hours later…and the Brewers offense now ranks #2 in all of baseball in runs per game.

[stoutdude04]

23 hours ago, markedman5 said:

https://twitter.com/CyrtHogg/status/1522232765449740290?s=20&t=sEhCMJMX7cRmuCeK0zmlQQ

But, why isn't he faster? Should move him down in the order so there isn't a log jam on the bases.

[monty57]

Still a lot of season to play, but it's nice to see the Brewers tied with the Angels and Mets for most runs scored to go along with one of the top pitching staffs in baseball.

I expect an average offense from the Brewers. If they can maintain an above-average offense, they can go far.

Fangraphs has them at 84.9% chance to win the division, 94.2% chance to make the playoffs, and 10.1% chance to win the World Series. 

[owbc]

Rowdy is the Jeromy Burnitz reincarnation that I've been waiting my whole life for. 

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

17 minutes ago, owbc said:

Rowdy is the Jeromy Burnitz reincarnation that I've been waiting my whole life for. 

LOL plus 4 inches and about 65 pounds. Burnitz managed to pack a lot of pop into what wasn't a very big frame.

[Cool Hand Lucroy]

24 minutes ago, owbc said:

Rowdy is the Jeromy Burnitz reincarnation that I've been waiting my whole life for. 

Awesome. Any day I'm reminded of Jeromy Burnitz is a good day.

[Brewcrew82]

2 hours ago, owbc said:

Rowdy is the Jeromy Burnitz reincarnation that I've been waiting my whole life for. 

Man, now you're stirring up the warm fuzzies in me. Jeromy Burnitz was my first Brewers love! Well, him and Richie Sexson. Was so devastated when they traded him to the Mets in what ended up becoming a cost-saving measure. Tried becoming an Alex Ochoa stan thereafter, but, for obvious reasons, it just wasn't the same...Darn you Wendy Selig Prieb!

[MVP2110]

It's super interesting how the people who were clamoring that our offense wasn't good enough aren't here to talk about the #2 offense in MLB 

[mke246]

I'm in the minority, but I still have significant concerns about the offense and think they still should make a move for a big bat. Most middling offenses would probably be in the top 3 offensively if they played our cupcake schedule mostly against the Pirates, Reds, and Cubs.  I still think they're not going to stand a chance against the Dodgers in a playoff series. If they can consistently hold their own against playoff teams, I'll change my mind.

[sveumrules]

The offense is very unlikely to finish the season 1st in runs scored like they are currently or bottom five like they were the first two & a half weeks of the season.

After 162 games they will almost surely finish somewhere in between those two extremes.

FanGraphs currently projects them as the 8th best offense...

https://www.fangraphs.com/depthcharts.aspx?position=Standings

BPro currently projects them as the 5th best offense,,,

https://www.baseballprospectus.com/standings/ 

 

[Brewcrew82]

5 minutes ago, mke246 said:

I'm in the minority, but I still have significant concerns about the offense and think they still should make a move for a big bat. Most middling offenses would probably be in the top 3 offensively if they played our cupcake schedule mostly against the Pirates, Reds, and Cubs.  I still think they're not going to stand a chance against the Dodgers in a playoff series. If they can consistently hold their own against playoff teams, I'll change my mind.

Agree with you to some extent. Our weak schedule has definitely helped, and as presently constituted, I would put this offense in the mid to lower-elite tier of MLB offenses, with a potential Yelich revival being an important X-factor. I also agree that we could still very much stand to benefit from a big bat acquisition (Josh Bell anyone?). With that being said, I would just like to point out that many people said the exact same thing about the 2019 Nationals and 2021 Braves not being able to stand a chance against the Dodgers in a playoff series, and we all know how that turned out. Our pitching alone gives us just as good of a shot as those teams had. Any sustained improvement we get from the offense puts us right up there with the Dodgers in my opinion. 

[MVP2110]

1 hour ago, mke246 said:

I'm in the minority, but I still have significant concerns about the offense and think they still should make a move for a big bat. Most middling offenses would probably be in the top 3 offensively if they played our cupcake schedule mostly against the Pirates, Reds, and Cubs.  I still think they're not going to stand a chance against the Dodgers in a playoff series. If they can consistently hold their own against playoff teams, I'll change my mind.

