2018-10-20 (NLCS Game #7): Dodgers (Buehler) at Brewers (Chacín) 7:09 PM CDT [Brewers lose, 5-1 -- 2018 Season Comes to a Close]

[DuWayne Steurer]

 

Maybe if batters were proficient in situational hitting, strikeout rates would be lower? We get a guy on base, and Brewers hitters come up there trying to knock the ball into the seats. When they fail to do so, they whiff at pitchers six inches above the strike zone, or bouncing in the dirt (see Moustakas and Aguilar). Adjust the approach like Anthony Rizzo did against us in the one game playoff. Behind in the count, I think it was 1-2, with a runner on base, he choked up on the bat, sacrificing the home run in order to foul pitches off, and force the pitcher to throw him what he wanted. When was the last time a Brewer bat came up to the plate with that kind of approach? Rizzo ultimately fouled 8 or 9 pitches off, and while I don't recall what he did, he worked the count, and increased the pitcher's pitch count in doing so. If he's successful, his team scores. Even if he just makes contact, and doesn't reach safely, he moves a runner over, which is a hell of a lot more than a strikeout does. If nothing else, the pitcher on the mound is out of the game that much sooner.

 

We look at metrics, and say, "this doesn't make sense". Well, if batters attained a more team friendly approach at the plate, strikeout rates wouldn't be what they are. Aguilar whiffed four times tonight swinging at crap that a high school batter knows to lay off of.

 

 

It's easy to say "if batters did x,y,z, they would be more successful", well of course. If Ryan Braun would just hit homers every time up, he'd be the MVP, and break Barry Bonds record.

 

Not choking up with two strikes, trying to elevate the ball, going for maximum exit velocity, this is not just stuff batters are deciding on their own, that is something all the data suggests maximizes potential for success. And yes, it increases strikeout rates quite a bit. Guys don't want to go up there and hit a weak grounder to 2nd base, they just don't. This is how they are being trained and taught to hit now. This is how baseball is being played now.

 

Guys like Rizzo, or Ben Zobrist, or a handful of players in the league might have a different approach, but by and large, guys are going up there, and swinging as hard as they can until they hit the ball fair, or they strike out. That is coached. This is the game. It's not entirely aesthetically pleasing to a lot of fans. This year saw more strikeouts in MLB than any other season. It's not just Brewer hitters. NL teams struck out on average, 1400 times. 8.6 K's per game, per team.

 

One can argue that this isn't the way baseball should be played, but it is how it is played. And it sucks when you're on the losing end of it. But guys just aren't going to go up there and give up at bats to move runners. That isn't even hardly part of the lexicon anymore. The paradigm has completely shifted.

[clancyphile]

Jeffress was salt in the wound and nothing more. After we started playing the "put a guy on 2nd then fart three times" game I knew where this was headed. Strategy didn't matter tonight. Talent won in the end.

 

Chacin matches up talent-wise with Hill and maybe Ryu. Not Buehler or Kershaw. He was put in a tough situation tonight where he would have to pretty much be perfect. He wasn't, and a monkey wrench was thrown in the plan for tonight. You can have the best pen in the world, but you still have to start someone.

 

Freddy Peralta did match up talent-wise, and was red-hot. But he was, for all intents and purposes, shut down after September 1.

 

At the very least use him in more than Game 4. He was at least as effective as Hader,

 

The non-use of Peralta, to me, is the most inexcusable decision by Counsell, especially when it was clear JJ was gassed.

[rickh150]

How many NLCS losers do you remember 5, 10 years later? Who last it last year or the year before? Yeah, exactly. Ultimately they are a blip. Tonight was their chance to go down in lore and they blew it. Again.

 

Winning one WS is going to change everything? Some would say that one in the last 50 would be a blip or insignificant. It stings to lose this one, sure. We had a terrific season. Show a little grace, tip your hat to LA, and hope for better next season.

[Bulldogboy]

Johnathan Schoop pinch hit tonight with two men on down a run. Think about that folks. Why?

 

Well, because despite the disaster that trade was, he IS a good hitter and could have had a hit at any moment. But the reason he was picked was obvious. It was super early in the game, close, and you don't want to use your best option there.

 

But really, I'm beyond nitpicking in-game decisions. There is no shame in losing to that team, on paper we were badly overmatched. I am not upset with the performance; I am just depressed that I don't think this franchise will ever get it done. It is just too hard for a team like them to succeed. You have to basically get lucky and finish the job when the stars align, and that was this year.

 

Good night guys. I am not around much at all in the offseason. I need to get away from this now for a very long time.

You could say the same about not using your best pitcher too. You cannot have next level urgency with your pitching and then be like this situation doesn't matter. Schoop get up there. This is why the Counsell doctrine rarely makes sense.

