BruisedCrew

No, it’s the one he had against the Twins last year when he took away a game tying HR with a running , leaping catch

This is one of the most disheartening losses of the season. I’m attributing part of it to playing 17 games in 17 days with a 6 man SP rotation. It was easy to see that Drohan had no command tonight when he was giving up walks, home runs, and near home runs. But they obviously feel like they can’t afford to be going to the bullpen after 4 innings or less, or even when he gives up 5;straight hits the next inning. The Brewers can’t afford to be losing games when the opponent gifts them 5;runs with shoddy defense.

I’m just seeing this thread and I want to add the perspective of someone who is old enough to have been around during Henry Aaron’s time in Milwaukee. My oldest memories of baseball come from 1957 when I was 5 years old and attended my first Braves game. I also have several distinct memories from the 1957 World Series. Ironically, I was rooting for the Yankees because my Dad grew up on Staten Island and rooted for the Yankees. Anyway, I don’t think you can compare Hank Aaron’s impact on the Milwaukee community to Giannis, especially while he was playing for the Milwaukee Braves. I am not quite old enough to remember the early days of the Milwaukee Braves that began in 1953. The team was a sensation and smashed attendance records even before Aaron joined them as a rookie in 1954. During the 4 year period (1956-1959) when the Braves won two pennants and came within one game of winning two others, all of the Braves players were treated like kings, and Aaron was one of the stars. But he shared the spotlight to a large extent with Mathews and Spahn, both future Hall of Famers who were with the team from the beginning. When the Braves won the World Series it wasn’t treated like Hank Aaron taking the team on his back and carrying them to the promised land. I think younger fans don’t fully appreciate how dramatically different sports were in the 50’s than they are now. You didn’t have fans wearing uniform jerseys with players names on them or really that much team merchandise at all. As a bottom line, I would say that the Milwaukee Braves had a dramatic impact on the Milwaukee community and Aaron was an important part of it. He was very popular then, and I think that popularity grew when he chased the home run record and returned to the Brewers. But his overall impact on the franchise and community, in my opinion, doesn’t compare to Giannis. But, if you wanted to vote on the greatest player to play for a Milwaukee team, and could somehow remove recency bias, I would vote for Henry Aaron. BTW, the comment about the Braves moving to Atlanta while Aaron was on the Braves is completely out of bounds. There is an implication there that Aaron couldn’t save the Braves from moving. The Braves moving to Atlanta had nothing to do with Milwaukee not being able to support a major league team. It was simply a case of Braves new ownership seeing Atlanta as a more fertile and profitable market. I wonder how many younger fans realize that in 1952 only 10 cities had major league teams, with St. Louis being the farthest west and Washington DC and Cincinnati a being the farthest south. The Braves move from Boston to Milwaukee started a wave of relocations, and the expansions in 1961 and 1962 added a couple more cities. But the southeast was still untapped, and the Braves new ownership in the early 60’s, despite pledging not to move the team, didn’t take long to begin the process to move the team to what they considered greener pastures.

If I were a Cubs fan I would be looking hopefully at the next 10 days as an opportunity to pick up a game or two. The Cubs next two series are on the road but they are against the weak Royals.and the weakened Nats (no Garcia or Wood to try to keep their awful pitching in the games). Then a home series against the Cardinals. Do what they should do in those games and hope for the Brewers to lose 3 or 4 on their return to the west coast.

Seems like people were pretty pumped about Contreras walk off HR a couple of weeks ago and that was a similar type of game..

Guerrero is usually in the lineup but he’s having a bad year. They’ve had a lot of injuries too.

It’s been awhile. Maybe 20 years.

Will you settle for a momentum boosting comeback win for the Cubs.?

Blue Jays 1 for 19 with RISP kept the Cubs in the game and now the Cubs can win it in 11 with the top,of their order.

Announcers said that if you talk to Pat Murphy he doesn’t think the Brewers offense is as good as they really are :5th in MLB in runs scored. What do you suppose he meant by that?

