Brewers (Misiorowski) vs Cubs (Brown): 5/19/26, 6:40pm

[Cool Hand Lucroy]

1 hour ago, MoreTrife said:

Interesting issue. Joey O is hitting 259/344/444/788 last 14 days. Hamilton .440 OPS and Rengifo under .600 OPS. The problem is we're playing well as a team and I would imagine it is hard to upset the apple cart when we have momentum. 

I wouldn't send down Joey O for Pratt or Williams. I know that offense stinks, but the guy's glove has value on this roster, and we've seen it over and over and over. Rengifo/Hamilton seem like better options. We're paying Rengifo, so maybe he gets a longer leash. Hamilton has options, though, and doesn't seem to offer much aside from being a good bunter/pinch-runner. That's a good postseason roster option, but seems like he'd be an easy send to Nashville.

[cragi]

4 minutes ago, adambr2 said:

Hamilton can still be optioned, though. They’re big believers in roster flexibility.

my thoughts as well. seems its Hamilton next. Hamilton's primary value is as a pinch runner right now. They arent likely to walk away as quickly from a $3.5m investment in Rengifro until one proves clearly better than the other.

[Playing Catch]

1 hour ago, adambr2 said:

No, just because a lot of people predicted the Cubs to win the division (which could obviously still happen) doesn’t mean the Brewers are being overlooked, disrespected, and “no one knows our names.”

It just means the division is very strong and only one team can win it.

I agree that anyone that pays attention to baseball is rolling their eyes each time Murph says stuff like this. But Murphy was responding to a Cubs beat reporter's question. Murph wasn't talking to people that pay attention to baseball. He was talking to Cubs fans.

[BarremlensTSSC]

4 hours ago, Underachiever said:

Brown has been really good against the Brewers. He threw 7 no-hit innings against them in 2024, He has a 2-0 record with an ERA of 1.00 and 19 strikeouts in 3 appearances (18 innings) versus the Brewers in his career.

So you're saying we're due against Brown.  Got it.😂

[adambr2]

11 minutes ago, Playing Catch said:

I agree that anyone that pays attention to baseball is rolling their eyes each time Murph says stuff like this. But Murphy was responding to a Cubs beat reporter's question. Murph wasn't talking to people that pay attention to baseball. He was talking to Cubs fans.

If that’s the case, to be fair they can’t typically name more than 5 of their own guys. 

[BarremlensTSSC]

2 hours ago, MoreTrife said:

Interesting issue. Joey O is hitting 259/344/444/788 last 14 days. Hamilton .440 OPS and Rengifo under .600 OPS. The problem is we're playing well as a team and I would imagine it is hard to upset the apple cart when we have momentum. 

Hamilton has an option left so he can be sent down if they decide to give Williams or Pratt a shot.  Rengifo is tougher because he's out of options and they'd have to DFA him.  I know a lot of folks think that's no great loss and I get it but I just don't think they're ready to give up on him yet given his 2026 BABIP is .50 below his career average even though his average exit velocity is right on par with what he's done historically.  He can't make bonehead outs on the bases when the play is right in front of him (which he did last night), but he plays 3B pretty well and the underlying numbers suggest he's still due for some positive regression (which a week ago looked like it was well underway).

If it were up to me I'd option Hamilton to AAA and bring up Williams while leaving Pratt to hit every day at AAA, and I'd probably give Rengifo a few more weeks at a minimum.

[Underachiever]

1 hour ago, liveforoctober said:

Can I ask why? Being disrespected is such a big motivator to perform. If it doesn't happen naturally and you can manufacture it yourself to give yourself an edge .. isn't that a good thing?

Michael Jordan was the king at creating fake disrespect from an opponent to light his own fire.

And I find it amusing. Because it's manufactured. Neil Brennan says it best. 

 

[StearnsFTW]

48 minutes ago, adambr2 said:

Hamilton can still be optioned, though. They’re big believers in roster flexibility.

Please, for the love of God, option him.

 

I've had enough of him for one lifetime.

