BrewersRaptor Recap: Losing to Royalty and Beating Up Dirty Birds

This week encapsulated baseball perfectly. The Milwaukee Brewers had plenty of lows, but there were so many highs to go along with it. Losing a series isn't ever fun to watch, but you have to remember that there are 162 games every year. 

Are the Kansas City Royals an amazing team this year? Not right now. They also aren't as bad as a lot of people thought, though. They are above .500, at 23-16 after thumping the lousy Angels Thursday night. That's basically the same record as the Brewers and Chicago Cubs, and would be third in the NL Central right now. 

The Royals, like the Brewers, are a small-market team. They haven't had the same recent success as the Crew, but they have won an actual World Series, (Well, two, but one of them was almost 40 years ago, now.) They, like Milwaukee, have a lot of fun and exciting young players. Bobby Witt Jr. just signed an 11-year, $288.7-million contract, and players like Cole Ragans, Maikel Garcia, Vinnie Pasquantino and MJ Melendez form a solid core group. There is a good chance the Brewers and Royals could meet in the World Series in the next few years, though Rob Manfred would walk through Hell in one of the new Nike uniforms to stop it from happening, if he could.

Kansas City Royals Series Highs and Lows
Losing the series obviously wasn't ideal. The series basically came down to the bats going a little too quiet, and the bullpen starting to show their fatigue. Some questionable pitching and lineup changes didn't help things, either.

But if this is what the Brewers will look like at their worst, we can all live with it. It's not the same as being swept by the Oakland Athletics at home last year. These were fun and hard-fought games, for the most part.

In the series opener, you got to see Gary Sánchez start to find his swing with a two-run bomb. We also got to witness a Brewers fan in Kansas City catch multiple home runs and grace our television screens quite a bit. It turns out his name is Jake Starck, who also has caught a bunch of other home run balls in his life.

The second game brought us maybe the coolest moment of the season so far. Top of the 9th, down by two runs and down to their final out. That is when Willy Adames happened.

My goodness, what a shot. Trevor Megill then came in and shut the door very quickly in the bottom of the ninth. It was a game win the team needed badly, and something you never get tired of seeing from Adames. 

Do we have to talk about the finale? Probably not. It was just a sloppy game, and it happens. It's going to happen again. The huge thing was that we saw the return of Christian Yelich. The team is absolutely better with him in there. Even though he didn't record a hit, it was great to see him healthy and playing.

The good thing is that the team didn't lose any real ground in the NL Central, and are still in first place. It's going to be quite a race for a bit against the Cubs, until a team can break away. Manifesting a sweep against the Cardinals wouldn't hurt.

Coming Home to the Cardinals
As I turned off the end of the game to watch "Baby Reindeer," I heard a great stat from Jeff Levering. The Milwaukee Brewers have beated the St. Louis Cardinals nine out of the last 10 times they have faced them.

That makes me happy beyond belief. Did I just jinx the team saying that? Probably. For the longest time, it seemed like the Cardinals had Devil Magic. They were always good. Always competitive. A threat that you couldn't ignore. Even now, seeing them at the bottom of the division at 15-21, I don't believe that they won't be struggling like this forever. But I will take any victory we get from them.

Thursday night's game was so fun to watch. Tobias Myers had another solid outing. He only went four-plus innings, but he also had six strikeouts and allowed only one earned run (thanks to great bullpen support). The offense was suddenly back, in full force. Three runs in the first inning, including a two-run home run from Rhys Hoskins. Another home run in the second from Jake Bauers.

In the third frame, Joey Ortiz hit his third dinger. Yelich had a monster of a second game back from the injured list. He went 3-for-4, with an RBI and a run scored. No strikeouts, either. And then the beautiful final and seventh run in the seventh. Brice Turang hits a single. Then he steals second. William Contreras hits a single to center field that brings Turang home. 

A thing of absolute beauty. That is gorgeous baseball right there. When it comes to a Brewers game, we were conditioned to have home runs or nothing. The offense disappearing at times. Never knowing what the team's identity was. Well, now they have one. Stealing, bunts, fights and playing baseball.

Remember to Enjoy It
Will this team have some rough stretches? For sure. We still don't know what this final rotation will look like. And wouldn't you know it, Robert Gasser makes his major-league debut on Friday, May 10th. Someone was just arguing with me that the team was stupid for not bringing him up earlier. What they failed to mention is that he had an arm injury that landed him on the injured list from late March to late April. But yes, it's the Brewers who are holding him back for "no reason" and "not serious about winning a World Series"

Sorry, went on a tangent there. But the truth is, we still have a lot of baseball left. We will probably see a double-digit number of starting pitchers make multiple starts this year. People keep claiming Milwaukee has too many outfielders, but I'm pretty darn sure I saw Andruw Monasterio and Jake Bauers close a game in the outfield this week. 

There is plenty of time to solidify the rotation and outfield. Yelich is back. Garrett Mitchell is on the way. Tyler Black can be back very soon after a good debut. The future looks bright. Come along for the ride. Because I guarantee you there will be more nights like Thursday against the Cardinals than there will be Wednesday afternoons against the Royals.

Be good people, and Go Brewers. and ALL ABOARD THE BRICE TURANG HYPE TRAIN