DuWayne Steurer

Yeah.... I'm a super strong backer of the decisions Counsell makes most of the time. But this odd insistence of playing Cutch *every single day* almost against right handers is hard to defend. It's not like there's a small sample of data to suggest that he shouldn't be playing vs righties.... it's a solid couple of years now. Same with Hiura, for whatever reason he has reverse splits and while it's still a relatively small sample, there's a large enough sample to start drawing information from, and using that data to make decisions. Stearns and co. have always struck me as a very analytical and data-driven group, so this insistence on ignoring data is puzzling, to say the least.

As long as we have more than a few games cushion on the Cardinals, I'm more than happy to just leave st. louis with a split. It maintains the status quo. Obviously I'd love to sweep or take 3-1, but if they're not gaining ground on us, I'm happy as a clam.

After taking two out of three in San Diego to start their eleven game road trip, the Brewers stop into St. Louis to battle the second place Cardinals in a four game set. The Brewers come into the series with a 3 1/2 game lead, so this could prove to be a crucial early-season test for the Crew. Image courtesy of © Joe Puetz-USA TODAY Sports After taking two out of three in San Diego to start their eleven game road trip, the Brewers stop into St. Louis to battle the second place Cardinals in a four game set. The Brewers come into the series with a 3 1/2 game lead, so this could prove to be a crucial early-season test for the Crew. Game 1, Brewers 4 -- Cardinals 3 https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SLN/SLN202205260.shtml The Brewers sent Eric Lauer to the mound to square off against Adam Wainwright and the Cards in the first game of the series. Luis Urias got the scoring started right away for the Brewers, knocking a solo shot to left center with one out to put the Brewers up 1-0. Tyrone Taylor added a two out run scoring single up the middle to continue his hot hitting and give the Brewers a two run first. Eric Lauer struggled with command most of his start, and gave up two runs to the Cards in the first as well. Christian Yelich knocked in a run in the second inning with an RBI single, but Lauer continued to struggle in the bottom half, allowing two singles and a walk, loading the bases before getting out of the jam, getting Harrison Bader to popout. With the Brewers holding on to a 3-2 lead going into the third, and both starters pitch counts running up quickly, it looked like we were going to have a high scoring, back and forth game for the series opener, but things settled down after the second. Andrew McCutchen would knock in a run in the fourth with an RBI single, but that would close out the scoring. Lauer worked through the fifth after a rocky first two innings, walking just one more batter for his final three innings of work. While his final stat-line looked pedestrian by the high standards he's set in this early season, it was good to see him settle down after the ugly first two innings where he was really scuffling to throw strikes and work an almost completely clean three innings through the fifth. The bullpen held things down until the ninth when Josh Hader, freshly returned from family leave came on to nail down the save. Hader uncharacteristically walked a batter and allowed a single, but ultimately worked through the ninth for the save and the series opening win. Eric Lauer is now 5-1 on the season, and Hader is 16 of 16 in save opportunities. Game 2, Cardinals 4 -- Brewers 2 https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SLN/SLN202205270.shtml In game two of the series, Brandon Woodruff started, going after his sixth win of the season. The Brewers were getting on base early and often, getting five hits and drawing four walks off of Cardinals starter Dakota Hudson, but failed to cash in any of their early run scoring opportunities. The Crew loaded the bases with one out in the third inning, followed by an inning ending double play by Andrew McCutchen. In the fifth inning, the Brewers had the bases juiced with two outs, and McCutchen again grounded out to end the threat. On the other side of things, Brandon Woodruff was cruising along until a two run home run by Paul Goldschmidt in the third put the Cardinals on the board. Throwing warmups in the bottom of the fifth, Woodruff tweaked his ankle, and came out of the game. He gave up just two hits and a walk, one hit being the homerun to Goldschmidt. Woodruff pitched well, so the hope is that the ankle won't keep him out long. Luis Perdomo again pitched well in relief, going two scoreless and striking out a pair, and lowering his E.R.A to 1.74 on the season. Brent Suter pitched the seventh and eighth inning, giving up a pair of runs, putting the Brewers down 4-0. The Brewers mounted a rally in the ninth. Keston Hiura socked a two run homer to dead center field to pull the Brewers within a pair, before Mike Brosseau and Kolten Wong were retired to end the threat. Woodruff's record dropped to 5-3 with the loss. Game 3, Cardinals 8 -- Brewers 3 https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SLN/SLN202205280.shtml Adrian Houser just didn't pitch well today for the Brewers. In four innings, he surrendered nine hits and eight runs, five of them being earned. His defense didn't help him out, but Houser wasn't sharp today. The Cards jumped on Houser for a run in the first, four in the third, and three in the third, with Paul Goldschmidt homering for the third time in three days. After Houser fought to get through four innings, Hoby Milner, Trevor Kelly, and Migael Sanchez finished the back half of the game scoreless, providing a bright spot for the bullpen. The Brewers offense came alive late in the game, with a solo home run by Keston Hiura, his second home run in as many days, and a two run shot by Victor Caratini in the ninth. In the end, it mostly served to make the final look "not quite as bad", but it's good to see Hiura's bat heating up and providing some serious pop. Houser's record drops to 3-5 on the season after taking the loss today. Game 4, Brewers 8 - Cardinals 0 https://www.espn.com/mlb/boxscore/_/gameId/401354947 The Brewers and Corbin Burnes repaid the pounding from the day before with one of their own in the series finale. Burnes was absolutely filthy early, striking out six of the first nine batters, and not allowing a runner on base in the first three innings. Burnes finally allowed a basehit and a walk in the fourth, but snuffed the rally out, and allowed one more base hit in the sixth. On the day, Burnes struck out eleven in seven innings, allowing just two hits and a walk. The Brewers offense helped Burnes out in a big way today, putting eight runs on the board. Omar Narvaez started it out with an RBI double in the second inning, plating Tyrone Taylor. Narvaez had a day, going 3-3, with a double, a triple, a walk, and raising his OPS for the season to a healthy .801. With the Crew hanging on to a 1-0 lead in the fifth inning, the Brewers put a pair of men on base, when Jace Peterson blew the game open. At 4-0, with Burnes on the mound, the Brewers looked like they were in pretty good shape. But the scoring wasn't over. Rowdy Tellez golfed a low inside pitch for his team leading tenth home run of the year. Lorenzo Cain added an infield RBI single in the sixth to make it 6-0 Brewers. On the day, Lorenzo had 3 hits and raised his OPS to .523. Cain's batted ball metrics this season backs up that he hasn't been hitting well. Zero barreled balls, career lows in hard hit percentage and an OPS that had been hovering around the .440 mark for most of the first quarter of the season. With that being said, lets take a look at how the scoring was wrapped up in the four game set today. With the win, Corbin Burnes ups his record to 3-2. WIth the split, the Brewers maintain their 3 1/2 game cushion on the second place Cardinals. After three games in San Diego and four in St. Louis, the Brewers are standing at 4-3 on the road trip, with four games remaining in Chicago against the Cubs. View full article