I hereby declare that, I will NEVER again refer to Pete Crow-Armstrong using his initials. Use of that label connotes a degree of affection that I do not have

I don’t see it as inconsistent at all. From a fan’s perspective, past experiences of seeing a team blow (or almost blow).a large lead creates a memory and knowledge of what can happen. It would likely be even worse if your favorite team has gone through that experience in a recent year (or 44 years ago). I should add that each year is also different because the chasing teams are different. Big leads are usually lost because of a combination of the leading team fading and a trailing team putting together an unexpected stretch of winning. Like the 2021 Cardinals, a team that played around .500 for most of the season, suddenly winning 17 games in a row to come from nowhere to claim a wild card spot from some team (I don’t remember who) whose fans probably thought their team was a lock to get in.

We'll have to agree to disagree about what is a more relevant sample when you take into account how much teams can change over the course of the season. The Brewers lineup the last two months is significantly different than the one they had in April. We could discuss the relevance of the Brewers 5.33 RPG in March/April and why it is higher than what they've produced since then, even including the first 10 games in June that produced both a lot of runs scored and a lot of runs allowed. BTW, when I have posted about these things I only refer to the Brewers rank among NL teams instead of MLB.I think that is more relevant because the NL teams are the ones the Brewers compete with for playoff spots and seeding. Most of the games played are intraleague. When it comes to RPG this year it doesn't really matter because the top 7 scoring teams are all in the NL

No two seasons are going to be identical, but all of those seasons illustrate the general concept that leads of various sizes can disappear fairly quickly. There is no special significance to August 4, except that it was yesterday. Choosing that date to make a point sounds to me like "cherry picking" For example, in 2022 the Brewers had a 4 game division lead on July 30 but by August 4, after 4 straight losses (and a trade deadline to forget) the lead was completely gone and the Brewers never led again. By the end of August they were 6 games out of first place and failed to get even a wild card berth. I'm not going to recite the details of all of the other examples of the Brewers losing big leads because that's been done before. But I will mention 1982, which is fondly remembered as the year the Brewers went to the World Series. But, for people old enough to have lived through it, they will remember not so fondly the anxiety of the last month of the season. On August 28 (which happens to be my wedding day) the Brewers had a 6.5 game lead over the Red Sox and a 7 game lead over the Orioles. A few days later Rollie Fingers got hurt, the Brewers lost a few heartbreakers in the late innings, the Orioles got hot, and the lead was down to 1.5 games by September 14. The Brewers then built the lead back to 4 games with 5 games to play, but the race still came down to nail biting final innings on the last day.

I might have missed your point, but you definitely missed mine, so I guess we're even on that point. I have never used 3 or 4 games to draw a general conclusion. But I think using the most recent 40-45 games (over a third of the games to date and a quarter of a full season) is quite different. I have explained exactly what data I'm using and why I think it's relevant. You can disagree with the conclusion without considering it dishonest or duplicitous. My guess is that if one of your favored compatriots had presented the exact same analysis the reaction would have been quite different. My dose of feeling like a victim comes from the poster you are defending specifically saying that he is reacting to the messenger and not the message. I freely admit (without apology) that some of my posts can be more negative than some people would like. And when I really get upset I will say things that are clearly pessimistic. And, if that causes someone to reject anything I say that is their right. But some of the criticisms are over the top hyperbolic. I reviewed all of my comments from last August through the end of the season and it isn't even close to true that "anytime in the last two months of the season that the Brewers had a bad game or two that (I) would say that that they are reverting back to who they were early in the season which is who they are". After the 14 game winning streak ended I did occasionally make some comments about the offense struggling for the last few games or week. I didn't see any that said that they were reverting to early season form. But, now looking back, comments that the offense was struggling seem to have been accurate. When the 14 game winning streak ended the Brewers had a record of 78-44 and their average RPG was 5.21. For the rest of the season their record was 19-21 with 4.25 RPG, bringing the final season RPG to 4.98. And I did express concerns that if the offense didn't perk up the team would have trouble against the better pitching they would be facing in the playoffs. We saw how that turned out, On the projections, I understand that the Brewers winning the division is more likely than not. But the Cubs would win a lot more than a "handful", of 10,000 simulations, unless you consider 1500 to 2000 a handful. And the history of winning 4 of the last 5 (80%) of the division titles seems largely irrelevant to me. i see each season as a generally independent event because of how different teams can be. This year's Brewers team with 3 players 22 years old or younger in the starting lineup and an especially young and inexperienced SP staff, almost all of whom are on innings management, is quite different that other recent teams. So, if you or others choose to interpret my refusal to take things for granted as "panic" or "expecting the worst" that's your right. i am not going to change my opinions and I will expect the Pavlovian responses.

