The stache

I would also make one more point. Like Yellich, who will miss a big chunk of the season, Betts was very hot at the end. In fact, scorching hot. He played out of his mind. Over his last 20 games, 69 at bats, he hit a whopping .377, with 20 runs scored, 26 hits (9 doubles, 3 home runs), and slashed .482 OBP/.638 SLG/1.120 OPS. His WPA over that stretch was 0.974. I agree with you all that old school thinking will look at the number of games played, and hold it against Yelich. But in my opinion, that's flawed thinking. Bellinger typically bats cleanup, and Yelich second (which makes his 97 RBI in 130 games all the more impressive). So, Yelich will get a few more plate appearances simply because of where he bats in the order. Logic might also say that the Dodgers score nearly three-quarters of a run more per game, so that advantage is largely negated. Bottom line, with all the games Yeli has missed, Bellinger only has 25 more plate appearances. That's 4-5 games worth. Bellinger is going to get approximately 100-110 more plate appearances over the course of the year. Even if he rebounds the last 20 games of the season, can he possibly bridge the huge gap in performance between the two? I don't see how Cody Bellinger for 153 or 154 games is more valuable to the Dodgers than Christian Yelich is for 130 games as a Brewer. Remember, Yelich's WPA advantage for the season is nearly 43%. That's a ridiculous gap. All things considered, hitting for average, getting on base, hitting for power, creating runs, stealing bases, playing defense, Yelich does far more, in the aggregate, to help his team win.

Right. Mookie Betts won the American League just last year; he played 136 games. 26 games missed is a month. Got any more arguments you want to send over, guys? Even with 32 games missed, Yelich will probably have a higher WAR, per Fangraphs, than Bellinger. And, Bellinger has been a wet fart of late. I'm not impressed by his putting on a nice clean Dodgers uniform if he's not helping his team win. Showing up to increase the total for your games played does nothing to alter the argument. In fact, the Dodgers would probably have been better off had Bellinger sat on his rear end the last 8 games-he's batting .185 over those 8 games, with a WPA of -0.079. The last 21 games (one-eight of a season), he's hitting .214, slashing .360 OBP/.400 SLG/.760 OPS. He's been below league AVG during what would usually be the most critical time of the year. He's not killing his team simply because the Dodgers are so good. You need to be less hostile towards your compadres here. We agree he should be MVP, we're trying to tell you why he won't. Betts didn't miss the last month of the season. Should that matter? Probably not, but it is what it is. It's a subjective award. And I understand what you're telling me. If discrediting your statement comes across as being hostile, then I apologize. But there was no intended hostility on my part. I wasn't attacking you, or being flippant, in any way. In fact, when I typed it out, I was smiling. It was the kind of banter people might engage in at the sports bar. That's how I meant it when I said, "any more you guys want to send over?" I saw it as the kind of observation a voter might make without actually looking at the facts. My friends used to do the same kind of thing when we'd watch football. The problem is, beyond this forum, we don't know each other. Our idiosyncrasies, our sense of humor, etc, is largely unknown. I'll be more careful to think about how what I'm saying might be perceived. I was calling into question the veracity of your statement. Nothing more. Again, I apologize.

Disagree, Baez faded badly down the stretch. Market size makes ALL THE DIFFERENCE. And Hollywood adds even more bias. Braun also won over Kemp with similar numbers. The big market argument just doesn't hold up. Braun was also performing in a pennant race. Kemp's Dodgers had been out of it by a couple of months into the season. Braun performing in the heat of a pennant race is far more impressive, to me, than putting up what were essentially empty numbers. When you go to the plate with runners on, and don't have to worry about winning or losing as it pertains to trying to make the playoffs, it's a lot easier to play.

