Is the Offense really the problem?

[BruisedCrew]

1 hour ago, Thurston Fluff said:

That's what every team has to hope for. The Dodgers have one World Series for all their spending this past decade. That's the same numbers as the Royals. Why didn't they win more? Because they weren't hot at the right time and another team did.

 Every team has to hope to be playing well at the right time, but the Brewers would really need for every piece to be clicking just right a lot more than the Dodgers, Braves, and Mets would. 
 

The Dodgers might just have one World Series title this decade. But they have a few other NLCS and World Series appearances too. And they aren’t the only big spenders.

[Nola Beery]

2 hours ago, Hopper said:

I keep seeing this take, and it just plain saddens me.  This is what we pin our hopes on.

"get hot at the right time and who knows"

Just plain sad.

I agree.  But it's all we've got.  And sometimes that's enough.

Baseball is weird.

 

[Nola Beery]

I have only coached girls softball, so there.  But this rule is sure in all forms of the game: whoever scores the most runs will win the game every time.  If your pitching is good, like ours mostly is, it's absurd and impossible to try to hit 5-run homers with nobody on base.  A run scored on a single, stolen base, sac bunt or ground out, plus a sac fly or RBI groundout counts exactly the same as a 453 foot homer. 

The Brewers simply don't play solid fundamental baseball most of the time.   Willie Adames:  I'm looking at you and your goofy bend-backwards and swing for the fences useless at bats. Who flipping cares if you hit a grand slam when we're up by 10!? bughghghghgh!         

[SomewhereInTime]

7 hours ago, True Blue Brew Crew said:

Uhh, one of these things is not like the others  ?

Before Peralta's good start yesterday, his ERA was right with the others.

[True Blue Brew Crew]

7 minutes ago, SomewhereInTime said:

Before Peralta's good start yesterday, his ERA was right with the others.

Stop it. His ERA has been below 5 (your arbitrary number) since May 10th and was 4.09 (now 3.69) when you threw him in there with guys who have nowhere near the track record. He went out and threw 6 no hit innings last night to make it even more laughable to be categorized with the likes of Houser, Alexander, Gonzalez etc.

[SomewhereInTime]

21 minutes ago, True Blue Brew Crew said:

Stop it. His ERA has been below 5 (your arbitrary number) since May 10th and was 4.09 (now 3.69) when you threw him in there with guys who have nowhere near the track record. He went out and threw 6 no hit innings last night to make it even more laughable to be categorized with the likes of Houser, Alexander, Gonzalez etc.

Calm down dude.  It was over 4 heading into the game.  That was my arbitrary cutoff point.  I don't care about track record for the purposes of explaining why the Brewers rank poorly in run prevention.  The guys I listed were the starters who gave up runs at the highest rates.

[brewmann04]

Has to be stressful on the pitching knowing they have to be almost perfect every game 

[monty57]

1 hour ago, BruisedCrew said:

I have some numbers to back this up, and at some point I will pull them together and present them. But the short version is:

Because the NL Central has 3 of the 5 worst teams in the NL in terms of both record and runs allowed, the Brewers have had significantly more games against these 5 generous teams than anyone else (including the Cardinals who have more of their games against these teams still on the schedule)  So, the Brewers have had more opportunities to face the league’s worst pitching staffs, and that pads their run totals relative to other playoff contenders.

On top of that, the last time I looked at this, which was just a few days ago, the Brewers were averaging about 2 runs per game more against that group of 5 worst teams than they were against everyone else. That difference is significantly greater than any of the other contenders except for the Mets, who just score more than the Brewers in general and have had better pitching too.

So, at least IMHO, the perception that the Brewers offense is worse relative to the rest of the league than indicated by the raw R/G numbers is valid. 
 

The fact that the pitching has not been elite just makes things worse. Last night’s game is a prime example. Last year, and even earlier this year, the Brewers might have won that game 1-0. Peralta goes 6, Boxberger, Williams, and Hader each pitch a shutout inning, and it’s a win. There have been a lot of games like that lost in the last few weeks because the offense isn’t putting up enough runs and the pitching is less reliable than last year. 

