Climbing up on the Anxiety Meter

[Samurai Bucky]

Ok... I'm not on the ledge. The Crew is still up 6 over the Cards. However, I'm disappointed at how the Brewers have dropped their last five.

Should I start creeping on the ledge?

[DougJones43]

This team is over-rated because of how they beat up on bad teams. They are above average, but with many glaring weaknesses (including the manager). When they've played the better teams in baseball, they've definitely looked like pretenders.

 

There's still a very good chance they sneak in to the playoffs though, and hopefully with Weeks back, not having to bat McGehee 5th and Yuni 6th will allow the Brewers to pick up the pace on offense a little.

[Eddiehitsthefoulpole]

What worries me right now is that the Cardinals are playing better baseball than us. Are they going to get hot like we were in August? We need the Braves to help us out tomorrow.

[BuckyBrewer61]

The team sorely misses having a major league baseball player in the 5/6 spots in the lineup, and it doesn't help that the manager makes no attempt to remedy this. Getting Weeks back playing everyday will be a huge boost, but to continually plug two of the worst everyday players in baseball behind your MVP candidate is asinine. I know the stats don't show protection means anything when it comes to performance, but (admittedly without actually looking at the numbers) it seems hard to argue that having Casey/Yuni behind Prince hasn't severely hampered the Brewers offense since Rickie went down. What's more, there are solutions available, but the manager has not and likely will not use them, which is absolutely maddening. This should be the lineup once Rickie is healthy:

Hart

Morgan/Hairston

Braun

Fielder

Weeks

Green

Hairston/Gomez

Lucroy

Unfortunately, this will be the lineup:

Hart

Morgan/Gomez

Braun

Fielder

Weeks

McGehee

Betancourt

Lucroy

It is the job of the manager to put the team in the best possible position to win, and unfortunately ours does not do so. The pitching picked up the slack over a stellar month, but now the blemishes are showing against legitimate competition. We will probably still win the division, but I'm afraid it won't be with our best team out there.

[DuWayne Steurer]

My issue is less anxiety, and more of a slow simmering anger that we continue to see McGehee/Betancourt in the 5/6 spots every day. We bunt/waste an out, with Braun and Fielder coming up. Betencourt hitting into a double play last night first pitch swinging on an almost unhittable pitch with the bases loaded and one out.

 

But what really makes me angry is something I brought up in the in game thread. We all have friends and family and co workers who are at best, casual baseball fans. And right now, the 'same old Brewers/chokers' line is getting over used, and this team isn't giving me any ground to stand on right now to argue the point. Yes, they *should* still hold onto the division with a 6 game lead with 15 to go, but it's NOT over, and it's not a given. The Cards are hot right now, and the Brewers are not.

 

To put it another way, if the Brewers continue to stink, and let's say go 5 - 10 the rest of the way, the Cards can go 12 - 5, and tie it up. That's not at all 'impossible'. Is it improbable? Yeah, but not impossible. And it's hard to ignore, given the way the two teams are playing right now.

[H4P]

My anxiety is climbing. Not neceesarily for the divisional race as I'm still confident they'll balance out and not suck this bad the rest of the way.

 

My anxiety is about this team playing well enough in the post season to win a series.

[wibadgers23]

Can this team beat good teams? That's what I'm worried about. We did a good job beating up on Houston, Chicago, and Pittsburgh this year, but can we compete against the best of the best? It sure doesn't look like it.

[DuWayne Steurer]

Can this team beat good teams? That's what I'm worried about. We did a good job beating up on Houston, Chicago, and Pittsburgh this year, but can we compete against the best of the best? It sure doesn't look like it.

They're 22 and 32 vs. teams over .500 this year. I think that's misleading though. Teams over .500 are over .500 because they win more than half their games.

 

To put it into perspective, the D'Backs are 19 -24 vs. teams over .500

 

The Braves are 25 - 19 vs. teams over. 500

 

The Phils are 25 - 19

 

So the Brewers have had, by far, the toughest schedule out of the 4 NL playoff qualifiers. Keep in mind, the Brewers had to play Boston, Yanks, and Rays, while the Cards did not.