I wasn't grumpy as hell at all. You posted "no" five minutes after I clicked "post". There's no way you could have read, and absorbed, what I wrote, in that short a period of time. You went with your gut instead of reading heavily compelling evidence to the contrary. I asked you to make an argument in favor of the guy that you have basically given the MVP to, his play be damned. And I'm still waiting. I'm not vested in Yelich's winning at all. I don't get a cookie if Christian Yelich wins the MVP. He's not sending a limo to come pick me up, and we're not gonna party like it's 1999. This is a facts based analysis of why Christian Yelich should be the overwhelming favorite to win the MVP again. The new "flavor of the month" guy, Anthony Rendon, doesn't compare, either. If the only argument to be made is "Bellinger isn't missing 32 games", does he get an award because he suited up, and stood out there in the outfield? I've demonstrated that he's done virtually nothing, of late. Look at the second half split comparison. Yelich has played at an MVP level since the break. Bellinger has not. All Star, yes, although a .900 OPS, given the ridiculous life to the ball this season, doesn't impress me the same way a .900 OPS in 1985 might have. Context is important. Look at his second half performance relative to the whole league. While I don't have the data for the National League's OPS for just the second half, one would assume that it's fairly constant. The National League composite OPS for 2019 is .756. (.324 OBP/.433 SLG). Now, I understand that this calculator has some room for error, but then again, there's no universal formula for WAR, anyway. Using the data I just listed for the NL's composite OBP and SLG, Bellinger's second half numbers (the All Star Game was July 9th, so the second half includes all games from July 12th forward. Bellinger is slashing .366 OBP/.537 SLG/.902 OPS. Utilizing this data, listing him as a right fielder (114 of 142 games played there in '19), listing him as an average runner, and a 2 defender on the 1 to 7 scale), the WAR calculator has Bellinger's second half WAR at 1.8; his OPS+ at 137. Again, this is just an eyeball test, but does that scream MVP to anybody? Some of you may like Bill James, some of you might not be able to stand him. But in his Historical Baseball Abstract (I think my copy is 2002), when assessing Roberto Clemente's impact as a defender, over the course of a season, and the entirety of his career, he looked at how big an impact his defense really had, everything included-his range, his prowess with the glove, his throwing arm. I took from his discussion that defensive performance, especially in the outfield, is overstated when it comes to WAR. It's important, but I don't think it has anywhere near the impact that a player's offense does. How many plays does a right fielder truly impact over the course of a season? How many runners will Cody Bellinger keep from taking extra bases? How many will he throw out at the plate, or at second? Or third? How many more balls will he get to over the course of a 162 game season than the average right fielder? You're going to tell me that those players make him worth an additional 1.5 wins? The defensive play of a right fielder, as good as he is, is worth 1.5 wins? Put this in perspective. Ignoring his subpar defense, look at the offensive contribution from Keston Hiura. His oWAR is 2.3, his dWAR -0.3. His total WAR, for 295 plate appearances, across 70 games, OPSing .941, is roughly equal to Cody Bellinger's defensive wins contribution? I don't buy it. Baseball Reference wants us to believe that his defensive contribution (1.5 dWAR) is equal to 1/4 of his oWAR (6.0); this for a guy that has hit 44 home runs, while batting over .300, and OPS'ing well over 1.000. Please. No matter how much Bellinger might blow up over the last twenty games, or so, he's not going to approach Yelich's offensive contribution. At the rate he's going, Bellinger's OPS is going to drop below 1.000. A 60 point difference in OPS is statistically significant, and that's before one even starts to look at performance with runners in scoring position, high leverage situations, etc. I have nothing against Cody Bellinger. I just don't see any argument to be made for his being the MVP. That Bellinger suits up for more games means nothing if he's not positively contributing to his team's success.

Right. Mookie Betts won the American League just last year; he played 136 games. 26 games missed is a month. Got any more arguments you want to send over, guys? Even with 32 games missed, Yelich will probably have a higher WAR, per Fangraphs, than Bellinger. And, Bellinger has been a wet fart of late. I'm not impressed by his putting on a nice clean Dodgers uniform if he's not helping his team win. Showing up to increase the total for your games played does nothing to alter the argument. In fact, the Dodgers would probably have been better off had Bellinger sat on his rear end the last 8 games-he's batting .185 over those 8 games, with a WPA of -0.079. The last 21 games (one-eight of a season), he's hitting .214, slashing .360 OBP/.400 SLG/.760 OPS. He's been below league AVG during what would usually be the most critical time of the year. He's not killing his team simply because the Dodgers are so good.

WPA from August 1 to September 12 Cody Bellinger .790 Christian Yelich 1.840 In 17 of the 37 games he's played since August 1st, Bellinger, the "MVP", has had a composite negative WPA. Expressed in another way, in nearly half of the games played for nearly the last quarter of an MLB season, Cody Bellinger has had a negative impact on his team's chance to win the game. That's an MVP?

There are 162 games in a season. A quarter season is 40 games. Well, 40.5. Bellinger has been hitting .231. For nearly a quarter season. I'm sorry, but if he wins after falling flat on his face, then the award is a farce voted on by people with the intellectual wherewithal of toe jam; and their ballots should be taken away, and given to a group of people who are not brain dead. Bellinger has done nothing the last 37 games. Bellinger's win probability added for the entire 2019 season is 4.958. Yellich's win probability added for the entire 2019 season is 7.083. Yelich's win probability added is nearly 43% higher than Bellinger's. Are you freaking kidding me?

Did you actually read my whole post? Or just blindly disagree? Where's the argument that Bellinger is the MVP? Yelich bests him in every comparison. High and medium leverage situations. Seasonal numbers. He's ahead in WAR on Fangraphs by 6/10 of a win. Belinger OPS'd 1.124 in the first half, and .902 in the second half. His OPS in the second half is 222 points lower than it was in the first half. Since August 1st, the last 37 games, he's hitting .231. He's hitting .219 with a .765 OPS In September. That's an MVP? Christian Yelich hit .345 in September, and OPS'd 1.237. His September OPS Is 472 freaking points higher than Cody Bellinger's. Bellinger's monumental collapse in the second half is offset by the fact that he's on one of the top two or three teams in all of baseball. Nothing about his play, of late, has been MVP caliber, and last I checked, MVP is based on a whole season. Yelich won it in the second half. Why on Earth could a guy hitting .231 the last quarter season not lose it? Don't just blindly say, "no". Make the case, if you can, which I doubt. Because there's no statistical justification for giving it to him. None.