According to http://powerrankingsguru.com/mlb/strength-of-schedule.php, the Brewers have had a fairly easy schedule (22nd), but the Dodgers have played the easiest schedule, the Cards are #28, and Astros and Padres are #26 and 27. 
 

Since good teams don’t have to play against themselves, they tend to have easier schedules than the bad teams. If the Dodgers had to face their own pitching every night, they wouldn’t score as many runs. Thankfully for them, they don’t have to face their own guys. That works for the Brewers as well. 
 

Now, this is simply strength of schedule, and not “strength of opposing pitching staff,” but they often go hand-in-hand. 

[Jim French Stepstool]

7 hours ago, Austin Tatious said:

 

I like Stearns as much as anybody but one thing he does not get is 3B is every bit the unicorn as an up the middle talent.  You need somebody with good size, athleticism and an extra base hit profile.  It’s as hard as anything to find and we’ve put zero priority on it.  And if you want to draft an up the middle guy and then move him to 3B that’s normal but you have to draft a guy that profiles that way.  

 

I think they've recognized that with some of the recent people they've added to the system, and how they're being used. As far as a more immediate remedy, I felt Urias did enough last season to roll with him this year as well. Obviously that didn't work out. 

[brewcrewdue80]

7 hours ago, Austin Tatious said:

I expect us to replace four guys in our lineup next year.  3B, CF, 2B and C.  Hiura can take over DH.  That’s quite simply not the sign of a good offense.

I like Stearns as much as anybody but one thing he does not get is 3B is every bit the unicorn as an up the middle talent.  You need somebody with good size, athleticism and an extra base hit profile.  It’s as hard as anything to find and we’ve put zero priority on it.  And if you want to draft an up the middle guy and then move him to 3B that’s normal but you have to draft a guy that profiles that way.  

I'll say this. You read top 10 3b prospects and it's nothing special. (Maybe a team or 2 in our division having best)  Harped on the 1b prospects a few years ago being similar.  Gotta give props to StL grabbing Goldy and Arenado. Which are not only elite for 1b and 3b but bats that create a lot of stress to a pitcher. Why our offense is the problem. Nobody should be looked at on the Brewers in that way. 

BRef has basically the Offense in 10s+ aside from HRs-SlG and BBs in NL team ranks. Ones I can recall off top my head were 14th in 2bs. 2 in HRs. I think 8-10 in Hits.  So truly all or nothing. B2b singles won't score someone often.  They need the XBH like doubles besides HRs.  A great reason why I believe in calling up 2 of the AAA CFs and ridding of Taylor and Davis.(which half happened) They profile as such type hitting with less ks and more ball in play!higher BA.  The amount of 0-2 for 10+ batting risp vs the poor teams the team should win against is frustrating.  Pitching is definitely worse than last year's, but when it's 1-2Rs given up on one of those 0 for notes it's the offenses fault missing the opportunities.

Last night. 3 times runners on 1st and 2nd 0outs. And not 1 of those 3 innings ended with a run scored.  

I really don't know where the team will get its intimidating batter pitchers fear coming up. Chourio's future call up? Wiemer? We've got Turang-Adames-Urias-Tellez with the OFs-Yelich and Hiura. You gotta push someone out the door this offseason in trade while finding your own Goldy-Freeman-Rizzo-Machado type young batter for future offense in/from the infield.

[HarryDoyle]

Is this a serious topic?

[Robocaller]

14 hours ago, Austin Tatious said:

No.  This is where fans don’t get it.  We are evaluating the team as a whole.  Being an average offense as a whole is very superficial to the point of useless.  The parts of the offense don’t fit together.  That’s why they struggle offensively.  Anyone could chart through the games and see how they struggle to put together runs.  That’s the important analysis.  Not average runs.  Hiding behind “this is how the game is played” is not helpful because fans are only given a very superficial view.  The Brewers’ know their offense isn’t good enough, because it isn’t.  Even if fans will yell that our offense is fine.  