Fwiw if you take away the games against us the Pirates would actually be above .500 at 10-8. They haven't been terrible this year. 

[TheAnalytics]

1 hour ago, sveumrules said:

FanGraphs currently projects them as the 8th best offense...

https://www.fangraphs.com/depthcharts.aspx?position=Standings

BPro currently projects them as the 5th best offense,,,

https://www.baseballprospectus.com/standings/ 

Somewhere in that second tier of overall team offense seems pretty reasonable to me

[Thurston Fluff]

22 hours ago, mke246 said:

I'm in the minority, but I still have significant concerns about the offense and think they still should make a move for a big bat. Most middling offenses would probably be in the top 3 offensively if they played our cupcake schedule mostly against the Pirates, Reds, and Cubs.  I still think they're not going to stand a chance against the Dodgers in a playoff series. If they can consistently hold their own against playoff teams, I'll change my mind.

Take away the bad teams from any schedule and every team will look worse.

[Robocaller]

Brewers lead the majors in runs scored. but they're 16th in batting, 17th in OBP, 3rd in SLG, and 1st in HR(tied).  So maybe hitting HRs is a really good thing, even if they can't get on base very often.

And before the last 5 games they were barely averaging above 4 runs a game. 28 runs in two games can skew stats a lot.

[JohnBriggs12]

Offense would look even better if Cain wasn't in the lineup 2/3rds of the time.  How much longer do you stick with a 36 year old who's posted an anemic .449 OPS batting against weak opposition?  To make matters worse, he's throwing the ball to uncovered bases and kicking the ball around in the outfield.  Two extra base hits in 70 plate appearances isn't getting it done.  His 2022 salary is a sunk cost.

[DuWayne Steurer]

Adames is hitting like we thought and knew he could.

Yelich is hitting better, and a deeper dive into the data and numbers suggests he could hopefully be an .800-ish OPS guy the rest of the year going forward.  If we get that, I think everyone would at least be satisfied.  Not ecstatic, but satisfied.

Hunter Renfroe is going to be what he is, a low on base blunt force object that hits about 30 dingers and a fair amount of doubles.

Is Rowdy a .950 OPS masher?  Probably not.  What's encouraging is that for the majority of his 1000 or so MLB plate appearances, he has almost completely neutral splits, so as long as he doesn't fall off a cliff, we're going to be ok at 1B.

Urias looks good.  Wong's been hitting better the last two weeks.  The area of concern is obviously CF.  Let's see what happens there, but overall, I think we're ok almost all the way around the field. 

[DoubleSwitch]

On 5/8/2022 at 9:07 AM, JohnBriggs12 said:

Offense would look even better if Cain wasn't in the lineup 2/3rds of the time.  How much longer do you stick with a 36 year old who's posted an anemic .449 OPS batting against weak opposition?  To make matters worse, he's throwing the ball to uncovered bases and kicking the ball around in the outfield.  Two extra base hits in 70 plate appearances isn't getting it done.  His 2022 salary is a sunk cost.

They will go with Cain until Taylor definitively earns the job from him, or deadline season I imagine.

[NBBrewFan]

On 5/8/2022 at 9:07 AM, JohnBriggs12 said:

Offense would look even better if Cain wasn't in the lineup 2/3rds of the time.  How much longer do you stick with a 36 year old who's posted an anemic .449 OPS batting against weak opposition?  To make matters worse, he's throwing the ball to uncovered bases and kicking the ball around in the outfield.  Two extra base hits in 70 plate appearances isn't getting it done.  His 2022 salary is a sunk cost.

Well that new Mets GM (who likely keeps his job when David Stearns becomes available) was smart and dumped Cano because he couldn't justify the benefit of having Cano on the ML roster.  How long did Eric Sogard get penciled into the lineup when he was as bad as Cain?  113 PA before they cut there losses.  Cain is at 73 and he was a big FA signing so they likely will give him longer to fail than Sogard before/if they cut ties.  If he's on the ML roster there's almost no chance CC doesn't run him out there 2/3rds of the game so it has to be Stearns that needs to make the decision.