Last night, as I was thinking about what might have been this season, and how fate, our cruel mistress, once again denied Wisconsin sports fans a chance at celebrating sports immortality, I tried to put "this", meaning the whole 2019 season, in perspective. It's funny how a moment of clarity can really change your vantage point, allowing (hopefully) all of us to enjoy whatever might come the rest of the way just a little bit more. We all had high expectations for 2019 after coming up one game shy of the World Series last year. Was it a realistic expectation that we'd play at the same level? Were we really going to put up wins in the mid nineties again? The pundits, as they seem apt to do, of late, said it wasn't going to happen. Like Rodney Dangerfield, the Brewers get no respect. And when the injuries started to pile up, first Corey Knebel before the season even got underway, it looked less and less likely we'd even qualify for bonus baseball. Players started dropping like flies in the second half-newly-minted All Star starter Brandon Woodruff's injury obliquely put us behind the 8-ball. Keston Hiura's hammy got an owie, and Mike Moustakas' wrist injury took a big bat out of the lineup. Our ace Jimmy Nelson, after missing all of 2018 with a major shoulder injury, did not return to the team until late in the season, and sadly, it seems, he has lost his command and velocity. Brent Suter was returning from Tommy John surgery. Jeremy Jeffress battled injury and ineffectiveness before being released. Lorenzo Cain has battled injuries all season long, and his usual All Star caliber play has suffered mightily at the plate. Cain hit .308 last year, and totaled 6.9 WAR. This year, his OPS has dropped by 140 points. And the long list of injuries doesn't even consider the bizarre ineffectiveness of both Jesus Aguilar and Travis Shaw, who combined to hit 67 home runs in 2018. Aguilar, prior to being traded, had started to come around, but is still OPSing only .705 for the season after putting up an .890 OPS last year, when he was an All Star. And Shaw has had one of the worst offensive seasons in recent memory, if not in baseball history. His OPS has dropped 300 points from last year, to .526; his 38 OPS+ is 62% below National League average. Yet, with all these injuries, and the puzzling crash by two of our biggest producers last year, the Brewers have fought their way to now being tied with the Cubs for the second N.L. Wild Card slot; and, having won the season series with the Cubs, 10 to 9, we hold a tie breaker. The Brewers are 9 games above .500, and while they have virtually no chance of winning the N.L. Central, they could make back-to-back playoff appearances for the first time since the 1981 and '82 seasons. Just to be in a position to make it to the playoffs, considering everything that has gone wrong, is something this team deserves a heck of a lot of credit for. It's not what we hoped for, but this team, with all its injuries, has fought to the last man. They could still make the playoffs, as they have the weakest remaining schedule of all playoff contenders in the Senior Circuit. Only a series at St. Louis sees us playing against a team with a winning record. And that might impact the MVP race. How many of us figured that Christian Yelich's season ending broken knee served as the end of his bid to win back-to-back MVP Awards? Not so fast. If we get into the playoffs, he could actually win it. I'm not kidding. This isn't wishful thinking. ESPN's Awards tracker had Yelich as the NL MVP favorite right before Yelich got hurt. He'd missed 14 games, already (that was game #130 for Yelich in the Brewers' 144th game of the season). So, he's going to miss 18 more games, total. Here are his ending stats for 2019: .329 AVG, 130 games, 489 AB, 100 runs, 161 hits, 29 doubles, 3 triples, 44 home runs, 97 RBI, 30/32 stolen bases (.938 success rate), 80 walks, 118 strikeouts, a slash line of .429 OBP/.671 SLG/1.100 OPS, 178 OPS+, 328 total bases. These stats are from Baseball Reference. Right now, Yelich currently leads the National League in OBP, SLG, OPS, OPS+, and total bases. He leads the Majors in SLG, OPS and total bases. The total base lead, having missed as much time as he has, is impressive. He's also the first 40-30 player since Ryan Braun in 2012. He was the NL MVP last year with a 1.000 OPS. He's raised it by 100 points this year. I was looking at some of the stats put up by Yelich and Bellinger, for the season, in September, and in leverage situations. The fact that Christian has been shelved for the year doesn't mean he automatically loses out on the MVP. In fact, I think he has a good chance to still win it. If you go by Baseball-Reference.com, it looks like it's Bellinger's award to lose-that is, if you look solely at WAR: bWAR Yelich 7.1 Bellinger 8.1 The culprit? dWAR. Though Yelich has a clear advantage in offense (7.3 to 6.0), Belinger is way ahead in the defensive component of WAR (1.5 to -0.6). But hold on. What about Fangraphs? fWAR Yelich 7.7 Bellinger 7.1 wRC+ Yelich 173 Belinger 163 Bellinger's stats are still quite good, but he's faded, of late. Here are his numbers through 9/11: .303 AVG, 109 runs, 154 hits, 30 doubles, 3 triples, 44 home runs, 106 RBI 11/16 SB (.688 success rate), 89 walks, 99 strikeouts, a slash line of .407 OBP/.634 SLG/1.041 OPS, 170 OPS+, 322 total bases. Since August 1st, Bellinger has been in a free fall. 37 games, .231 AVG, 130 AB, 23 runs, 30 hits, 8 doubles, 1 triple, 10 home runs, 26 RBI. A slash line of .342/.538/.881. And Yelich? 