Brewers 5, Pirates 2: Who's Your Daddy?

Entering the weekend, both the Pirates and the Brewers were limping, and neither seemed especially secure in their grip on the top rungs of the NL Central ladder. By Sunday, the Crew made it clear that they are (at least among these two clubs) the real deal.

Image courtesy of © Jeff Hanisch-USA TODAY Sports

Brewers Video

Box Score

Starting Pitcher: Freddy Peralta - 6.0 IP, 2 H, 2 ER, 3 BB, 9 K, 103 pitches, 58 strikes (56.3%)
Home Runs: None
Top 3 WPA: William Contreras (.456), Jesse Winker (.219), Christian Yelich (.138)
Bottom 3 WPA: Rowdy Tellez (-.258), Owen Miller (-.098), Joey Wiemer (-.093)

Win Probability Chart (via FanGraphs)

Peralta Puts Up Power Performance
Freddy Peralta’s nine strikeouts were incredible to watch over his six innings. He was able to get up to 98.0 mph with his fastball and still reached 96.6 mph on his 100th pitch.

Despite his spectacular strikeout abilities, he still has issues with walks and giving up hard hits. Today’s two earned runs came by way of a two-run homer by Bryan Reynolds, a 415-foot rocket ship that left the bat at 110 mph.

Peralta’s HR/9 and BB/9 currently stand at 1.6 and 3.5, respectively. Compared to the league-average figures of 1.2 and 3.4, Peralta is a subpar pitcher when looking at these figures. He is able to make up for it by having an above-average K/9 figure of 9.9, but his seasonal ERA of 4.60 is not quite what Brewers fans would expect from such a talented player.

Relievers Lock It Up
Hoby Milner, Trevor Megill, and Devin Williams kept up the recent trend of near-invincibility by the Brewers bullpen, pitching three scoreless innings while giving up just two hits and zero walks.

Williams, in particular, chose to lean on his four-seam fastball today, instead of his usual changeup, using the Airbender just twice. After a three-pitch strikeout of Carlos Santana, he threw five consecutive four-seamers to Connor Joe, striking him out with an off-speed pitch. After getting Tucupita Marcano to fly out, he was able to get his 12th save of the season.

Turns Out The Brewers Can Indeed Hit Baseballs
After the Pirates took an early 2-0 lead in the third inning, it seemed like this game would be another episode of Milwaukee’s often disappointing offense. In the fifth inning, the Brewers would score on a Jesse Winker RBI single, but it seemed like a futile effort. For the whole season, the Brewers seemed to really struggle in the second half of games. The eighth inning was a welcome twist.

The Brewers started with two consecutive walks by Winker and Willy Adames. A William Contreras single pushed home Winker to tie the game at 2-2, before another walk by Owen Miller loaded the bases.

Raimel Tapia hit a go-ahead sacrifice fly to record the second out and put the score at 3-2. Finally, a crucial single by Luis Urias would score Contreras and Miller, putting the Brewers in a dominant position at 5-2 heading into the ninth inning.

What’s Next?
While this series sweep was crucial for creating separation between the Brewers and the Pirates in the NL Central standings, the Cincinnati Reds have become the new threat, dominating the Astros and completing a sweep this past weekend to stay just 0.5 games behind Milwaukee for the division lead.

Corbin Burnes will make the start tomorrow at home against Merrill Kelly of the Arizona Diamondbacks, while the Reds will start a series against the (likely) less challenging Colorado Rockies.

Postgame Interviews

Bullpen Usage Spreadsheet