Nineteen Games: How the Early Schedule Could Make or Break the 2023 Brewers

Other than the elbow injury to Tyrone Taylor and the shoulder trouble that plagues Aaron Ashby, the Brewers have largely survived spring training with good health. It's a good thing, too, because much about this team's season depends on how they play right away, in the season's first three weeks.

Opening the season at Wrigley Field against the Cubs isn't exactly daunting, but it's an immediate reminder that the Brewers are a bit closer to the middle of the National League pack than they are to the front of it. If the Cubs win that series, it's not only an early indication that they might be more frisky than expected, but also an opportunity missed. The Brewers only get 13 games against the NL Central's lesser lights this year, rather than 19, and they need to make hay while the metaphorical sun is shining. There's also an inherent adversity involved in March and early April baseball in Chicago, where the weather is invariably cold and windy and the skies are always some shade of dark gray.

From there, though, things get much more conventionally tough. The first home series of the season comes against the Mets, who won 101 games last year and believe they can be even better in 2023. Buck Showalter's rigging of the New York rotation to get Justin Verlander the start in the team's home opener later in the week will allow the Brewers to miss Verlander, but they still have to try to hit Max Scherzer in one game of the set, and they'll be the first MLB team to face Kodai Senga in a game that counts. Milwaukee's starting pitchers can match the Mets', but New York is a deep, dangerous team.

Justin Verlander will start the third game of the Mets' season, Buck Showalter said. So he'll be lined up to pitch the home opener at Citi Field. The team wanted to split up him and Opening Day starter Max Scherzer.

— Anthony DiComo (@AnthonyDiComo) March 24, 2023

The Cubs and Mets are just warm-up acts, though, because the first weekend home set the Brewers have is against the co-favorites in the NL Central, the Cardinals. That will be a tremendously fun series--an early clash between two teams who should be fighting for something all year, and our first look at the matchup of the two Contreras brothers behind the plate in heated battle. For that very reason, though, and because this is one of just two home series the Brewers have against their chief rivals this year, losing the series would signal trouble.

Once the Cardinals leave town, so do the Brewers, and the pressure and difficulty only builds. Without a day off, the team flies back to Arizona to face the upstart Diamondbacks, a club in much the same kind of position as the Cubs this year, but with more compelling young players dotting their lineup and rotation. From there, it's on to San Diego, for four games against the team FanGraphs projects to have the best record in the NL this year, and then the West Coast swing wraps up with three games in Seattle, another 2022 playoff team with high hopes for 2023. The 10-game, 10-day road trip is as stern an early test as any team can face, especially given the caliber of the opponents, and it comes right on the heels of some games with naturally heightened leverage in the push for the six playoff spots in the NL.

No team's season is truly made or broken in April, but the Brewers have to start well this year. If they're mired in semi-contention come July, the front office will probably supplement the roster, but they might trade one of Brandon Woodruff, Corbin Burnes, or Willy Adames even while doing so. That's how Matt Arnold thinks, and it's why the first half has disproportionate import for this club. Given that, these 19 games to open the season become more important than usual, on multiple levels.