31 games, .316 AVG, 114 AB, 22 runs, 36 hits, 7 doubles, 0 triples, 8 home runs, 16 RBI. A slash line of .431/.588/1.018. Yelich has clearly been the better offensive force, and by a wide margin. Then, I look at compared metrics for the season. Win Probability Added (source: Fangraphs) Bellinger 5.71 Yelich 7.86 Clutch (defined by Fangraphs: Clutch - How much better or worse a player does in high leverage situations than he would have done in a context neutral environment) Bellinger -0.76 Yelich 0.39 Look at the splits for both men First half and second half OPS Bellinger 1.124/.902 (-222 points in the second half) Yellich 1.140/1.034 (-106 points in the second half) A 1.034 OPS is still outstanding. MVP level. Remember, Yelich won the MVP last year with a 1.000 OPS. .902 is still good, but it's clearly not MVP level. Bellinger has faded. Drastically. Yelich, on the other hand, is still playing strong. In fact, since the calendar turned to September, he's been unstoppable. Again. Unfortunately, Christian will only play in nine games in September (well, eight, really). But look what he's been doing as the horses have come down the stretch. September 1-September 10th, 2019 9 games, .345 AVG, 29 at bats, 6 runs, 10 hits, 2 doubles, 3 home runs, 8 RBI, 9 walks, 8 strikeouts, 4/4 stolen bases, and a slash line of .513 OBP/.724 SLG/1.237 OPS. And one of those at bats was finished by Trent Grisham, who struck out. Still, it's attributed to Yelich's statistics (unfairly, I might add). Yelich should be batting .357 for September, and OPSing 1.264 for the month. It's a small sample size, but for those 8 games before he got hurt, his WPA (win probability added) was 1.271. Of his eight best games for the entire season, by win probability added, three of them have come in the last 24 days. In the stretch. The biggest impact on WPA came on September 7th. +.686 against the Cubs. His second biggest game by WPA? August 17th at the Nationals. +.629. He hit the first of three Brewer home runs in the top of the ninth, when we were down 8-11. Then, in the top of the 13th, he hit a go ahead solo home run to put the Brewers up 13-12. His eight best game by WPA came on September 6th against the Cubs, +.314. His seventh best came on July 27th, +.339. His sixth best on July 12th. +.365 against the Giants. Five of his eight most clutch performances have come in the last two months. That's what MVPs do. There will be ignorant talk about how Yelich's stats are the product of Miller Park, how he hits all his home runs there. He spiked early in the season, hitting 8 home runs in his first 8 home games. Since then? 19 home runs at Miller Park, 17 home runs on the road. Yelich is OPSing 1.201 at the friendly confines of Miller Park, but he's no slouch on the road. His road slash is .409 OBP/.597 SLG/1.006 OPS. His road OPS this year is higher than his 2018 OPS of 1.000 when he won the MVP. He hits at home. He hits on the road. He hits in the clutch. What about when runners are in scoring position? Compare Yelich and Bellinger. Yelich .327 AVG, 10 HR, 52 RBI, slash .462 OBP/.693 SLG/1.155 OPS Bellinger .290 AVG, 6 HR, 54 RBI, slash .441 OBP/.533 SLG/.973 OPS. Christian Yelich's OPS is 182 points higher than Cody Bellinger's with runners in scoring position. High leverage situations for the entire season? LOL, Yelich kills him. Bellinger .319 AVG, 6 HR, 28 RBI, slash .404 OBP/.648 SLG/1.052 OPS Yelich .384 AVG, 9 HR, 32 RBI, slash .460 OBP/.791 SLG/1.251 OPS. Yelich's OPS is 199 points higher than Belinger's in high leverage situations Medium leverage? Bellinger .268 AVG, 18 HR, 45 RBI, slash .383 OBP/.589 SLG/.972 OPS Yelich .320 AVG, 15 HR, 34 RBI, slash .424 OBP/.651 SLG/1.075 Yelich's OPS is 103 points higher than Cody Bellinger's in medium leverage situations. Tell me, again, how this is a two man race for the MVP? In my opinion, there is no race. Christian Yelich is heads and shoulders above Cody Bellinger. Bellinger's numbers are the product of a spectacular first half, in which he slashed .432 OBP/.692 SLG/1.124 OPS. Since the All Star break, Bellinger's production has tanked. .366 OBP/.537 SLG/.902 OPS. Yelich had a tremendous first half .433 OBP/.707 SLG/1.140 OPS But, he's had an MVP caliber second half, as well. .423 OBP/.611 SLG/1.034 OPS. In my opinion, which is based solely on statistical analysis, ignoring my obvious bias for Christian Yelich, Yelich is clearly the National League MVP of 2019. There's simply no argument to be made in favor of Cody Bellinger. None. Yelich was better by Bellinger in the first half via OPS (1.140 to 1.124), though it was close. Since the break? Yelich's OPS is 132 points higher. And I'll be sure to send a Tweet to both MLB.com and the Journal-Sentinel with a stat comparison.