[FVBrewerFan]

Green should have been starting months ago. Hairston should have had several spot starts at SS by now, just to see how he can play there. (Really should have tried harder to get Furcal or another SS for that matter.) The problem is compounded by the fact McGehee and Yuni hit 5th/6th. Lucroy is buried in the 8th spot because clearing the pitcher is more important than scoring runs.

 

If they put the best players on the field, best lineup, best in-game strategy and still flame-out it's somehow more acceptable. If Greinke/Marcum/Yo just aren't quite good enough to beat the Phils rotation in the playoffs, I can tip my hat. If the Yankees are just flat-out a better team, I'll be crushed that we lost the WS...but looking back I could accept it.

 

Now some of those things can be debated, but it should be obvious by now Yuni shouldn't have ever been the starting SS this year, should have been replaced in July with a better option, and can STILL be replaced with a slightly better option tomorrow. As every day goes by, it's more obvious Green has a better approach at the plate than McGehee and was held back way too long, and is still being limited today. Heck, I still don't understand why you wouldn't want to use a power bat like Gamel off the bench. But the vets feelings would be hurt by any of this, so get used to McGehee and his backward Ks or weak 6-3s to kill innings.

[brewmann04]

the crew against bad teams can win but when the big boys come to play they Wilt. every brewer fans should be nervous cause now that the Backs passed us the Cards will come breathing down our neck by next weekend.

[FVBrewerFan]

I can't even believe we're talking about this now. A 10 1/2 game lead in September and we have to worry about making the playoffs. This was supposed to be a discussion we have after the first Yuni blunder or McGehee 0-5 in a Braves/Brewers first round game.

[jerichoholicninja]

They got shut down by 3 of the best pitchers in baseball. It's frustrating but I don't think you can get too worried about it.

[Bombers]

They have lost 4 of 12. Those 3 pitchers only account for 3 of those games. and against 1 of those great pitchers,(today) they had plenty of opportunities. In 3 innings of relief pitching they failed to score with a guy on 2nd and only 1 out twice.

[GAME05]

i'm too hesitant to be jumping off the ledge after so many months of great baseball and just this week of looking bad against St. Louis and Philadelphia. it's not like we'll have three more weeks against playoff teams that our division lead will evaporate. we're a little more comfortable and St. Louis is in the position of needing to win every single game they play, so i'll just tip my hat to them for stepping up when they've needed to.

 

there's still something to lineup protection when you look at intentional walks to get to a lesser hitter. statistics show it doesn't make a difference, but that doesn't account for late-game situations when you can walk a great hitter in Fielder to get to someone like McGehee. Weeks coming back is going to help that a lot.

 

my concern isn't winning the division, but what kind of team is going to be entering the playoffs. we backed into the playoffs in 2008 with basically only CC getting us there, so it wasn't a shock that we got rocked by Philadelphia in the first round. our pitching has been steady, but we've seen how it has made up for a cold offense, and that won't get us past Atlanta. i'm really hoping right now is the stretch where we're hitting bottom and that we'll start to hit it on all gears in the next couple of weeks.

 

Green and Hairston getting a lot more starts would make me feel a lot better, but obviously that's not going to happen, especially come playoff time.

[paul253]

Well as of tonight, they have lost home field advantage and now are in line to play Philly in the first round. Not good!

[SeriesFinale]

I have pretty much zero anxiety about the division (get back to me if the Cards take 3 of 4 from the Phillies)...the playoffs are another story. The Brew Crew clinched a losing record against the Phils tonight for the season, as they have for the the two probables.

 

The Phillies look like their big-spending AL East brethren. Makes me kinda sick.

[razzzorsharp]

If the Cars keep winning and the Braves slow down a little the Brewers could possibly be playing Arizona in the first round (barring St. Louis winning the division).

[cnycerveceros]

I'm not anxious because I've given up. So I'm at peace. Now, objectively I know that's ridiculous because the Crew are still 6 up and the last 4 losses have come to 4 excellent pitchers. I never really believed they were as good as they played in August and I don't think anybody did, and I still, in the end, believe that they will hold on to win the division once this predictably hard stretch against StL and Philly is over. What's most annoying about it is that right now it's not any fun, and this is supposed to be fun, otherwise why watch? So, I've been a very hands off fan since the StL sweep in Milwaukee.

