What Year Is It?
The Milwaukee Brewers dropping a late-season series to the Pittsburgh Pirates can go one of two ways.
Time really is a flat circle. Apparently that flat circle begins and ends in Pittsburgh.
The NL Central-leading Milwaukee Brewers went into PNC Park late in the season and dropped two of three. They left the series 1.5 games up in the standings, went 10-22 the rest of the way and finished eight games back, well out of the postseason picture. The collapse triggered a full organizational review, culminating with manager Ron Roenicke’s departure early the following season and general manager Doug Melvin’s retirement later that year.
The third-place Milwaukee Brewers went into PNC Park late in the season and dropped two of three. They left the series 4.5 back in the standings, finished the regular season 23-8, forcing Game 163 in the process. The late-season charge catapulted the Brewers into the postseason, where they handled the Colorado Rockies and got their hearts ripped out by the Los Angeles Dodgers.
The NL Central-leading Milwaukee Brewers went into PNC Park late in the season and dropped two of three. They left the series 1.5 games up in the standings. The rest is to be determined.
Does this Brewers team more closely resemble 2018, or the 2014 edition? It’s entirely possible that this team rallies after Pittsburgh and asserts itself on the homestretch. But comparing the three clubs, I’m not confident invoking 2018 at all.
All three clubs were below league-average in OPS+: 2014, 95; 2018, 99; 2023, 88. The 2014 club finished fifth in the NL in home runs with 150. The 2018 Brewers finished second with 218. 2023? 143, good for 11th. oWAR broadens out the point: 2014, 18.1; 2018, 23.1; 2023: 8.8. RAA is concerning: -17, 147, -48.
[Note: I find the distinction between OPS+ and wRC+ more often than not ends up being little more than hair-splitting. I prefer the former to the latter.]
All three clubs’ pitching staffs were above average in ERA+: slightly in 2014, 103; and decidedly in 2018 and 2023 (110. The 2014 club finished 10th in strikeouts, while 2018 and ‘23 claim/ed fifth. Pitching bWAR: 2014: 14.3; 2018: 8; 2023: 14.1.
The 2014 club had pitching but the offense fell off a cliff. The 2018 Brewers really were a complete team that ran out of gas and into the Dodger buzzsaw. In 2023, with the benefit of rules changes designed to generate more offense, the Brewers aren’t just bad at the plate and getting around to it, they’re abysmal. The Pirates, CB Bucknor-assisted or not, just ran the Brewers out of Pittsburgh with a team OPS+ of 89 and almost exactly league-average pitching.
With the Chicago Cubs hard-charging up the standings in recent weeks, it’s not difficult to imagine a reverse 2018 scenario. While a game 163 is no longer possible — much to the detriment of baseball and fans — the season does culminate with the Cubs and Brewers facing off in Milwaukee. That series may well determine a division winner, or worse, be a most ignominious victory lap for the visiting club and its caravan of fans, imparting both injury and insult to a team that spent six months more or less high on its own supply.
Perhaps the Cubs implode and the Brewers figure it out, pulling away and putting the race out of reach. I wouldn’t — and don’t — count on it.
This was the season where we would find out what the Brewers could actually do offensively, and it turns out that it’s not much, continuning an alarming trend of historically-inept offenses. There are no more excuses, and there is no other way to see it: this is an institutional problem — both on the farm and at the parent club level — that requires the kind of sobered willingness to look in the mirror and hold entrenched stakeholders accountable.
(The much-ballyhooed freshmen have a combined bWAR that just ekes past Gunnar Henderson. No one should expect 5+ win seasons from all their rookies, but still: where is the lasting impact? And how should all of this frame or temper Brewers fans’ expectations for one Jackson Chourio?)
Yes, the pitching has been good, ten percent better than league average, but disproportionately weighted by its top-end talent. It takes scoring to win games: runs take pressure off pitchers and stress opposing pitchers. It takes intelligence to know what to expect from opponents and how attack their batters. The Brewers’ response to all of this is to continue selling out contact for power, to insist on run prevention as a viable strategy, to continue to let unknown quantity pitchers tie up their bats and leave no margin for error for a pitching staff that apparently isn’t allowed to play to its strengths (too much nibbling, trying to induce contact) and is already pushed to — and perhaps beyond — its limits.
Craig Counsell has the luxury of walking away from this mess at season’s end. And, honestly, who would blame him?
From here, with three-ish weeks to go, can anyone reasonably expect a team that can’t hit and has overextended its pitching staff to catch fire against a remaining slate of teams pushing for a spot in the postseason and a Cardinals squad eager to play spoiler for a team that demonstrably doesn’t fare well against bad clubs?
Christian Yelich, though showing signs of rehabilitation, isn’t playing like an MVP and there certainly isn’t a Travis Shaw and Jesus Aguilar there to help shoulder the run production load. This isn’t 2018. And, if this Brewers club does make it to the postseason, it won’t matter: they’ve shown they also can’t play against contenders and are already displaying signs of wearing out. Short of doing things this Brewers club has shown no signs or inclination of doing — namely, regularly hitting for power (or, if we’re honest, hitting at all while avoiding double plays) and generating runs — there’s no reason to expect 2018’s magic to return.
The real question, after years of disappointment and franchise-low offensive output, is less about the on-field product and more about you and me: Are we OK with being gaslit like this?
Stats courtesy Baseball Reference.