He's not predicting? Sounds like a kind of prediction to me. If it's not a prediction-if it wasn't even remotely likely with Yelich, then why say it at all? Being upset the guy is injured is fine. We all are. But making a quantum leap into, "we may have seen the best of Yelich" is absurd hyperbole. Further opining about how "these are the types of injuries that lead to other injuries and consistent stints on the DL" is pure fiction. That is a patently false statement. It is conjecture, and poor conjecture, at that. First of all, we don't know to what extent the thing is broken. It could be a simple hairline fracture. It may well be that, had it happened much earlier in the season, he could have healed, and returned in the regular season. There are some twenty games left, approximately. We're almost done with this thing. I'm assuming the Brewers medical staff are much like the Packers medical staff, taking the conservative approach to allow their athletes all the time needed to fully heal properly. It probably doesn't make sense to try to rush him back, so shutting him down, allowing him to heal properly, and start getting ready for next season is the logical, and prudent thing to do.

Seriously? This is the kind of irresponsible rhetoric that I hate about the internet. Throwing out an opinion with absolutely zero basis in fact. What you're "feeling" is completely ridiculous. It's a broken knee cap, not a soft tissue tear. I've had one. Two years ago, I fell and split my left patella into two pieces. I was on bed rest for two months, as there was one little part of the bone that was still connected, and doing so, my orthopedic surgeon hoped to avoid surgery. Doctor put a soft cast on it. Outside of getting up to use the restroom, or taking a bath, I was stuck in bed for the whole time, 24/7, because my bones are naturally weaker. The knee healed fine, and you'd never know it was injured. Regardless of the kind of fracture, be it a hairline break, or something more substantial, the likelihood of there being any kind of complications from this going forward are slim. If it's a serious fracture, they'll out some hardware in place, and the bone will heal. Have you seen the kind of shape this guy is in? His body physiology is off the charts. He'll heal fine, and I expect we'll see Yelich back at 100% for the start of spring training. It sucks he got hurt. I feel for him. And, it probably costs him a second straight MVP. He was leading the award index coming into the day. But let's not start in with the, "he might never be the same again" stuff. Especially with today's medical technology.

Why am I more afraid of the Marlins than I am of the Cubs?

Agreed 100%. I look at umpires as being elephants. Really bad eyesight, really good memories. One would hope that umpires would be professional, and call balls and strikes based on where the ball arrives relative to the strike zone. But umpires are human, and as we've all seen, prone to blowing calls. I wouldn't put it past one of them to allow their egos to enter into the equation. And we've got enough going against us as it is. We don't want to tick off an umpire, and have it come back to bite us in the butt at some inopportune point in the future.

The past doesn’t amount to a hill of beans. This massively injured brewer team is coming together, and their beefed up September pitching staff, Suters aura, and Yelich’s bat, at worst, are gonna make things interesting this last 26 games. I want to know what you're smoking. They've "beefed up their pitching staff"? LOL. The only guy I'm expecting to see good things from is Woodruff. Nelson didn't show anything that made me believe he could still be a Major League pitcher again. I hope I'm wrong, but you're seriously overvaluing the arms coming up to Milwaukee.

