BruisedCrew

First ever to hit HR in first 3 ABs. I added him to my fantasy roster after the first two. Once I put him in the lineup tomorrow that should cool him down quickly.

They probably didn’t have any option, but I wonder how the Brewers feel about giving up the last home game against the Braves to play in a minor league park in Williamsport. Those games tend to be home run derby like and that leaves the Brewers relatively unarmed. Plus, it means one more road trip before heading to New York. At least they get a day off before the start of the series against the Mets that starts the next string of 16 games in 16 days that includes the 2 series against the Cubs.

Where is the outcry about focusing on the offense after June 10? When I do it the reaction is that it’s improper “cherry picking”.

This is an example of what I’m talking about that people do all of the time when evaluating players and teams. I think it’s fair to identify when a player has a couple of outings that skew his overall season results. A classic example of that was Harrison’s outing in Las Vegas But when I point out that the Brewers run totals are pumped up by a stretch of 10 games 10 weeks ago, some people want to cry “cherry picking”. As long as someone explains what they’re doing, like you have, I have no problem with it. Anyone who thinks that that is “cherry picking” and that only a pitcher’s ERA for the whole season is relevant, that’s their choice.

You had to figure that Uribe going to the IL was a good possibility the way he’s been held out the last few days.

Certainly you aren’t suggesting that somebody cherry picked a stat to support a narrative.

Yes, teams get hot and cold over the course of the season. But, as I have said before, teams can change significantly over the course of a season as players get injured, come back from injury, shuttle between AAA and the MLB club, and change teams through trades and waiver pickups. Using the 2026 Brewers as an example, how relevant are results generated in April when Rengifo, Lockridge Perkins, and Frelick were getting regular playing time and Black and Jones were filling in? So, my opinion is that using more recent data provides a better picture of the current state of the team, and what to reasonably expect in the near future. Some of the same people who are bothered by my focus on the games after the Coors/Vegas trip routinely started posts in 2021 with "Since the Adames trade..." thereby brushing aside the team's mediocre performance before that trade. But I don't remember anyone complaining about cherry picking I would be interested in input from other advanced stats devotees about whether xwOBA is really the best metric to use in this context. It seems like I see wRC+ cited a lot more often when evaluating team and player offensive production. 'Applying a predictive metric to a team (as opposed to a player) really seems flawed because the mix of players might be significantly different in the future . Anyway, however you decide to come to the conclusion, anyone is going to have a hard time convincing me that the Brewers offense is as good as the Cubs'. It's not because I don't "believe" the numbers being thrown around. But I do question that they lead to the conclusion that the offenses are almost equal. BTW, does anyone have the team wRC+ numbers for season to date?

I am not cherry picking any more than anyone who makes a comment that starts with “Since …” Are you going to tell me that you never do that? My “narrative” has been that the Brewers success this season has been produced by exceptional run prevention supported by average offense. I have never hidden from the fact that I have been starting with “since June 10” because the Brewers first 10 games in June featured aberrations in both runs scored and runs allowed by the Brewers in no small part because of the environments in which those games were played. The Brewers lost 4 of those 10 games despite scoring 84 runs. I first came up with this “narrative” that you think is so negative after the month of May, when the Brewers went 19-7 while only scoring 4.15 RPG largely because they only allowed 2.77 RPG. I don’t know why my opinion and observation bothers you so much, and why you feel compelled to dig to find advanced statistics to disprove what seems obvious to almost everyone else.

I am not referring to any advanced metric, and if I was looking for one it certainly wouldn’t be “Expected Weighted On Base Average”. I’m one of those older posters that one advanced metric devotee thinks “doesn’t believe in statistics”. I’m just using my eyes and simple mind to conclude that a team that has averaged just over 6 runs per game over the last 2 months has a much better offense than one that has averaged 4.38 runs per game (4th lowest in the NL) over the same period. Maybe there is some fancy stat that can prove definitively that the Cubs have been extremely lucky and/or the Brewers have been unlucky. But I doubt it.

IMHO this is an example of advanced statistics being grossly misused. Winning baseball games and scoring runs involves a lot more than hitting the ball the hardest. Many times just putting the ball in play has value Has anyone studied the correlation between team hard hit ball percentage and team runs scored. Just the fact that the statistic completely forgives strikeouts to me severely limits its value for evaluating a team’s offense.

Remember when the Brewers had a team that relied on speed and defense? I’m checking out on this one.

Any analysis of the Brewers offense that looks only at the whole season without recognizing what they’ve like been like the last two months can and should be ignored. What they did in March and April is pretty much irrelevant at this point.

I would bet that Cubs fans are looking at the wild card standings. They’ve been burned enough times that they aren’t taking anything for granted. Especially older fans who remember 1969 when they had a 9 game division lead in mid August and ended the season 9 games behind the Miracle Mets I also think that Murphy and the Brewers coaches are looking at those standings. Their plan for the rest of the regular season seems to be prioritizing having the team, especially the pitchers, be as fit as possible for the postseason and if they can win the division while doing that, it would be a bonus. But they have to keep an eye on the wild card standings to make sure they don’t put the wild card spot in Jeopardy.

Too bad I don’t have Netflix and can’t watch it.

Yikes. We’re seeing a lot of examples why you can never be too comfortable with a division lead in August. A lot of crap can happen. Getting a second opinion doesn’t sound like we should expect to see him this weekend.

Not to mention that, even with the veteran SP they have resting, they have a much deeper stable of veteran pitchers. Right now there is a lot of focus on the floundering Brewers offense. But there are also some question marks about how the pitching will hold up as pitchers hit their career highs in IP and the relievers are showing signs of wear from heavy use. It sounds like Uribe is dealing with some kind of dead arm and with his velocity down in his last start I’m not going to be shocked if Harrison is having a recurrence of what put him on the IL

You can’t compare how Dodgers fans react to how Brewers fans would react to a similar situation. For Dodgers fans my age their biggest concern is whether their team might be putting in jeopardy the chance for the threepeat, and the 10th World Series championship in their lifetime. Brewers fans my age are concerned that time is running out to get one World Series championship in their lifetime

Nats are leading the Cubs 6-0 after 6. As I’ve been saying this week, given their pitching, I won’t believe the Nats will beat the Cubs unless (1) they score at least 9 runs, or (2) the final out is recorded. Crow-Armstrong, who I refuse to call by his initials, just struck out after swinging and missing at a pitch that hit him.

A roster with 100% players currently in the NFL, including some with 10 years of experience and development, is MUCH stronger than one with 30% of players who will end up in the NFL, including some who are 19 or 20 years old. They would get manhandled.

The Nats will have to score at least 9 to win a game against the Cubs.

Won’t have to hear about the Brewers having the best record in baseball for awhile.

I thought for a few seconds that the Brewers might have a chance to win when they had the runner on third and nobody out with a run in. But I should have known better.

At least for the next 5 minutes.

Might have been better to let the Padres score there so the Brewers wouldn’t have to waste any more pitchers today.

Maybe have better luck with the Dodgers tomorrow.