[NBBrewFan]

Hunter Renfroe has 7 HR for the year including 6 solo HR with 12 RBI.  For comparison Adames has 8 HR/23 RBI, Rowdy has 7 HR/26 RBI and Yelich has 5 HR/20 RBI.  He's had plenty of opportunities to bat with men on base as his LOB = 49 for the season and while Adames and Yelich are consistently at the top of the order, Tellez has been close to Renfroe most of the year. Somebody else commented that he will give you about 30HR and a bunch of doubles, but will some of them be with runners on base?  That's some light hitting.

[sveumrules]

31 minutes ago, NBBrewFan said:

Hunter Renfroe has 7 HR for the year including 6 solo HR with 12 RBI.  For comparison Adames has 8 HR/23 RBI, Rowdy has 7 HR/26 RBI and Yelich has 5 HR/20 RBI.  He's had plenty of opportunities to bat with men on base as his LOB = 49 for the season and while Adames and Yelich are consistently at the top of the order, Tellez has been close to Renfroe most of the year. Somebody else commented that he will give you about 30HR and a bunch of doubles, but will some of them be with runners on base?  That's some light hitting.

So far Renfroe is averaging 9.5 ABs per RBI compared to marks of 5.4, 5.5, 6.9 and 5.9 ABs per RBI the past four seasons.

Sequencing doesn't even out over the course of 162 games, much less at this early juncture in the season, so I don't think there is much predictive power to his current rate.

By the end of the season he will likely regress towards his established mean and be more productive driving runners in.

[Harold Hutchison]

On 5/6/2022 at 12:12 PM, owbc said:

Rowdy is the Jeromy Burnitz reincarnation that I've been waiting my whole life for. 

I think it's like someone crossed Burnitz with Sexson.

We got a big, left-handed hitting first baseman with power.

[monty57]

23 hours ago, NBBrewFan said:

Well that new Mets GM (who likely keeps his job when David Stearns becomes available) was smart and dumped Cano because he couldn't justify the benefit of having Cano on the ML roster.  How long did Eric Sogard get penciled into the lineup when he was as bad as Cain?  113 PA before they cut there losses.  Cain is at 73 and he was a big FA signing so they likely will give him longer to fail than Sogard before/if they cut ties.  If he's on the ML roster there's almost no chance CC doesn't run him out there 2/3rds of the game so it has to be Stearns that needs to make the decision.

I think Counsell is a good manager, and I think that he and Stearns communicate and work together pretty well. Your final sentence hints that there is a lack of trust and/or communication between Stearns and Counsell, and I don't think that's the case. Right now, Cain has 74 ABs and Taylor has 65. While Taylor is hitting better than Cain, he's certainly not hitting so well that he's forcing himself into a starting role.

I'd like to see Taylor named the starter to see what he can do, with Cain finishing out his career as the 4th OF where he can  still provide some value. I think the only way they'd cut him would be if both Taylor and Cain continue to play so poorly that they decide to bring up Mitchell or Frelick as the starter later in the season. In that case, it might make sense to cut Cain and keep Taylor as the backup.

[Outlander]

For those that actually watch minor league games, can Turang actually play a decent CF? Is a Taylor/Turang platoon possible until the deadline if they give up on Cain.

[Brock Beauchamp]

2 hours ago, NBBrewFan said:

Hunter Renfroe has 7 HR for the year including 6 solo HR with 12 RBI.  For comparison Adames has 8 HR/23 RBI, Rowdy has 7 HR/26 RBI and Yelich has 5 HR/20 RBI.  He's had plenty of opportunities to bat with men on base as his LOB = 49 for the season and while Adames and Yelich are consistently at the top of the order, Tellez has been close to Renfroe most of the year. Somebody else commented that he will give you about 30HR and a bunch of doubles, but will some of them be with runners on base?  That's some light hitting.

He has 22 PAs with RISP and 44 PAs with men on base. We're still in microscopic sample size territory.

Strangely though, Renfroe has just a 74 tOPS+ split with RISP in his career. Though that's also probably at least in part due to data noise, as his men on base tOPS+ is 98.

Overall, it's the kind of thing I rarely pay attention to because almost all players end up performing to their career baseline in run-scoring situations.