BruisedCrew

Who's on the short list? Maybe they have a deal to bring LaRussa back.

You could throw the games against the Rockies, DBacks, and Nats into this too. Pounding on bad teams and holding your own against good ones is a great way to win a division. The Brewers did a great job of that. But, in the playoffs you have to be able to win against the best pitchers on the best teams. There were warning signs that the Brewers might have trouble with that. For one, they were not good at scoring early in games, and often relied on late rallies against weak bullpens to break open low scoring games. Those opportunities aren’t there in playoff games. Another clue that the Brewers offense was a big step below that of the other playoff teams lies in the run differentials. As good as the Brewers pitching was, they were still just third in runs allowed per game, behind the Dodgers and Giants and just ahead of the Braves. In runs scored they were 6th, with the Dodgers, Giants and Braves 1,2,3. The net result was the Brewers run differential of +115 being significantly behind the Dodgers and Giants at +269 and +210 and even the Braves (who were coming on strong after the ASB) at +134. The Brewers loss to the Braves was hardly inevitable, but it was foreseeable. The Brewers pitching (especially at full strength) may have been built for October, but the offense was not. With the benefit of hindsight the Brewers winning the World Series would have been a pretty big upset.

If we had Williams, pretty good chance he pitches the 8th instead of Hader. Would Williams have fared better than Hader? We'll never know. Not to mention wondering how many innings Gustave would have had to pitch before the Brewers scored another run. There are a number of little things that we could second guess about, such as removing Peralta in Game 3, playing Yelich and batting him third in some games, playing Urias or Escobar, waiting until the lead was gone in Game 4 before bringing in Woodward, etc, etc. But, all of that pales in comparison to the fact that they scored 6 runs in 4 games, and the reality that shuffling the order around or playing Taylor or Peterson probably wouldn’t have changed that. Consider this frightening thought. If Tellez hadn’t been able to come back from his knee injury, the Brewers might have been swept in 3 games without scoring a run. As disappointing as this series was, at least winning the first game made attending game 2 more exciting. But, after Adames’ catch on the foul pop in the first inning of Game 2, there was very little excitement in that game or for the rest of the series. The quick and humiliating exit from the playoffs, coming on the heels of the uninspiring play that delayed the division clinching until the last game of the last homestand, will create a lasting final impression that places the 2021 team at the bottom of my list of favorite Brewers division winners. Those teams at least won a series that created excitement of their own and kept the anticipation going. Getting knocked out of the playoffs is always disappointing, both because it ends the hope of winning the World Series and marks the end of an activity that has been a daily source of entertainment for over 6 months. For me, football and basketball do not fill that void if only because the games are less frequent. I’m also finding that today I don’t have the same “wait until next year” attitude that I had in 1982, 2011, and 2018. The weaknesses of this team that were laid so bare in the final weeks of the season are going to be difficult to fix, even if the pitching can repeat this year’s performance, which is far from guaranteed.

Only fitting that this flameout ends on a Yelich K.

Wong has been a complete bust in this series.

At least there won’t be a walkoff win for the Braves.

Only way to see the Brewers winning is for Hader to shut them out in the 8th, Brewers score in the 9th, and Hader finishes. After that even if the Brewers score it’s going to be hard to close it out.

Lets help the pitcher out by swinging at ball 4 in the dirt.

Not having Suter and Williams is going to hurt tonight. Hard to see how they’re going to cover 5 innings.

We’re going to find out what Ashby is made of. This is a tough spot for someone with as little major-league experience as he has.

That lead was fun while it lasted. 2 hours into the game and this much effort expended in the 4th inning. It could be a long night.

Another chance for Arcia to haunt the Brewers.

I can’t believe the play at the plate was that close. Garcia must not have gotten a good jump off of second.

Hallelujah!

Sir, it is the 2nd inning. 21 of the necessary 27 scoreless innings to me is “well on their way”.

The Brewers are well on their way to joining the 1966 Dodgers as the only teams in the last century to get shutout in 3 straight postseason games. That Dodgers team lost the first game of the World Series 5-2 to the Orioles before getting shut out in the next 3, two of them by 1-0 scores.

When Yelich came up I was absolutely hoping for him to try to bunt toward third. It’s pitiful to say that for a hitter in the 3 spot, but I thought a bunt would give him a chance for a hit to load the bases and at least move the runners up.

I mean, seems like a no-brainer to play the guy who went 2/4 in the first game against Morton. No Brewer had 2 hits in Game 1 against Morton.

I think once the season officially ends it could be a therapeutic exercise to discuss how we’ll all remember the 2021 Brewers, but for at least one more day the story is still being written. I will gladly withhold my personal feelings about this season until it is officially over.

I would say that in these 3 games only Tellez has really done anything. The position players in varying degrees are contributing a hit or walk here or there to get someone on base, but the sum total of them is not enough to provide many scoring chances. By my count the Brewers have had 24 base runners in the 3 games, and that isn’t likely to produce a lot of runs unless you hit home runs, string the base runners together, or have exceptional hitting with RISP. The Brewers have had none of those things except for Tellez’s HR. I don’t think they have ever had 3 hitters reach base in one inning except for that same inning when Escobar followed Tellez’s HR with a single. The Braves are ahead in the series not because of great offense of their own but because they have 3 HRs to the Brewers one and one other inning where they strung hits together. This unproductive offense didn’t spring out of thin air. It was evident in quite a few games over the last few weeks of the season, especially if the opponent didn’t provide some significant assistance with walks or errors. At this point the Brewers have no choice but to hope that one or more of the hitters who have been their biggest producers during the season suddenly break out with some big hits. I wouldn’t throw Peterson in there thinking that his two pinch hit walks indicate that he will spark the offense.

On 538 the probability of the Brewers winning the World Series has dropped to 3%. But, regardless of those odds, I prefer to focus on the Brewers chances of winning tomorrow, and then again on Thursday, and then go from there.

You can only laugh at how this offense does exactly what the opponent wants. If only Counsell had kept Peralta in and if Williams were available the Brewers might have had a chance to lose in extra innings.

To be honest, after Narvaez’s double, my thought was that if Cain didn’t drive in a run Counsell would have to pinch hit for Peralta. I guess I’m as dumb as Counsell is. Despite happy talk about taking it easy and staying healthy for the playoffs, Counsell has seen what everyone else has seen. This team has been in a team wide hitting slump since mid September and that has continued in this series. Scoring chances have been few and far between and cashing in on those chances has been nonexistent. I thought he had to take his best shot at pushing a run or two across and apparently he did too.

Yes.

Or he's simply sticking with a good pitcher who made one bad pitch. Two singles, a home run and a walk sounds like more than one bad pitch. It sounds more like a guy who doesn’t have his good stuff.