Baseball is OFFICIALLY back (for now)! Finally, after 4 long months of anticipation, The Brewers played three games of baseball. The Brewers decided they would pick up where they left off after that heartwrenching Wild Card game against the Nationals and drop two out of three against the Cubs in absolutely brutal fashion. My summer is officially back now that the Brewers are crushing my heart and soul while also giving me one game of hope. In honor of the first series being done, I figured I'd look at what we learned from a truly forgettable series.
Takeaways
Kyle Hendricks is really good at throwing a baseball. Nine innings, three hits, nine strikeouts. Arcia was the only bright spot, making history for the Brewers.
The players are rusty, on both sides. Kris Bryant is 1/14 after the series, Yelich is 1/13. It will take a bit for players to hit consistently
Milwaukee is going to be a streaky team, as shown by this series. We have decent pitching this year, but Burnes and Freddy both can be strikeout machines one batter and then lose the zone completely the next. Our hitting is not great. Last year, they struggled with leaving guys on base, which has not stopped. Through the three games, the Brewers left 17 runners on the bases.
Sogard is looking like a good pickup. Through twelve plate appearances, he has not struck out once, walked twice, has one hit, and a couple of warning track deep flyouts. Exactly what you want from the guy in front of Yelich.
Omar Narváez will not be able to replace Yasmani Grandal on the defensive side, so he needs to be great on offense. He is just not the pitch framer that Yaz was or the pitch blocker. Omar had 22 homers last year while hitting .278. Yaz last year had 28 home runs while hitting .246. Omar needs to be what he was last year, or even better. If he slumps, then not only did we not replace Yaz as a catcher, they didn't even replace him as a hitter.
This is maybe the most important point. Do not worry about Yelich. He will be fine, just give him time. I don't even want to get into stats here, just relax, breathe, listen to some Enya, and watch his career highlights.
Ben Gamel is a baseball Demigod of the likes of Thor. I love him and am so happy the DH means we get more Gamel. He was killing it in the summer scrimmage (they were no stats kept but the report was he was killing it). Just look at this amazing diving catch! Not even Jon Gamble could make that catch.
Brewers and Cubs still hate each other. In the second game, Corbin Burnes was a teeny bit wild and threw inside to a couple of batters, hitting Baez and Contreras. The Cubs said some stuff to the Brewers, some Brewers hopped out of the dugout, but nothing happened thankfully. You love to see this already. The players care, and with no fans, they can hear even more.
The Cubs suck at pickles. This is now back to back years Lorenzo Cain conducted a textbook example of how to get both runners safe on an infield grounder. Just amazing. They may have taken two out of three, but they look like dumb-dumbs, so who really won?
Basically the series did not go great. There were some bright spots, young pitchers looked decent, our relievers mostly looked adequate, and Yelich did hit a big homer (his only hit of the year). This series against the Pirates should be a bounce-back opportunity, and if not, the league is probably going to get canceled anyway, so it doesn't really matter.
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