So, I've been kicking this thought around in my head for some time-a hypothesis that the Brewers more heavily rely on the home run to score than other teams in the National League. It seems to me that Milwaukee has great difficulty, or, should I say, comparatively greater difficulty putting runs on the board when they're not sending baseballs into the seats. But, as sveumrules and select other members of our forum are quick to point out, perception and reality are often quite different animals. When the Brewers stumble for a time, it's easy to let that recent impression color our perception of the season, as a whole. Tonight, I re-upped my monthly subscription to Baseball-reference's play index, and decided to actually look at the raw data to see if the numbers support my hypothesis. I'll preface this by stating that the numbers we're about to look at include all games through August 18th; baseball-reference has not yet updated for games completed on the 19th. First, I want to look at where the Brewers rank in the National League in home runs hit. As the season is still ongoing, and not everybody has played the same number of games, the best way to look at this is home runs hit per game played. Currently, the Brewers are second in the NL with 202 home runs, and second in home runs per game played at 1.63. The National League averages are 171 home runs, and 1.38 per game. The last column displays each team's projected 162 game home run total based on their current rate. Just as an aside, these numbers are insane. In National League history, only ten teams have hit 225 or more home runs. Nine teams are currently on a pace to top 225 in 2019. I find Rob Manfred's public comments regarding the increase in home runs spurious, as something is clearly amiss; but that's a discussion for another time. Next, let's look at how the Brewers compare to other National League teams as far as runs scored is concerned. Again, this is on a per game basis. While the Brewers are the second best team in the National League (out of 15 teams) hitting the long ball, we're tied for seventh in runs scored per game with the Mets. We score 4.85 on average, which is a tick above the 4.82 league average. Now comes the interesting part. How many runs have we scored this season via the home run, and what overall percentage of runs scored came as a result of the long ball? Though perception often distorts reality, occasionally, ones instincts are dead on. Though the Dodgers (348) and Braves (318) have both scored more runs via the long ball than Milwaukee (316), as a percentage of runs scored, the Brewers have relied on the home run more than any other team in the Senior Circuit. 52.6% of the runs Milwaukee has scored in 2019 have come via the home run. That's nearly 2.5% more than Los Angeles, who came in second with 50.2% of runs scored via the home run. With only one other team realizing 50% or more of their runs via the home run (Chicago, though San Diego is nearly at 50%), a 2.5% gap between Milwaukee and Los Angeles is statistically significant. Of great interest, to me, is the average return Milwaukee gets from home runs, relative to the rest of the National League. We hit a lot into the seats, but on average, we realize 1.564 runs per home run; that's ninth best in the NL, and slightly below the league average of 1.578. Now, the Brewers are ninth in the National League with a .251 AVG. But because of their walk rate, their .330 OBP is fifth, and right behind the fourth place Cubs at .331. They get on base. Scoring opportunities beyond the home run abound. This walk rate helps to somewhat mitigate their awful strikeout rate. We already know they hit the long ball, so one would expect they'd have a competitive overall SLG, relative to the rest of the National League. Surprisingly, their .447 SLG ranks only seventh-about the middle of the league. While they hit a lot of home runs, they don't rack up the doubles and triples. Their 212 doubles puts them twelfth in the NL, and having only 12 triples ranks them thirteenth. The ability to hit the home run is a real asset for any team. Point in case, the Brewers were down three runs in the ninth inning against the Nationals just a few nights ago. Christian Yelich homered. Keston Hiura doubled. Mike Moustakas homered to tie it, and Ryan Braun homered to give Milwaukee a one run lead headed into the home half of the ninth. Without the ability to hit the long ball, coming back from a three run deficit in the ninth would have been highly improbable. Obviously, power is a boon to a team's chances for success. However, a problem arises when the long ball is the only real weapon in the offense's arsenal. And now we arrive at runners left on base, the numerical evidence of a team's failure to capitalize on opportunity. Milwaukee's National League rank in: AVG, walks, OBP, strikeouts, SLG, OPS and runners left on base. That last list is highly problematic for the Brewers. We're stranding better than 7.2 runners, per game. To date, the Dodgers have actually left nine more runners on base, but they've also scored 92 more runs. So, the Brewers are competitive in terms of getting on base. And, not only do they have outstanding team power, they are ranked second in the National League in power-speed index. Only the Nationals are better, and that's in a dead heat: The stolen base is seemingly a lost art in the year 2019. Though the Brewers rank third in the National League in stolen bases, they only have 82 swipes. But their best two hitters in the second half, Christian Yelich and Ryan Braun, have been incredibly efficient. Yelich is among the league leaders with 24 steals (and has only been caught twice). And Ryan Braun, while no longer the same player that stole thirty bases in both 2011 and 2012, has swiped 9 bases in 10 tries. 33 steals in 36 attempts is a 92% success rate. They hit the long ball. They get on base. They can steal bases. So, why are the Brewers lagging so far behind other playoff contenders where scoring runs is concerned? The Brewers have been very poor situational hitters. Though they rank fourth in the National League with 2,927 total base runners (with BR being the total number of base runners when a batter is at the plate), the percentage of base runners that scored is worst in the National League. Yes, they are behind even the Miami Marlins. Total baserunners, baserunners that scored, scoring % First, a word about this metric, and how I am reading it. Obviously, the Brewers have not had 2,927 base runners in 124 games. That would be nearly 24 each and every game. This counts the opportunities for each batter. If the Brewers load the bases to start the game, and the cleanup batter comes to the plate, they had three men they could have driven in. If he strikes out, the #5 batter comes up. It's the same three base runners, but now that batter has the chance to drive in all three men. Thusly, the metric counts each batter throughout the season, and the total number of scoring opportunities those individual base runners represented. This conversion rate is more than just a problem. I believe it is emblematic of a fatal flaw in how the Brewer offense is constructed. Building around power been the predominant thinking in Milwaukee going back to the days of George Bamburger and Harvey Kuenn. Remember, the Brewers have scored 316 runs via the home run in 2019. Recall, too, that they have left 894 runners on base. Compare those numbers. A rational baseball fan would sacrifice some power in order to be more productive situationally. Let's look at some other indicators. First up, a metric considering the opportunities to ground into a double play. Baseball-reference defines this as instances with a runner on first and less than two outs. DP is defined as two or more force outs on a ground out. The Brewers have the fourth worst rate, currently, in the National League. In plain English, opposing teams are highly successful at forcing the Brewer hitters into double plays. It's just one way the opposition can eliminate Brewer scoring threats. The Brewers also have the second worst productive out metric in the NL. Created by Elias and ESPN for three possible situations: Successful Sac for a pitcher with one out. Advancing any runner with none out. Driving in a baserunner with the second out of the inning. Failed means the batter made an out without advancing the runner(s). This is baseball fundamentals. Being able to move the batter over, even at the cost of an out, can benefit a team tremendously. Here's yet another example of Milwaukee's inability to generate runs absent the long ball. How many times has somebody mentioned this in an In Game Thread? Having a runner at third base that we can't get across home plate. This metric measures the number of plate appearances with less than two outs, and a runner at third base. Again, this demonstrates very poor fundamentals on the part of the Milwaukee Brewers. The Brewers get the runner home only 44.6% of the time. The NL average success rate is 51.7%. Shockingly, there's one team better at converting than the Dodgers' 57.1%-the lowly Miami Marlins, who get the runner in 58.2% of the time. Lastly, one more incriminating statistic. This one measures instances where a runner is on second base with no outs, and that runner was successfully advanced. It doesn't mean the runner scored. They were simply moved to third. Is it any coincidence that the teams who make it to the World Series perform well in this last metric? The personnel change. Injuries happen. Players get older, and rookies and new acquisitions come in. Yet, if you look at the Giants, Cubs, Cardinals and Dodgers-these teams have all gotten to the Series in the last few years. The Giants have won it all three times. The Cubs once. The Cardinals have been to the Fall Classic four times in the last fifteen years, winning two. And while the Dodgers haven't won the Series in some time, they've won the last two National League pennants, and they're the best team in baseball currently at 82-44. They can hit home runs. But, they also do the little things well. And the Braves? They're a team definitely on the rise again, and loaded with talent. Opportunities for GIDP converted, Productive out percentage, Runner on 3rd base, <3 outs conversion rate, Runner on 2nd base, no outs, runner advanced When the Brewers are locked in, and hitting home runs, we can score runs by the truckload. But if you look at last night's game, one in which the Brewers were one hit, if the Brewers cannot trot around the bases at their leisure, they stumble far too often. Christian Yelich was walked three times last night. He has a very realistic chance at winning back-to-back MVP Awards, and could go over 50 home runs. The Cardinals put Yelich on, and forced the rest of the lineup to come through. They didn't. Strikeouts, like home runs, are way up. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that strikeouts do not in any way benefit a team. The Major League record for strikeouts by a team in one season is 1,594 by the White Sox last year. And directly behind them? The 2017 Brewers, with 1,571. And in third place? The 2016 Brewers with 1,543. After 8 strikeouts last night, we have 1,188 in 125 games. At that pace, we'd end up with 1,540. The fourth highest strikeout total in history (though there are some other teams in 2019 that will challenge that dubious mountain peak). I will make no summation. The data speaks for itself. Hopefully, this generates some inspired debate.