[clancyphile]

 

Maybe if batters were proficient in situational hitting, strikeout rates would be lower? We get a guy on base, and Brewers hitters come up there trying to knock the ball into the seats. When they fail to do so, they whiff at pitchers six inches above the strike zone, or bouncing in the dirt (see Moustakas and Aguilar). Adjust the approach like Anthony Rizzo did against us in the one game playoff. Behind in the count, I think it was 1-2, with a runner on base, he choked up on the bat, sacrificing the home run in order to foul pitches off, and force the pitcher to throw him what he wanted. When was the last time a Brewer bat came up to the plate with that kind of approach? Rizzo ultimately fouled 8 or 9 pitches off, and while I don't recall what he did, he worked the count, and increased the pitcher's pitch count in doing so. If he's successful, his team scores. Even if he just makes contact, and doesn't reach safely, he moves a runner over, which is a hell of a lot more than a strikeout does. If nothing else, the pitcher on the mound is out of the game that much sooner.

 

We look at metrics, and say, "this doesn't make sense". Well, if batters attained a more team friendly approach at the plate, strikeout rates wouldn't be what they are. Aguilar whiffed four times tonight swinging at crap that a high school batter knows to lay off of.

 

 

It's easy to say "if batters did x,y,z, they would be more successful", well of course. If Ryan Braun would just hit homers every time up, he'd be the MVP, and break Barry Bonds record.

 

Not choking up with two strikes, trying to elevate the ball, going for maximum exit velocity, this is not just stuff batters are deciding on their own, that is something all the data suggests maximizes potential for success. And yes, it increases strikeout rates quite a bit. Guys don't want to go up there and hit a weak grounder to 2nd base, they just don't. This is how they are being trained and taught to hit now. This is how baseball is being played now.

 

Guys like Rizzo, or Ben Zobrist, or a handful of players in the league might have a different approach, but by and large, guys are going up there, and swinging as hard as they can until they hit the ball fair, or they strike out. That is coached. This is the game. It's not entirely aesthetically pleasing to a lot of fans. This year saw more strikeouts in MLB than any other season. It's not just Brewer hitters. NL teams struck out on average, 1400 times. 8.6 K's per game, per team.

 

One can argue that this isn't the way baseball should be played, but it is how it is played. And it sucks when you're on the losing end of it. But guys just aren't going to go up there and give up at bats to move runners. That isn't even hardly part of the lexicon anymore. The paradigm has completely shifted.

 

More like the metrics are useful most of the time, but the real genius is knowing when to discard them, and go with the more traditional approaches.

 

Build a team, play the metrics, but be willing to do the small ball stuff. Steal the bases. Make the bunts against the shifts.

 

Good lord, why not give Perez or Cain, or some of the faster players green light to steal?

[RollieTime]

As unfortunate as the loss was tonight, it’s important to remember the success we had this season and build off of it for next year. Our guys got a good taste of playoff baseball this season and will be much better off in the future when we return to the playoffs. The core pieces to this Milwaukee team will be around for many more years. Our window is only opening.

[trwi7]

he IS a good hitter and could have had a hit at any moment

 

He's a below average hitter in his career and was terrible this year.

 

But the reason he was picked was obvious. It was super early in the game, close, and you don't want to use your best option there.

 

This is not a good reason. This was a run scoring opportunity where a hit to the outfield would at minimum tie the game and if it's an extra base hit could potentially give us the lead. Waiting for later to use your best option is the exact thing that would get a manager lambasted if he had done it with a reliever. So Counsell used perhaps his worst option in a one run game and runners on 1st and 2nd to save his best options for later. Well, later came and he used Santana with nobody on in a 1 run game and he used Granderson with a runner on 1st in a 5-1 game. Use your best option to try to get even or ahead now because you don't know if you're going to have the chance to do the same later in the game and it turns out, we didn't have the chance later in the game.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

How many NLCS losers do you remember 5, 10 years later? Who last it last year or the year before? Yeah, exactly. Ultimately they are a blip. Tonight was their chance to go down in lore and they blew it. Again.

 

Winning one WS is going to change everything? Some would say that one in the last 50 would be a blip or insignificant. It stings to lose this one, sure. We had a terrific season. Show a little grace, tip your hat to LA, and hope for better next season.

 

Yes. Winning one would change it for me, and a lot of other folks.

[rickh150]

Come on you guys. This whining is friggin pathetic. So easy to be a monday morning qb. It's been a fun season. Move on, be optimistic that we can improve

 

I've been optimistic that we could improve since I went to my first home game in 1979. At what point does the annual optimism just fall by the wayside? At some point, a franchise has to win. Instead, we've had decades of "wait until next year". I'm tired of people feeling the need to blow sunshine up my butt. We can spin all we want, but every year, we lose the last game of the season, and it's become incredibly deflating.

 

Just leave the bandwagon then and stop cryin about it.

[rickh150]

How many NLCS losers do you remember 5, 10 years later? Who last it last year or the year before? Yeah, exactly. Ultimately they are a blip. Tonight was their chance to go down in lore and they blew it. Again.

 

Winning one WS is going to change everything? Some would say that one in the last 50 would be a blip or insignificant. It stings to lose this one, sure. We had a terrific season. Show a little grace, tip your hat to LA, and hope for better next season.

