How 2023 Brewers Players Have Performed in Past Postseasons

[Jason Wang]

Players don’t always perform the same during the regular season and the postseason. The added pressure of elimination can sometimes be overwhelming. Thankfully, the Brewers are fortunate to have several guys that have been able to step up to the plate when the lights are the brightest.

Image courtesy of Brock Beauchamp & Brewer Fanatic

Having suffered the heat of those October spotlights can temper and harden a player, and the Brewers' previous forays into the postseason under Craig Counsell have done some of that firing already. Here are the guys to whom younger players can turn for insight on the experience ahead, and whom Counsell can trust most to know and manage the moment.

Corbin Burnes
The team's ace has pitched in a total of three playoff series. Coming out of the bullpen in his rookie year, he made two relief appearances against the Rockies in the 2018 NLDS, pitching four shutout innings and giving up just one hit along the way. In the NLCS against the Dodgers, he gave up two earned runs in five innings. 2021 was Burnes’ first year as a playoff starter, pitching six shutout innings against the eventual world champion Braves. 

Overall, he’s got a pretty stellar 1.20 ERA and 0.67 WHIP, but over just 15 innings. 2021 was also his Cy Young year, and his 2023 has been a step back from that season, but this year’s peaks have been as good as he's been in any season. With his combination of stuff, command, and stamina, look for Burnes to be an integral piece of the Milwaukee playoff run.

Brandon Woodruff
Having one of the best regular seasons of his career thus far (well, when he's been available, anyway), it can be easy to forget that Woodruff has also made great starts in the postseason. He pitched alongside Burnes in the 2018 NLDS and NLCS, pitching 12 1/3 innings. Most notably, he pitched 9 ⅓ innings against the Dodgers, giving up just three earned runs.

Because of Burnes’s struggles in 2019 and his oblique strain late in 2020, Woodruff picked up the slack, and has nearly twice as much as his rotation mate in the playoffs, posting a cumulative 3.18 ERA and 0.85 WHIP over 28 1/3 innings pitched. He’s been nothing short of incredible since returning from the IL, and there doesn’t seem to be any reason for that momentum to stop any time soon.

Carlos Santana 
A veteran clubhouse presence, Santana has put together 120 postseason plate appearances and an OPS of .681 over the course of his lengthy major-league career. While his best years are undoubtedly behind him, he managed to turn back the clock in last year’s AL Wild Card round.

Over nine plate appearances with the Mariners, Santana slashed .250/.333/.750 against the Blue Jays and hit a clutch three-run homer when his team was faced with elimination. This kickstarted a momentous rally that saw Seattle overcome a six-run deficit and punch their ticket to the ALDS. 

Santana has been right about league-average offensively since coming over from Pittsburgh, but given how young this Brewers team is, he’s one of the few players with robust October baseball experience. Both his bat and his leadership will be key tools.

Josh Donaldson
Okay, hear me out. Since arriving in Milwaukee, fans have seen an immediate uptick in offensive performance over his time in New York. Like Joey Gallo and Aaron Hicks before him, it seems like New York was the problem for Donaldson--or at least part of it.

He’s got even more playoff experience than Santana, putting together 203 plate appearances and a slash line of .246/.335/.397 over 12 series played. Sure, his OPS of .732 is inflated by some monstrous runs with the Blue Jays in his younger years, but who’s to say there isn’t still some of the old “Bringer of Rain” somewhere in there?

Furthermore, while he’s not remotely qualified given the amount of time missed to injury, his limited Savant data shows that he’s still hitting the ball hard and walking at an exceptional rate. Don’t expect him to put the entire team on his back, but his experience and intensity might be enough to push the Brewers over the edge.

That's not a comprehensive list of the players on the roster who have experience in the postseason, but these four guys have played there the most and the best. They're the ones to whom Sal Frelick or Abner Uribe can turn for advice on the different dynamics of high-stakes baseball. After that, it's up to everyone to perform for themselves, and to write their own heroic October legacies.

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[Outlander]

One guy not mentioned is Devin Williams. It seems like the Brewers make the playoffs every year but due to injury or other issues Williams has never been able to make an appearance. Crossing my fingers nothing happens between now and the playoffs.

[Team Canada]

2 hours ago, Jason Wang said:

Players don’t always perform the same during the regular season and the postseason. The added pressure of elimination can sometimes be overwhelming.

I think the more correct way to say this is: It's a really small sample size and so any conclusion about postseason clutchness is probably a fool's errand.

[Jake McKibbin]

3 hours ago, Team Canada said:

I think the more correct way to say this is: It's a really small sample size and so any conclusion about postseason clutchness is probably a fool's errand.

I feel like the point of language is to convey ones intended meaning. As such I think both ways are coherent and acceptably written ways of producing the same desired effect

[CheezWizHed]

Obviously, Craig Counsell has extensive playoff experience. It would be interesting to see what the other coaches have for experience as a player or coach in the playoffs.

[Team Canada]

9 hours ago, Jake McKibbin said:

I feel like the point of language is to convey ones intended meaning. As such I think both ways are coherent and acceptably written ways of producing the same desired effect

Ok, so my response was a roundabout way of saying I disagree. Obviously the words he chose conveyed his intended meaning, which I think is quite different from my argument. "Players are overwhelmed by the moment" is pretty much the opposite of what I'm claiming.

[Brock Beauchamp]

On 9/20/2023 at 12:17 AM, Team Canada said:

Ok, so my response was a roundabout way of saying I disagree. Obviously the words he chose conveyed his intended meaning, which I think is quite different from my argument. "Players are overwhelmed by the moment" is pretty much the opposite of what I'm claiming.

You don't think some players are anti-clutch? I do. I think the number is exaggerated by fans and players are hard to identify in the moment but there are plenty of pitchers in baseball who just seem incapable of handling the ninth inning but are good middle men. I think the same could apply to the postseason but it's damned hard to identify those players in the moment, largely due to sample sizes.