Was that a joke?

[Robocaller]

10 hours ago, brewmann04 said:

Has to be stressful on the pitching knowing they have to be almost perfect every game 

A lot of games are won by a run or two. That's always been true. 

[BruisedCrew]

4 hours ago, Robocaller said:

A lot of games are won by a run or two. That's always been true. 

The difference is that when a pitcher knows when he takes the mound to start a game that the offense isn’t likely to produce more than a couple of runs, he also knows that a mistake early in the game might decide the game. 
 

I would think that a starter for the Dodgers would feel less like he has to nibble when he can be more confident that his offense will score 5 or more runs if needed.

 

[clancyphile]

23 hours ago, Austin Tatious said:

I expect us to replace four guys in our lineup next year.  3B, CF, 2B and C.  Hiura can take over DH.  That’s quite simply not the sign of a good offense.

I like Stearns as much as anybody but one thing he does not get is 3B is every bit the unicorn as an up the middle talent.  You need somebody with good size, athleticism and an extra base hit profile.  It’s as hard as anything to find and we’ve put zero priority on it.  And if you want to draft an up the middle guy and then move him to 3B that’s normal but you have to draft a guy that profiles that way.  

Regarding CC,  you don’t like to bunt.  Fine.  But there are times that it can win you a game.  Think: situational baseball.  

Last night, watching Caratini try to bunt in a clutch situation was repulsive.  He had no idea how to do it.   A high schooler could be brought in to show him.  Fine, as a manager, you don’t like to bunt but it’s still part of the game and there are situations where every hitter needs to have the fundamentals to execute basic ball plays.  That’s how lose a game you shouldn’t.  

EXACTLY!

How does someone like Rowdy Tellez get teams to stop playing a shift? He makes them pay by blooping a single to left.

Runner on third, less than two outs? Squeeze play. When you have Burnes/Woodruff/Peralta, getting that run in matters,

This needs to be fixed at the next spring training, and if Counsell can't do it, it's time for the Brewers to find someone who can.

[BruisedCrew]

On 8/27/2022 at 3:27 PM, monty57 said:

According to http://powerrankingsguru.com/mlb/strength-of-schedule.php, the Brewers have had a fairly easy schedule (22nd), but the Dodgers have played the easiest schedule, the Cards are #28, and Astros and Padres are #26 and 27. 
 

Since good teams don’t have to play against themselves, they tend to have easier schedules than the bad teams. If the Dodgers had to face their own pitching every night, they wouldn’t score as many runs. Thankfully for them, they don’t have to face their own guys. That works for the Brewers as well. 
 

Now, this is simply strength of schedule, and not “strength of opposing pitching staff,” but they often go hand-in-hand. 

Here is the (much) longer explanation of why I think the Brewers R/G average is inflated relative to other NL playoff contenders.

I will illustrate the point I’m making using the Brewers and Phillies as an example. Using just runs per game, going into play on Saturday, the Phillies are averaging 4.66 runs per game to the Brewers 4.50. That’s not a huge difference; the Phillies have scored 29 more runs than the Brewers and have played 2 more games.

But I have been looking at how the NL playoff contenders have performed against the 6 NL teams that are allowing more runs per game than the league average of 4.42: Rockies, Nationals, Reds, Pirates, Cubs, and Diamondbacks. Not coincidentally, these teams, along with the Marlins, have the worst W-L records in the league. I am intentionally excluding the Marlins from this discussion because their pitching has been pretty good. Their R/G allowed of 4.20 is slightly better than the Brewers’ 4.32. A team doesn't get any expected bump in run production by playing them.

Using the tables on Baseball Reference that list each team’s wins, losses, runs scored, and runs allowed against each opponent, I have divided each team’s runs scored and allowed into two groups: (1) games against these 6 “Bad” NL teams, and (2) games against all of the “Other” teams.