[jay87shot]

1 hour ago, tmwiese55 said:

True.  We know Murph loves Hamilton so he isn't going anywhere. We know how much they value Ortiz D and he's been ok lately at O.  Which leaves Rengifo as the likely guy they'd dfa for one of the prospects, being a brand new guy to the team this year you'd think he'd be one of the guys that least upsets the cart.   

Still, Jett has been playing 3B in the minors and chances are they won't bring him up until mid June with the super 2 date.  So these vets are likely going to get a few more weeks to show something (or someone gets hurt) unless we think they'd bring up Pratt and put him or Joey at 3B after not playing there all year which seems unlike the Brewers.

I think bringing up Jett wouldn't mean one of those guys needs to get sent down. Jett can play IF and OF so Perkins could go down. Jett could be slowly easied into everyday work at SS or 3B and mixed into the OF to keep his playing time up the 1st couple weeks. I don't remember where the super 2 general date falls (I know it changes year to year) but if that is within the next month or so it might be smart to be patient.

[BarremlensTSSC]

57 minutes ago, Cool Hand Lucroy said:

I wouldn't send down Joey O for Pratt or Williams. I know that offense stinks, but the guy's glove has value on this roster, and we've seen it over and over and over. Rengifo/Hamilton seem like better options. We're paying Rengifo, so maybe he gets a longer leash. Hamilton has options, though, and doesn't seem to offer much aside from being a good bunter/pinch-runner. That's a good postseason roster option, but seems like he'd be an easy send to Nashville.

I should have read on before I replied to an earlier comment.  CHL said it better and shorter. 😂

 

[AKCheesehead]

26 minutes ago, adambr2 said:

If that’s the case, to be fair they can’t typically name more than 5 of their own guys. 

And they often cannot tell the difference between these: 

 

[adambr2]

1 hour ago, Cool Hand Lucroy said:

I wouldn't send down Joey O for Pratt or Williams. I know that offense stinks, but the guy's glove has value on this roster, and we've seen it over and over and over. Rengifo/Hamilton seem like better options. We're paying Rengifo, so maybe he gets a longer leash. Hamilton has options, though, and doesn't seem to offer much aside from being a good bunter/pinch-runner. That's a good postseason roster option, but seems like he'd be an easy send to Nashville.

Isn’t Pratt’s glove at SS considered best of the best?

[BruisedCrew]

2 hours ago, sveumrules said:

During this current 14 W - 5 L stretch the Brewers are on they've had Perkins (18 PA of -53 wRC+), Sanchez (39 PA of 54 wRC+), Hamilton (47 PA of 55 wRC+), Mitchell (63 PA of 63 wRC+), and Rengifo (65 PA of 71 wRC+) acting as varying degrees of boat anchors. Sal (74 PA of 86 wRC+) and Joey (45 PA of 90 wRC+) have been below average too but at least closer to respectability.

The rest of the offense has been good enough to render all that essentially moot though with a 109 wRC+ (4th) and scoring 5.26 R/G (2nd) over the past 19 games.

Of course the pitchers running the gauntlet with a 2.34 ERA | 2.77 xERA | 2.69 FIP | 3.02 SIERA | 30.2 K% | 0.59 HR9 | 1.06 WHIP | 81.4 LOB% (all of which are best in MLB over the last 19 games) has helped too.

Put it all together and that's a +53 run differential over these last 19 games.

Because there are often threads on this board inviting predictions for a given month, I was looking yesterday at the team’s performance for the month of May which is on track to significantly exceed my expectation, 

I was noting that the offense had been pretty pedestrian at 4.14 RPG while the run prevention has been exceptional at 2.5 runs per game. Yesterday’s 9 runs gave a little boost to the RPG but it is still closer to a league average.

My conclusion is that the 10-4, now 11-4 record is largely a result of exceptional pitching and enough offense to take advantage.

.The average of 5.26 runs per game that you site is, of course, helped out significantly by the two 13 run games against Arizona that came in the last 4 games of April. The May average is now up to 4,46 and the run differential +29. 

[Team Canada]

13 minutes ago, adambr2 said:

Isn’t Pratt’s glove at SS considered best of the best?

Best of the SS prospects, but I assume Ortiz is still better by some margin.