Game 2 takeaways: Brewers defense falters before finding a way
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Sure enough, the Milwaukee Brewers fulfilled their promise to Win Our Way, cashing in a trio of ninth-inning walks to set up a dramatic game-winning single by Jackson Chourio on Oct. 4. But the first eight innings didn't resemble Brewers baseball, making it a microcosm of the team's ability to win without its best.
Arguably, you could apply that description to both games of the National League Division Series, where the Brewers nonetheless take a 2-0 lead to San Diego and need just one more victory to reach a second straight NLCS.
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"We feel like we probably didn't play our best, cleanest game," Brewers veteran Christian Yelich said, not long after he scored the tying run ahead of Sal Frelick's winning run on Chourio's single. "It happens, and you just gotta flush it. You can't dwell on it while the game's happening. I think that would be something that you'd look at after the game, like all right, where did this go wrong, if it went wrong?
"But you kind of pushed that out in the moment. Just keep grinding. We're still in this thing, find a way to win."
Frelick registered an outfield assist to cut down Manny Machado streaking for third base in the seventh, one of Milwaukee's best defensive highlights even though a run scored on the play to give the Padres a 3-1 lead at the time. The rest of the game was tough to watch on defense.
It began early, when a Logan Henderson two-out walk and ensuing wild pitch moved Machado into scoring position for Ty France’s two-out single.
Brice Turang’s uncharacteristic bungling of a would-be double play grounder in the fifth and David Hamilton getting handcuffed in the seventh – both of which led to unearned runs scoring – made you wonder if the Brewers went from having angels in the outfield the night before to being replaced by the Bad News Bears.
"We didn't play special," Brewers manager Pat Murphy said. "When do you see us make four defensive miscues in a game in the infield? Four defensive miscues?"
The fourth was a missed assignment on a bunt play in the eighth, when Aaron Ashby came up with the ball in what seemed like a clear bunt situation but didn't have anyone at first base to catch the ball. Ashby kept it in his pocket and then escaped the jam.
"Henderson didn't have his best," Murphy continued. "We gave up all those free bases (with walks and a hit batter). We gave up all those free bases, and we're lucky to stay in the game. And I attribute our pitching staff making quality pitches to keep us in those games. But it's not like us to make those errors."
It extended to the offense, too. Indecisiveness on challenges proved costly on a pair of occasions. While William Contreras flipped three of four calls in the Brewers' favor behind the plate, Brewers hitters failed to take advantage of having both challenges remaining in key, green-light spots for helmet taps.
In the bottom of the fifth, the Brewers had yet to put a runner on against Padres starter Michael King when Garrett Mitchell worked a 3-0 count with one out. King missed high by a couple inches with a fastball for what would have easily been ball four, but Mitchell didn’t challenge Barrett’s strike call. Two pitches later, he struck out.
When Yelich followed with Milwaukee’s first hit, a double down the line. Frelick and Cooper Pratt followed suit with singles to bring the Brewers within a run at 2-1, but it sure would have been nice to have another runner on in that spot.
An inning later, Brice Turang turned around to disagree with Barrett calling a 2-1 pitch a strike despite it missing low, yet he didn’t challenge. Instead of a 3-1 count with the potential tying run on first, Turang had two strikes on him and popped out.
Mitchell did it again, too, failing to challenge another 3-0 pitch well off the plate to begin the seventh, though the at-bat ended in a single. Jake Bauers did also have two successful challenges in the game.
For what it’s worth, Pat Murphy was asked during the build-up to the series about whether the Brewers used the week off to refresh the players on ABS strategies given their struggles in the area during the regular season.
“You don't want them to have that feeling that everything's different,” Murphy said. “They're going to feel that it's different. And if you fill their mind with, OK, no ABS, and no ABS after this. It's really hard. You kind of have to let it flow and you might mention generally, ‘Hey, man, remember, green only.’ Could put you in a bind.”
Despite it all, the Brewers found a way, somehow, yet again. Despite playing something south of their best baseball, they have a commanding 2-0 series lead.
Two other takeaways from Game 2 (aside from Jackson Chourio and the thrilling ninth inning, of course):
Logan Henderson made one miscue
Save for an uncharacteristic bout with his control early, Logan Henderson looked like, well, Logan Henderson.
Henderson was within a strike of whiffing the side in the top of the first before throwing four straight balls to lose Manny Machado. The right-hander then uncorked a wild pitch by spiking a changeup which proved costly when Ty France battled back from 0-2 to rifle a single to center.
Henderson found his changeup command following a shaky second that featured two more free passes, which he stranded by wiggling off with a pair of flies to left. He retired eight in a row before a Luis Campusano single to open the fifth, and even then Henderson should have gotten off the hook unscathed but Turang, in stunning fashion, had a Tatis grounder near second skip underneath his glove.
Henderson tied his career high with three walks but got through five innings on 72 pitches, departing after hitting France to begin the sixth. The Padres registered only two hits against him and he logged nine whiffs on 34 swings – all things considered a more encouraging outing than his final two of the regular season when something just seemed a little off.
Christian Yelich is rewarding his manager's faith
It was eyebrow-raising when Christian Yelich was penciled into the Game 1 lineup against a left-handed starter; the veteran has struggled through the worst statistical season of his career, but Murphy has repeatedly reinforced his faith in Yelich, including bestowing the title of "captain" on the ninth-year Brewer.
Yelich singled in Game 1 and reached base twice in Game 2, including via walk before stealing a base against Mason Miller in the ninth inning. He also doubled and scored the first run of the game in the fifth and hit a ball to the wall in center in the seventh, one that sounded like a two-run home run off the bat but landed in the glove of Jackson Merrill as his back crashed into the outfield wall.
In the end, Yelich was at home plate trying to hug Frelick, noting his marginal success trying to rein in the "Massachusetts Gatorade Football Player of the Year before he broke the tackle," with both going after Chourio thereafter.
"It's just pass it on to the next guy, and whatever the game gives you, it gives you," Yelich said. "And do your job in that moment and that pitch. And live to see the next one and the next one and the next one.
"And eventually somebody's going to find themselves in a situation to do something or get the pitch to hit and, you know, that's just how baseball works."
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Game 2 takeaways: Brewers defense falters before finding a way