Ok, I think I found it. The team https://tinyurl.com/yxh22rtcbatting event finder, for 2019, the Brewers shows that we've scored 316 of our runs via the home run. We've hit 3 grand slams (+9 runs) We've hit 27 3-run home runs (+54 runs) We've hit 51 2-run home runs (+51 runs) We've hit 121 solo home runs. So, we've scored 285 runs without the long ball.

I know it feels like that after a game when we got one hit. But I seem to remember just a couple of nights ago when we were down 8-11 going into the ninth inning in Washington. Then Yelich homered. Hiura doubled. Moose hit a two-run bomb, and Braun hit a solo shot to put us up 12-11. I'd say that was four pretty big hits in a row. The problem this team has, as I see it, and it's maddeningly apparent in games like this one tonight, is that they are too feast or famine. When they're hitting the ball into the seats, they can score runs in the bunches. Before tonight's game, they had 202 home runs, third best in the National League. Yet, we're only 8th with 601 runs scored. League average is 598 runs scored. With all that firepower, we're in the middle of the pack. We have a lot of trouble manufacturing runs without the long ball. I'm looking on baseball reference trying to figure out where within the splits it shows home run logs. I am wondering how many of out 601 runs scored came as a result of the long ball. Then, I'd like to compare that to the other teams in the National League.

As a Brewers fan that has witnessed one no hitter in 41 years, I'd gladly take a combined no hitter from this staff. Beggars can't be choosers. One hit tonight. One. The next two are must wins. Time is running out.