[Teatoe993]

Personally I am a bit glad we are in a bit of a slump. This team has always been really streaky for as long as I can remember. There was no way we could keep up our August pace. We built up a really nice cushion of a division lead before we went in the tank. I'm hoping it will be perfect timing before we get hot again with huge momentum going into October. The last thing I would have wanted was for us to lock it up right away and finish September cooling off and losing a ton of games.

[Ennder]

Only because I think our only shot at making it past the first round is home field advantage and even with that it is really unlikely that anyone beats the Phillies. The Brewers are definitely in that 2nd tier of teams who have to get really lucky to beat the better teams.

[RockCoCougars]

I find this eerily similar to September 2008....can't get a clutch hit, not scoring many runs, one bad mistake per game seems to kill them...right down to the poor performance against Philly. They had better win today. I'm not really sure that you can rest on 'St. Louis would have to go 13-3' etc. Outside of the Philly games, they have a tremendously easy schedule...not to mention that Philly has been sitting a lot of their big bats this weekend, who's to say they won't rest a lot of guys next weekend? I believe that the Cardinals finish against Houston, would you really want to go into that final series with a 1-2 game lead. There is three weeks left of the season, 2 games a week isn't that tough to make up, especially if these guys start feeling the pressure around their necks.... they've lost 4.5 games since Tuesday.

[logan82]

I am not really worried about the division. I am more worried about our seeding and how we match up against the other playoff teams. Bring back Weeks, get Betancourt out of the lineup more than once a week and sub in Green as the big half of the platoon at 3B and I feel a lot better about this team. We still may not stack up against the Phillies with those changes but at least I would feel we are putting our best foot forward.(well almost but the Gamel ship has sailed barring injury)

[Tbadder]

The Phillies are the best. Why shouldn't they take 3 outta 4 or sweep the Brewers? The Crew has the division wrapped up I think. I have absolutely no worries or concerns. They're weaknesses are well documented and they're not going to change, so I thinks it's our expectations (as fans) that has changed--not the Brewer chances. The long awesome ride the Brewers took in building a 101/2 game lead made us fall into a false sense--that we'd be able to compete effectively in the playoffs. At the beginning of the year I think most people here thought the Crew were a playoff team, but any chance for a pennant would be based on getting hot at the right time or luck, because realistically we aren't as good as Atlanta (when healthy) or the Phillies. We're probably better than Arizona, but they're riding their wave now--they'll cool down soon enough. Lets just enjoy the division championship, and maybe we can sneak past Atlanta, but that's as far as it will go. Pretty good I'd say. I'll take it happily and enjoy the memories.

P.S. This isn't my first post. I've been here for years under a different name--no need for the typical classy/friendly welcome that you give people when first arriving here.

[paul253]

The Phillies are the best. Why shouldn't they take 3 outta 4 or sweep

the Brewers? The Crew has the division wrapped up I think.

 

Up until this series, the Brewers were the second best. The second best team in the league shouldn't be getting swept at home by anymore, especially when home field advantage is on the line.

[owbc]

Up until this series, the Brewers were the second best. The second best team in the league shouldn't be getting swept at home by anymore, especially when home field advantage is on the line.

So, I guess we can then conclude that the Brewers were not the second best team in the NL. But does it really matter? Home field advantage doesn't mean much in the playoffs. It's a short series and you just have to hope you are clicking when October 1st comes along. Looking back at the playoff history shows this even more--the best team in the NL rarely wins the pennant.

 

Only in 3 out of the last 15 years did the team with the best record in the NL win the pennant. So based purely on recent history, there is an 80% chance that a team other than the Phillies is going to represent the NL in the World Series. Yes, the Phillies are the best team by far, but they were last year also and they lost to a team that didn't clinch until game #162. The hot team usually pulls it out, which is the Diamondbacks, or the Cardinals if they can sneak in.

 

But with all those easy games coming up, the Brewers could easily be on a nice hot streak going into October--and the quality of opponents doesn't mean as much as the confidence that the players and fans will have. Two weeks ago when all the "best record in the NL" and World Series talk was going on, the talk on the quality of the opponents was subdued. So lets not give up on winning the pennant yet.