Cool Hand Lucroy

I've been really surprised that Anderson hasn't been used all week. I know he's not a top guy, but he's been pretty effective, and this is a long stretch without an off day. I'll say he's first guy out if May gets in trouble.

Reds have been pretty good against lefties. Tough start for Drohan. Lot of runs left in this one, though, methinks.

Some good, some bad. My one gripe about Murph tonight is that he let two left-on-left matchups happen in the 9th, while Gary Sanchez sat on the bench in a one-run game. Other than that, our left-handed hitters really let us down. Not a good performance offensively from them. Cubs pitched well, we didn't get a ton of chances, and we failed to put pressure on when we had the chance. The good obviously starts with Henderson. That guy looks nails. What a great performance. From a travel/rest perspective, we also got this one done quickly (half-blue). Seriously, though, we only used two pitchers, and buying a day of rest for our bullpen, which had to work hard this series, despite two easy wins is important. Great showing from the young guys this series, too, especially Pratt and Lara. In terms of the Cubs, their pitching is clearly gassed, even though they managed to hold on tonight. They now take a much longer trip to Miami and then have to return fly back to Milwaukee without an off day. Overall, I think this series is a big-time net positive. Took four games off the calendar and held steady in the division. Going to take something insane to lose the Central. Win one game in Milwaukee, and you own the tiebreaker too. As for the bye, I'm just not that worried about the Braves. Their schedule is so, so hard, starting right now. Phillies, Rays, Phillies, Cubs, Astros. Two+ weeks of difficult after difficult. The Dodgers have work to do to catch us, too. They might. But if we play just okay down the stretch, it's going to be hard for BOTH of those teams to do enough. We're set up really, really well. Just keep grabbing wins. If we can get on even a mini-roll against the Reds (twice), Pirates, and Orioles, we're going to be playing a 5-game series again.

Well, it'd sure be nice to really break some hearts in the 9th.

Gausman hasn't been that much better than May overall. His ERA with the Cubs, coming into tonight, was over 5. We can disagree about the trade. We might not even! I think it was a lot to give up. My only point is that I don't think it's outside market value. The Cubs had to give up a good CF prospect (who was mostly blocked) and another organizational top 10.

Well, silver-lining. Worst case scenario we only have to use two pitchers tonight.

Considering one of the traded guys has already helped his team at the major-league level, I'm not sure I agree with you here. Plus, again, we got a whole second major-league contributor.

I know folks hated the May trade, but that's not THAT far off, especially when you consider we also got a bullpen arm. Bateman actually is hitting .330 in CF for a Blue Jays team that's now within .5 games of the playoffs. Good deal for them.

Little unfair. He's been about 50-50 good start-blowup in his last 6 or 7 starts. Threw 7 shutout in a great offensive environment in Arizona. He's been good tonight. Brewers have missed a couple of chances, but they're noticeable because it's been very fine margins.

Smoltz says so much trash with the utmost confidence, and then it's immediately undercut. Said it with Chourio ("he isn't even looking to go to right center," just before he hits one to right center). Said it with the Cubs "getting Ben Brown back" despite Brown being done for the year. Then, he immediately talks about "pitchers used" as his own genius, proprietary statistic. Booooooooooo

Good AB from Wild Bill...that last pitch was just nasty.

If he keeps going with this Vaughn and Bauers lineup, you could slot those guys to 3-4, or hit Yelich or Mitchell 2 and keep them 4-5, but yeah... Maybe worth a shot to move him down in the order. The bottom guys have produced lately. Problem is the same thing that I think plagued us against the Dodgers in the NLCS. If we don't get production from our LHB, it becomes a lot more difficult to score runs. Turang's one that just has to hit, no matter where he is.

Some much better work challenge-wise last few days.

Couple of bad ABs from our lefties doomed that inning. I don't think Gausman makes it two more full innings, but, even if he does, 6 outs is a lot to get for this Cubs pen. Have to keep it close, get a shot to steal it late.

In the category of little things...Mitchell taking a walk makes this inning even more dangerous.

(At least half) Seriously, is anyone listening for garbage cans? Bregman certainly looks like he's knows what's coming.

Good pitch; better swing.

I really think he was arguing he tipped it into the dirt.

Brewers hitting it hard, just on the ground. Cubs have had a few balls hit hard in the air, fortunately without damage so far. I love Henderson, man. Just looks like a chill customer out there. I don't care what happens this year. Trading him as part of a Skubal deal would have been a bad move. Gausman is throwing well. Hopefully, the Brewers can settle in offensively. You just know CC is going to try to push his starter as far as possible. Turang trying to argue he fouled that, I think...

I'm in the "blame the conditions" camp for Miz's outing. Living a couple hours west of Chicago, it was an absolute nightmare yesterday. Hottest I've been since peak summer in Raleigh. Felt like walking out into a bowl of soup, covered and left on low boil. You saw the hand sweat. Hard to grip the ball. Plus, the homer to Bregman (who's been hearing a whole lot of trash cans lately) was kind of the usual Miz homer. Just a good hitter, making contact with a good fastball. Obviously, he's looked significantly more human the last few starts. Maybe does need a break. But there's a whole lot of noise around last night that makes it tough for me to do anything other than give the guy a full pass.

Incredible work. The last two nights, I'm struck by how close these games were, in hitter-friendly conditions, and how they each felt very stress-free in the late innings. Cubs not able to mount any threat against Ashby, Uribe, even Senzatela and Romero (whose work on Tuesday was inning of the year type stuff in terms of how much crap he had to deal with without losing any composure or effectiveness). Cheers to this thread, and cheers to a group that was looking really, really shaky early in the season.

Biggest play of the game was the 4th inning. Cubs lead 5-3. Turang lays down a bunt. Amaya throws home with zero shot to get Pratt. He takes the out at first, that inning ends with the score 5-4. I am sure others mentioned it live, but I think it bears repeating. A split series basically buries the Cubs as far as the Central is concerned. Still be nice to win tomorrow, but no one should leave this set feeling bad either way.

Absolutely the right call to go with Trevor here, whatever happens.

Bauers and Vaughn both in the lineup again. Turang and Pratt both starting as well. Lara in CF. No Yelich. El Gary at DH.

Almost my experience exactly. I did, however, watch the first 7 innings. Then, went for a long walk. Came back about 1 minute after the final out and managed to rewind and watch the last two. The only thing capable of ruining the cultivated zen calm I've created for Brewers playoff baseball is losing to the Cubs. Even the most painful loss imaginable probably wouldn't make a dent.