Well well well......

If it's a 4 run lead, Counsell isn't using Hader

I like the idea from Wong.

I'm ok with it with 2 outs. good relay, good throw to home. It happens.

Jose Altuve is like 5'7" As previously mentioned, Luis Urias is 5'9" Mookie Betts is 5'9" etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Secondly, we're seeing mentioned that great players get picked later in the draft. Yes. But if they're available later in the draft, it's because at this stage of their development (either high school or a few years of college), we don't have enough information to see that future greatness. Nobody knew Corbin Burnes was a future Cy Young winner or he wouldn't have been available in the fourth round. Nobody knew Mike Piazza was even going to make a dent in a 40 man roster some day, or he wouldn't have hung around until, I believe, the 35th round, let alone end up a HOFer. Yes, there are great players that come from the late first round, the 2nd round, the 4th round, and the 11th round, but we don't know those guys are going to be great, or they'd be picked 8th, instead of in the 8th round. The MLB draft is way more of a crapshoot than any other sport (by far!) because of the amount of development these guys still have to go through to reach a point where they're going to contribute to the major league clubs. One can just keep saying "they need to pick a great player with the 27th pick", but repeating it over and over doesn't mean that the guy that ends up being there is going to be a known quantity, or will even sniff a 40 man roster some day. This is a super inexact science.

So, possibly one of the best players in the history of baseball is who we should be looking for at the end of the first round.

It must be a pretty dang serious fantasy football league if Joc Pederson and Tommy Pham are throwing hands over it in May. https://twitter.com/BleacherNation/status/1530366083525398538?s=20&t=pfvgkpPsx1DQ6j5ik6s_GQ

B-R currently has the Cardinals with a .9% higher odds of making the post-season than the Brewers. Odd.

Yeah.... Woody went 6 for 52 with 28 strikeouts last year. I'd just as soon have someone who can hit, hit. The upside of a guy like Woodruff taking a few hacks is definitely outweighed by the risk of getting a Woodruff or Burnes hurt running the bases or tweaking a quad or something swinging a bat. I'm perfectly ok with things how they are now and 100% happy that the possibility of our pitchers hitting the DL because they jammed a shoulder diving into a base or something like that is now (hopefully) 0%

I'll rephrase. regardless of wainright being the opening day starter, mikolas and Hudson are good starters and their rotation is good enough to keep them in contention.

I think mikolas and Hudson slot in ahead of wainright

Well, stadiums are not built to last 50 - 60 plus years anymore. The Brewers have a 30 year lease on American Family Field, and that's going to be up in 2030, which isn't really all that far away. The Rangers only played 25 years in the Ballpark in Arlington, and that was a pretty dang nice field. In keeping that this is the optimism thread..... I'm optimistic that the Brewers are here for longer than the next 8 years. AmFam has aged fairly well, and the team and the ownership group has been fairly pro-active with updating the amenities pretty often. I don't think AmFam needs replacing, but it's probably going to be reaching the point by 2030 that there's some structural things that at least need some looking at.

For all the flack Perdomo takes, (and let's be honest, he's "just a guy"), he did a nice job today in a high leverage situation against a good team.

are we good again??

This is....... not ideal.

Brent Suter, when he's on camera and goofing around seems a bit more natural. Again, maybe I'm wrong, and I'm not even saying I think Suter wants, or should have a future in the booth, but his humor seems more natural. It doesn't feel like he's just trying super hard to get a few chuckles and be "that guy".

Dillards "funny" seems really forced and not all that funny. I feel like he wants to be the new Uecker (maybe I'm wrong!) and he's just trying way too hard, and his stories and personality seem way too try-hard.

He went from a .750 - .800 OPS guy to "can't punch a ball through a wet paper bag". I hope it's more than just going from the juiced ball to not. That's a super steep drop off for a 25 yo.

Grisham's really scuffling. I know we wanna "win" the trade, but I still would like to see him at least be semi-respectable. Hate to see the kid crap out at 25.

Fair enough. Neither of them should (hopefully) get the lion's share of playing time going forward. Cronenworth and Kim are the regular MI for the Padres, and even then, when Tatis gets back, Cano is likely gone. I"m sure he was "just a guy" they grabbed hoping to catch lightning in a bottle for a few games. If it works out, great. If not, they aren't out anything much.

Well, we have a guy with a .450-ish OPS starting more than half the games in center so...