The Brewers Are Not a Slugging Team, but They're Flashing Some of the Power They'll Need in October

The Brewers look like an unstoppable machine right now. Winners of 11 straight – their second such streak this year, making them the 13th team all-time to do it multiple times in a season – Milwaukee owns the best record in baseball by 5 1/2 games and leads the NL Central by 7 1/2 games.

They keep winning by doing so many things well. They pitch. They play defense. They reach base and then take extra bases on balls in play. The Brewers have allowed the second-fewest runs in baseball and rank fifth in fielding run value, third in on-base percentage, and first in baserunning runs above average.

All of those attributes were on display as the Brewers clobbered the Pittsburgh Pirates in a 14-0 blowout on Tuesday night. So, too, was more pop than they had shown at arguably any point in the year – the offense combined to hit a season-high five home runs.

If there's been a knock to make against an otherwise well-oiled unit, it's a lack of home run power. The Brewers are 20th in isolated power and 18th in home runs. That has changed this month, as the Crew have hit a league-leading 23 home runs in August. While not the leading reason for their string of offensive outbursts, putting more balls over the fence has played a role.

The contributions have come throughout the lineup. Brice Turang and Sal Frelick have doubled their combined power output from a year ago. Andrew Vaughn and Christian Yelich are supplying thump in the middle of the order. With restored bat speed, William Contreras is scalding the ball again and has gone deep four times this month.

While Turang acknowledged that he has made some adjustments to transfer his raw power into games, the Brewers maintain that, on the whole, the long ball is not a significant piece of their identity.

"I don't think we're going to fool anybody with a bunch of slug, but usually homers are thrown," Pat Murphy said. "That's the way it is, you know? You don't create slug on balls on the edge or something like that. Homers are thrown, and it's taking advantage of it when [they are] thrown."

"Homers are bonuses," Frelick said. "When we stick to our approach and put good at-bats together, that's when those home run pitches show up. So I think [the recent home runs are] a product of that."

To their credit, the Brewers are doing more damage against home run pitches this month. Their slugging percentage and hard-hit rate on pitches labeled by Statcast as over the heart of the plate are higher in August than in any previous month this year.

Even if the power surge is not by design, it's a development worth monitoring. While the Brewers' strengths in other areas mean they need not be an elite home run team to win, the reality remains that decent slugging ability is typically a prerequisite for making noise in October. In recent postseasons, teams that hit the most home runs in a game have boasted winning percentages approaching .800; only six of the last 25 World Series winners finished in the bottom half of the league in regular-season home runs, and none since the 2015 Royals.

Winning requires scoring more runs than the opponent, and home runs are the most efficient means of scoring. They're also the only outcome that cannot be affected by defense or batted ball luck in a small sample. Given the profiles of most of their hitters, the Brewers should not be trying to hit home runs. Their existing approach is the most productive for the players they have. They do, however, need the ability to drive a mistake pitch when the opportunity presents itself. If they can do that on top of the many existing strengths that separate them from other teams, look out.