Road Trip Preview (with a special look at tonight's game)
By: Big Rygg
Here we go again.
The Milwaukeee Brewers are in Atlanta tonight for the beginning of yet another three-city road trip. In fact, the Brewers have been on the road officially 5 times this year. Of those trips, one has been three games (to open the year in Chicago), one has been six games (our most recent trip to Colorado and Houston) and the other three have been at least nine-game, three-city trips.
We first went to New York, St. Louis and Cincinnati over 10 days. We then were in Chicago again followed up by trips to Houston and Florida over another 10 day span. Our third trip was actually 10 games over what was supposed to be 11 days, but we were rained out the first night in Boston so we ended up playing 10 games in 10 days in Boston, Pittsburgh and then Washington D.C.
Conversely, we have only had two homestands of that length to this point but we, again, are about to head out on our fourth such road trip. This disparity coupled with our level of play on the road makes a lot of people wonder how the Brewers are seven games over the .500 mark.
The Brewers, to this point, are five games below .500 on the road. Last year, they ended up 17 games under at the end of the year. So, if we can somehow figure out the road woes before this year is over (and by "figure out" I basically mean come up with a way to play .500 on the road), then we should be sitting quite pretty come September.
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Now, as for this upcoming road trip, these are three teams whose home/road splits are also as drastic if not more so than Milwaukee's own.
Minnesota (40-36 overall) is nine games over .500 at home (25-16) while going 15-20 on the road. Arizona, owner of the NL West's best record of 39-37, are 24-15 at home and 15-22 on the road. Tonight's opponent Atlanta has one of the worst splits in the league of 27-12 at home (+15) and 11-27 (-16) at home for an overall record of 38-39 (4th in the 5 team NL East).
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But let's go ahead and focus in a little closer on Atlanta.
As I just mentioned, Atlanta's overall record at home is 27-12. Before we start worrying too much about that we need to take into account where those wins have come from.
First and foremost, Atlanta only has only won 8 games at home against teams that currently have winning records. Two of those games were against Arizona who, as I mentioned, are 15-22 on the road too. Four of them are from the Marlins who are under .500 on the road, but in all fairness had they won the four games they lost in Atlanta, they'd be over .500 on the road.
Atlanta, especially without John Smoltz (who is my answer when I'm asked who my favorite pitcher is, though I've never really thought about it for an extended period of time), has been fortunate to play many a bad team at home.
We should be just fine tonight and throughout this series, especially since we have Ben Sheets starting things off for us tonight. Let's just hope the team fairs better starting off this road trip than the last one which was started by Sheets in Colorado.
Tonight, Sheets squares off against Jo-Jo Reyes. The last time Reyes pitched against the Brewers was this season on May 28th at Miller Park in a game that the Brewers won 1-0. Reyes was pitted against Jeff Suppan in that matchup and gave up the one run in 7.0 IP.
I had a very good feeling about tonight, but tomorrow and Wednesday scare me a bit with Morton and Campillo. As I type this Jo-Jo Reyes just got pulled after 1.1. I wish Yost would have had as quick of a hook on Friday as Bobby Cox. Anyways, the Brewers have never faced Morton and Campillo is a hard-throwing righty. Unless the Brewers continue to do what they've started tonight (Walk, go opposite field, advance runners and use the homerun), then trouble is brewing. I like what I've seen the last four games.
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What great start to the trip...can you believe the way Bush is pitching? Is this how he can be, or an apparition? Does his last 3 starts make the front office think twice about trying to pull off a deal for more pitching help?
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Tough game 3 and I agree with the writer's asking Yost is he felt the team was sluggish, they were. Yost, of course responded by saying "If you know baseball, if you have any baseball knowledge, you would know that was a well-pitched game". Ahhh, Ned, we missed you (Not really). This is what young teams do. THEY FORGET. The portion of the game I watched on Wednesday, I was watching Ryan Braun look silly in two plate appearances when he tried to pull each pitch out of the ballpark. The pitcher was busting him outside and Ryan was getting himself out. Now, I'm not blaming the game on Ryan but when you see players do this, the average observer can draw their own conclusions and determine that they are not going with the pitch. Players need to adjust. If a pitcher refuses to come out over the plate or the inner-half, you have to take the ball the opposite way. When you don't, you lose games like 4-2 to a pitcher by the name of Campillo...
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The Brewers get themselves out A LOT. Until they learn that, they're going to struggle against pitchers like Campillo. They even struggled against Morton, but were handed the game. Two red hot teams start tomorrow. The Twins are 9-1 their last ten.
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