Padres (Canning) vs Brewers (Harrison): 5/14/26, 12:40pm

[yourout]

Heck of a home stand. 

Man I love having Vaughn back.

[BarremlensTSSC]

6 hours ago, BruisedCrew said:

So, today against a journeyman RHP the Brewers have no Yelich or Bauers with Sanchez batting in the cleanup spot. Not exactly putting the best foot forward after a silent night at the plate on Wednesday.

In the month since his last home run, Sanchez has been pretty much deadweight at the plate. In 65 plate appearances he’s put up an OPS of .568. Over the same time period  Joey Ortiz has had 53 plate appearances with an OPS of.584.

 

 

 

Baseball!  Not being critical.  These were all completely rational comments and thoughts at the time.  So of course Sanchez, while he didn't light it up exactly, scored twice, drew a walk and doubled.  

[sveumrules]

4 hours ago, edfunderburk said:

Sincere Question: I’d love to hear from some of you …

Why does Milwaukee bat Chourio in the lead off spot? 

I’ve never thought this was a good idea since he is one of only a few power bats. 

Help it make sense from a baseball perspective. 

Thanks in advance for your feedback. 🙌

The Brewers five best hitters when everyone is healthy are Turang, Contreras, Yelich, Chourio, and Vaughn so ideally they would bat one through five in some order.

Given that Murphy likes to stagger L/R when possible, and three of those guys are righty, and Chourio is the fastest of the three is probably most of the answer. Though for his career Chourio has 532 PA batting second versus 295 PA leading off for whatever that is or isn't worth.

Another wrinkle to maybe consider are the bases empty versus RISP splits of the players in question (all numbers since Chourio's first season in 2024)...

Chourio
MPTY: 693 PA of 118 wRC+
RISP: 274 PA of 121 wRC+

Yelich
MPTY: 533 PA of 119 wRC+
RISP: 280 PA of 147 wRC+

Contreras
MPTY: 811 PA of 109 wRC+
RISP: 432 PA of 142 wRC+

Turang
MPTY: 853 PA of 96 wRC+
RISP: 379 PA of 141 wRC+

Vaughn
MPTY: 134 PA of 155 wRC+
RISP: 96 PA of 162 wRC+

Jackson is fractions off Yelich for the best bases empty production (excluding Vaughn's small sample though he isn't really a typical leadoff candidate anyway) but is considerably lower than the other four with RISP, so that could be another factor playing into things.

A little more zoomed out answer would be that the way the league in general views lineup construction has changed to emphasize getting your best hitters the most plate appearances. League average wRC+ for a leadoff hitter was a couple two tree points higher than league average wRC+ for a cleanup hitter in each of 2023 (111 to 108), 2024 (109 to 106), and 2025 (110 to 108).

[edfunderburk]

1 hour ago, sveumrules said:

The Brewers five best hitters when everyone is healthy are Turang, Contreras, Yelich, Chourio, and Vaughn so ideally they would bat one through five in some order.

Given that Murphy likes to stagger L/R when possible, and three of those guys are righty, and Chourio is the fastest of the three is probably most of the answer. Though for his career Chourio has 532 PA batting second versus 295 PA leading off for whatever that is or isn't worth.

Another wrinkle to maybe consider are the bases empty versus RISP splits of the players in question (all numbers since Chourio's first season in 2024)...

Chourio
MPTY: 693 PA of 118 wRC+
RISP: 274 PA of 121 wRC+

Yelich
MPTY: 533 PA of 119 wRC+
RISP: 280 PA of 147 wRC+

Contreras
MPTY: 811 PA of 109 wRC+
RISP: 432 PA of 142 wRC+

Turang
MPTY: 853 PA of 96 wRC+
RISP: 379 PA of 141 wRC+

Vaughn
MPTY: 134 PA of 155 wRC+
RISP: 96 PA of 162 wRC+

Jackson is fractions off Yelich for the best bases empty production (excluding Vaughn's small sample though he isn't really a typical leadoff candidate anyway) but is considerably lower than the other four with RISP, so that could be another factor playing into things.

A little more zoomed out answer would be that the way the league in general views lineup construction has changed to emphasize getting your best hitters the most plate appearances. League average wRC+ for a leadoff hitter was a couple two tree points higher than league average wRC+ for a cleanup hitter in each of 2023 (111 to 108), 2024 (109 to 106), and 2025 (110 to 108).

Very helpful - thank you!

[Underachiever]

2 hours ago, BarremlensTSSC said:

Baseball!  Not being critical.  These were all completely rational comments and thoughts at the time.  So of course Sanchez, while he didn't light it up exactly, scored twice, drew a walk and doubled.  

Rational, sure. But we have to have a separate Optimism thread because we sure don’t get it in the game threads. Really, people expect the worst. This was a 5-1 home stand against two first-place teams while only giving up TWELVE runs total in those games. Murphy has to manage 162 games and it seems some fans think every game is to be treated as a playoff-clincher. A 1-0 game in May is the perfect time to see if Uribe can go back to back nights. I’m glad the lesson was learned in May, and not October. Because the Brewers are gonna need Uribe to go back-to-back again. They will need everyone on the 26-man roster. So yes, rational, but not fun. 

[owbc]

3 hours ago, Underachiever said:

Rational, sure. But we have to have a separate Optimism thread because we sure don’t get it in the game threads. Really, people expect the worst. This was a 5-1 home stand against two first-place teams while only giving up TWELVE runs total in those games. Murphy has to manage 162 games and it seems some fans think every game is to be treated as a playoff-clincher. A 1-0 game in May is the perfect time to see if Uribe can go back to back nights. I’m glad the lesson was learned in May, and not October. Because the Brewers are gonna need Uribe to go back-to-back again. They will need everyone on the 26-man roster. So yes, rational, but not fun. 

Yep, baseball fans want to win them all but smart bullpen management pays huge dividends in the fall.

I don’t know what the Brewers do but these days load management is often a collaboration between the manager and the FO. Murphy probably has a spreadsheet for who is pitching in different situations and today he likely just went to the “blowout win” column and deployed in the order that was decided before the game even started.