Oops, I was thinking the score last night was 4-2. But, 9 runs or 10 runs the point is the same. This was not intended to be anything other than using the last few games to illustrate how the Brewers success is based on exceptional run prevention and average offense. Many teams scoring just 10 runs in 4 games would be lucky to win 1, but the Brewers won 2. Are you cherry picking by only mentioning the prior 3 games instead of the prior 4 (which would include a shutout)? 😀 It’s getting past my bedtime. So, you and your gang of friends can pound away but I won’t be responding any more tonight.

Not one time have I said that a 5.5 game lead is basically nothing. But, yes,, my years of following baseball have told me how quickly leads can disappear, My attitude about this is described in my signature. Compared to a lot of posters I don’t post that often For example I don’t post 10 times in every game thread that Yelich doesn’t belong in the lineup, So, if my style bothers you that much it should be peretty easy for you to put me on ignore. At my age I’m not changing

That’s your read. Why is picking that date that comes right after the aberrational Coors and Vegas trip “cherry picking”. How is it different than what people do all,of the time when trying to describe a recent trend (positive or negative). When describing a slump people start at a high point. When describing a hot streak they start at a low point. But it is nice to see people admit that they are engaging in ad hominem reactions instead of addressing the message itself. I have come to expect Pavlovian reactions to seeing my screen name on a post Personally I think the board has more value with some counterbalance to unbridled optimism. I think that comments in mid June that a division title is a near certainty because of projections based on assumptions layered on assumptions are ridiculous.

First of all, winning the division still has some value as an accomplishment. I don’t want to give the Cubs and their fans the pleasure of a division title. Second, the 3 seed would be in a bracket opposite the 1 seed so, if that’s the Dodgers, it would push that possible matchup off to the NLCS.

It was someone else who made the comment I was referring to.

You seem to be agreeing with an opinion and observation I posted a few weeks ago that the Brewers success has been a result of exceptional run prevention combined with average offense. That post did not produce positive responses. But if you look at the results of the last 6 weeks ago that statement is almost irrefutable. The last4 games have been a perfect example of that. The Brewers have managed to go 2-2 while scoring just 9 runs.

Hmmm. I was told the other day that the Cubs couldn’t go on a winning streak because they would be facing Skubal today. To be clear, I wasn’t necessarily talking about a long winning streak with no losses, but more of a winning “stretch” like winning 11 out of 14 while the Brewers are going 7-7 to finish their run of 17 games in 17 days.

Yes, many people have feelings. They aren’t robots whose emotions are controlled by numbers, some of which can be very misleading.. A normal non-robotic human’s feelings are going to be affected by recency,. Last season after the scuffling through mid May the team was incredibly hot for about 75 games. Normal humans are going to feel good about that. The full season offensive numbers for this year’s team are bolstered by a lot of runs in March and April and 10 days in June that included the trips to Coors and Vegas. For the last six weeks or so the offense has been very mediocre. I think it’s normal for a rational person to think that the future (at least the near future) is going to look like the last 45 days unless and until it shows signs of improvement. You have made the comment that some posters, especially older posters “don’t believe in statistics” or don’t understand advanced stats. I don’t think it’s a matter of believing or understanding, but questioning whether those statistics are predictive of the future.

It’s hard to believe that the Pirates have the record they do the way they own the Brewers. With their beefed up bullpen they could be a difficult wildcard round opponent. Hopefully the Brewers won’t have to face them.

So, who’s that?