Does this team have any guts? Come on. Your season is on the line. Let's go, bats!

Nothing says, "we want to make the playoffs" like getting no hit through six at Busch.

He can't perform at that MVP level for a whole season anymore. But for a few weeks, he's completely capable of lighting it up. As referenced earlier, in 30 second half games, he's hitting .315, and OPSing 1.041. If the thumb and back can stay happy happy, he's a major threat. It speaks to how talented a player Braun is that we're left wondering what might have been. If the thumb nerve issue never rears its ugly head, if he never violated the MLB JDA, who knows. I really think he's a Hall of Fame caliber offensive talent. Brauny still has one of the sweetest swings I've ever seen. He's going to top 50 WAR. He's going to go over 400 home runs and 2,000 hits. And somehow, it seems like it should be more.

I agree. But, God, do I hope I'm wrong. With the year Christian Yelich is having, it just will seem like such a waste if we don't get to bonus baseball. He could win another batting title, put up 50 home runs and 30 stolen bases. The guy's just special. I want to see him take it to the next level in the post season.

Yes, he's missed some RISP opportunities, but he's also come up clutch quite a few times. His second home run as few nights ago, in the top of the ninth, would have been the game winner, 12-11, if Hader hadn't blown it again. It all started with the Gomes walk to begin the bottom half of the inning. He's hitting .280 for the season with RISP, with a .917 OPS. Pretty good, all things considered. Still, nothing will ever beat Yelich and Braun back to back last year to beat the Cardinals!

This is where some of the real rough patches come back to haunt us. On July 30th, we started a 9 game road trip by going 1-5 against the A's and Cubs. We scored only 14 runs in the 6 games (2.3 runs per game), and allowed 27. What's maddening is that two of those losses belong to Josh Hader. On July 30th, after an Eric Thames home run tied the score at 2 in the top of the 9th, Hader surrendered a game winning home run to Matt Olson in the bottom of the 10th. Then, Hader came in on August 1st with a 3-2 lead in the bottom of the 8th, and gave up a game winning 2-run home run to Matt Chapman. But what really kills me, still, is losing 2 of 3 at home to the lowly Marlins. Miami was 21-36 coming into the game, and we'd just taken 3 of 4 at Pittsburgh to improve to 34-26. What's more, we scored 31 runs in the 4 games. Then, we lay two eggs against the Marlins, losing 0-16 and 3-8 before salvaging the last game 5-1. How the hell does this team allow themselves to be outscored 24-3 in two games against the Marlins, at home, no less? At a minimum, we should have taken 1 of those 2 losses against the A's, and 1 of those 2 blowout losses against the fish. Realistically, we should have won 3. There are other games, of course, but those jump to mind. Instead of 64-60, 3 more wins puts us at 67-57. To get to the 90 games I think we need, 23-15 (.605) would have been much more doable than 26-12 (.684), especially considering the schedule we have after these next 3 weeks. We harp on it throughout the season. Every game counts, and we aren't a good enough team to just fritter away games we should have won.

One thing that did make me smile, last night. I looked at Ryan Braun's ESPN profile. "Aug 18: Braun went 3-for-6 with a walk, two solo home runs and a third run scored in Saturday's 15-14 extra-innings win over the Nationals. The veteran slugger had just one homer in his prior 18 games, but Braun broke out in a big way during the marathon 14-inning win Saturday, with his second long ball coming off Nats closer Sean Doolittle as part of a four-run ninth. Overall, Braun has turned back the clock in the second half, slashing .323/.396/.645/1.041 through 30 contests since the All-Star break with six home runs, four steals, 15 RBI and 20 runs." It's a real shame that he had such a poor first month of the season, because his offensive production ever since then hasn't been that far off of his prime. Consider this: May 1st to August 17th: 86 games played, 65 starts 276 at bats 44 runs 87 hits 20 doubles 2 triples 13 home runs 39 RBI 20 walks 61 strikeouts .315 AVG .371 OBP/.543 SLG/.914 OPS. Now, offense is up this year, clearly, so his OPS+ differential relative to the rest of the league isn't what it was in those years, but his .914 OPS is better than 20% above the NL average of .759. With a park adjustment, he should be right at a 120 OPS+ since May 1st (assuming that .759 has been constant all season). He's clearly having his most productive run since the 2016 season. With a 1.4 bWAR and fWAR, he's got a good shot at getting to 2.0 WAR. His 113 wRC+ is 63rd best in baseball (for the whole season), and 31st in the National League. Better than Paul Goldschmidt's 110 and Domingo Santana's 110 (and Santana's fWAR is 0.3). How is Braun performing (again, the entire season, including his terrible April)? Compare him to some other big names: wRC+ (source: Fangraphs) Mike Moustakas 116 Javier Baez 115 Nolan Arenado 114 Ryan Braun 113 All three of those guys directly above Braun were All Stars. Considering all that's gone wrong this year, I think Ryan Braun's offensive performance has been a pleasant surprise.