Tell Everyone We’re Dead
The Milwaukee Brewers’ 2023 campaign has come to an ignominious end.
Caught without people or drink I don't know what else to think
But I'm going to grow wings and sing “Amen, I'm checking out.”
It’s over. You don’t have to pretend this was a good Brewers club anymore.
They may go down amongst the worst 92-win teams in major league history; a house of cards in a mirror maze in a smoke screen. Their exit from the Wild Card round was as predictable as the sun rising in the east.
The bad mojo stemming from partying after a loss to celebrate a division title they did not earn. The clunkers down the stretch. Brandon Woodruff. An inauspicious pairing with an Arizona Diamondbacks team that never buckled, knowing that this Brewers club strikes early, seldom strikes again and hits into a metric crapton of double plays.
All they needed to do was wait for a mistake from Brewers starting pitching. They did, and the Brewers were ushered out of the postseason proceedings.
The Brewers were fully exposed as a not very resilient bunch, a team insofar as they shared the same laundry and showered together. This was a mishmash of veterans, rookies and hired gun replacements. There’s choreography and there’s a cheesehead, but this team, in retrospect, suffered from incoherence leading to incompetence. Don’t mistake goofiness for camaraderie. Garrett Mitchell, in all his incalculable je ne sais quoi, showed us the on-field distinction in April and even more so in his absence. Willy Adames, who once upon arriving in Milwaukee inserted himself into the nucleus of this organization, seemingly retreated as his proficiency at the plate inverted, a worrying trend for any Brewer after a full offseason in the org.
Zooming out, yes, this is the golden age of Brewers baseball. Yes, there are division titles and postseason appearances. If recent history is any indication, teams that keep showing up in October do one of two things: They win the whole damn thing, or they keep flaming out until their window closes and are forced to retool. With all these division titles and postseason appearances and nothing to show for it, that’s not a series of flukes, that’s a front office that hasn’t learned from its mistakes. The pathetic offense, the mental lapses, the persistent inability to navigate lineups a third time through, these are reflections of the organization, not the players. And it’s an organization’s ability to put its roster into a position to thrive in these kinds of contexts that is tested in October. Streakiness is part of the baseball season, but it does not exist here: you either win or you go home.
The talented and prepared team moves on. For all their wins, there have been and continue to be real questions about the overall talent level on this roster. Craig Counsell, for all his success with the clubhouse, has shown his inability to get his guys over the hump. As much as the Counsell family means to the franchise and he means to fans, his contract expiring is an opportunity to find someone who can do what Craig couldn’t.
It’s likely time for a new voice and new approach throughout the baseball ops hierarchy. Tod Johnson’s scouting team is great at identifying talent, but there appears to be zero emphasis on scouting opponents and obtaining critical business intelligence. Tom Flanagan’s farm clubs make great-looking Triple-A players, but do not produce impact major league bats. Brewers fans should be worried about Jackson Chourio and the weight of expectations.
The Angels couldn’t manage to ruin Mike Trout. The Braves wouldn’t ruin Ronald Acuña or Austin Riley. We just saw what Royce Lewis did for the Twins and Gunnar Henderson is leading a number of forceful Orioles youngsters into prominence. Even the Royals couldn’t bungle Bobby Witt, Jr. Corbin Carroll was the best player on the field in Milwaukee this week.
Meanwhile, Keston Hiura just fled the Brewers organization like a freed hostage. Frelick looked outmatched at times, Wiemer couldn’t be trusted with a bat, Mitchell was left off the roster entirely and Brice Turang’s impact in these two games was most felt on poor Gabriel Moreno’s head.
Jackson Chourio’s success is not guaranteed. And if Chourio flounders on arrival, when so many other downtrodden clubs are seeing results and club uplift from their impact rookies? What exactly will it take for recognition and accountability, because someone of Chourio’s projected capability and ceiling should not be squandered by a franchise that doesn’t know what to do with it and thus doesn’t deserve it.
So that franchise fires up its stove with critical decisions to make. The Brewers’ progression since the Melvin era and through the Stearns administration is clear, but it has once again plateaued. It’s up to Matt Arnold to do something about it.
Because no one should be content with what happened this week, or in any of the four exits before Wednesday. And no one in the baseball offices at 1 Brewers Way should be exempt from criticism.