 

Yes. Winning one would change it for me, and a lot of other folks.

 

It would be great to win it all, I agree. I'm not sure how my opinion of the team would change, however. Still go to games, still hope they get to the playoffs, still be proud to be a Brewer fan, all that. So in your mind we're all losers until we win one championship? Then we can wear our championship gear for the next 30 years and feel like winners? It would be great to win it all, huge fun, but not life altering.

[Pugger]

With strikeout rates being what they are in todays game, bunting is a waste, unless you're doing it with your pitcher. Putting a man on third with one out, to give ONE batter a chance to score a run with a grounder or flyball, just doesn't make sense. If I have a man on 2nd, give me 3 tries at a base hit, vs one try at a fly ball, and one try at a basehit. Strikeout rates are just too high in the current iteration of the game to count on sac flies and the like to make bunting a viable strategy.

 

Maybe if batters were proficient in situational hitting, strikeout rates would be lower? We get a guy on base, and Brewers hitters come up there trying to knock the ball into the seats. When they fail to do so, they whiff at pitchers six inches above the strike zone, or bouncing in the dirt (see Moustakas and Aguilar). Adjust the approach like Anthony Rizzo did against us in the one game playoff. Behind in the count, I think it was 1-2, with a runner on base, he choked up on the bat, sacrificing the home run in order to foul pitches off, and force the pitcher to throw him what he wanted. When was the last time a Brewer bat came up to the plate with that kind of approach? Rizzo ultimately fouled 8 or 9 pitches off, and while I don't recall what he did, he worked the count, and increased the pitcher's pitch count in doing so. If he's successful, his team scores. Even if he just makes contact, and doesn't reach safely, he moves a runner over, which is a hell of a lot more than a strikeout does. If nothing else, the pitcher on the mound is out of the game that much sooner.

 

We look at metrics, and say, "this doesn't make sense". Well, if batters attained a more team friendly approach at the plate, strikeout rates wouldn't be what they are. Aguilar whiffed four times tonight swinging at crap that a high school batter knows to lay off of.

 

Love this post! Not doing situational hitting has been an issue for us all season long. Another thing we do that drives me and my hubby crazy is the pitcher just walked a guy and can't find the plate and the next guy up is swinging at these lousy pitches. Coles has to go.

[Pugger]

Lack of offensive discipline has been a problem for not only years, but decades. I don't know why switching hitting coaches would work now. Not that I think they shouldn't.

 

What else can you do to fix this ongoing problem? Isn't the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result?

[Pugger]

Johnathan Schoop pinch hit tonight with two men on down a run. Think about that folks. Why?

 

Yes, there had to be somebody better than him! A pitcher in the bullpen would have been a better choice.

[PinaMadness]

I hope this loss makes people appreciate what the 1982 team did instead of scoffing at the organization when the organization commemorates them on an anniversary. An opportunity like this may not come again for another 10 years or more.

[adambr2]

I hope this loss makes people appreciate what the 1982 team did instead of scoffing at the organization when the organization commemorates them on an anniversary. An opportunity like this may not come again for another 10 years or more.

 

I do appreciate what the 1982 team accomplished. But I also do long for a day when making it to a single World Series and losing it isn't the pinnacle of our organizational accomplishments.

[Pugger]

I hope this loss makes people appreciate what the 1982 team did instead of scoffing at the organization when the organization commemorates them on an anniversary. An opportunity like this may not come again for another 10 years or more.

 

Yes, however this team has a different feel to it than the 82 team and especially the 2011 team. The core talent on this team is returning in February so the future is very bright. Our leadership is different too.

[trwi7]

I hope this loss makes people appreciate what the 1982 team did instead of scoffing at the organization when the organization commemorates them on an anniversary. An opportunity like this may not come again for another 10 years or more.

 

1982 team playoff record: 6-6

 

2018 team playoff record: 6-4

 

So no, the 1982 team only had to win a 5 game series to make it to the World Series. The Brewers of this decade have done that twice.

[rickh150]

Disagree. Bunting has its place. Getting a guy to 2nd or 3rd with a bunt, especially with a pitcher or low OBP guy to turn the lineup over, is needed especially when top notch pitching is on the hill. For the big inning, no, bunting has no place, I'll agree with you. You are talking about one run. Having a contact hitter or three on your bench to hit the ball when a guy is at 3rd has its place, as well. In Game 7, I agree with you. It's not why we lost.

 

 

You are simply wrong. A runner on 2nd with no outs vs a runner on 3rd with 1 out is a 4% increase in a chance to score a single run. The odds with a runner on 1st vs runner on 2nd are similar. So you have to be successful with the bunt over 90% of the time for it to be a valid strategy. It is extremely rare for this to be the case. Bunting in the current game of baseball is a huge mistake unless you have a pitcher up or an elite bunter up.

 

You aren't including the times the guy gets on whether by hit, error, or walk.