When I did this for the Brewers and Phillies for games through Friday, I find that the Brewers are averaging 5.62 runs per game against the Bad teams and 3.61 RPG against the Others. That’s a pretty significant difference of 2 runs per game.

The Phillies are averaging 5.78 RPG against the Bad teams and 4.19 RPG against the Others. That’s more than the Brewers in both categories, but over half a run more against the Other teams. The difference of 1.59 between the two groups is not as large as the Brewers 2.01.

Now here’s what I think is the most significant part of this. So far, in the Brewers 124 games, 55 of them (44%) have been against the Bad teams. The Phillies have only had 37 of their 126 games (29%) against these teams, an obvious reflection of being in a stronger division.

As an attempt to equalize the teams’ run production based on these different strengths of schedule, I adjusted the Brewers runs by (1) multiplying their RPG against the Bad teams by 29%, (2)  multiplying their RPG against the Other teams by 71%, and (3) adding (1) and (2) together. That is meant to approximate what the Brewers run production might be if they played the same schedule as the Phillies. That exercise produces an adjusted RPG for the Brewers of 4.19, somewhat lower than their actual RPG of 4.50.

I don’t claim this to be a foolproof scientific method, but it illustrates my point. And the point is that the combination of (1) being more productive against the worst pitching teams in the league, which would be expected for every team, and (2) having significantly more games against those teams than other NL contenders, flattens out the difference between the quality of their offenses.

I have done comparisons between the Brewers and the other NL playoff contenders, and the results are all similar. The other contenders, except for the Padres, all have had significantly more productive offenses, especially when factoring in the schedules they have played.

Of course, the Cardinals come the closest to the Brewers in games played against these Bad teams. They are averaging 5.87 RPG in 53 games against the Bad teams and 4.14 RPG in 73 games against the Others. In addition to having a better offense overall than the Brewers, they are a half a run per game better against the Other (better) teams.

[mtsportsfan]

On 8/27/2022 at 3:22 PM, brewmann04 said:

Has to be stressful on the pitching knowing they have to be almost perfect every game 

I said this very same thing a while ago and got chastised pretty good for it , but still firmly believe that it is just more added pressure, to be perfect ! Knowing if u give up a couple of runs there is a good chance you might get a loss or no decision . 

[mtsportsfan]

On 8/28/2022 at 6:04 AM, BruisedCrew said:

The difference is that when a pitcher knows when he takes the mound to start a game that the offense isn’t likely to produce more than a couple of runs, he also knows that a mistake early in the game might decide the game. 
 

I would think that a starter for the Dodgers would feel less like he has to nibble when he can be more confident that his offense will score 5 or more runs if needed.

 

Should have read farther down , you put it way better than I did.

[Robocaller]

On 8/28/2022 at 9:50 AM, clancyphile said:

EXACTLY!

How does someone like Rowdy Tellez get teams to stop playing a shift? He makes them pay by blooping a single to left.

Runner on third, less than two outs? Squeeze play. When you have Burnes/Woodruff/Peralta, getting that run in matters,

This needs to be fixed at the next spring training, and if Counsell can't do it, it's time for the Brewers to find someone who can.

what makes you think Rowdy can just start hitting singles to left?

[sveumrules]

On the season as a whole the Brewers have scored 4.57 runs per game (8th in MLB), while allowing 4.31 runs per game (17th in MLB). To this point I would say the offense has definitely performed better than the pitching relative to preseason expectations.

But we also know there have been (at least) two seasons so far, the first 50 games where the team went a franchise best 32-18 and the last 77 games when they have been much more like the pre-Attanasio Brewers at 36-41. So, let's break it down along those lines.

First 50 games the Brewers offense scored 4.56 runs per game. Their wRC+ of 101 and WPA of +1.13 both ranked 11th in MLB. The pitchers posted a 3.28 ERA (4th), 3.31 FIP (2nd) and +5.87 WPA (2nd). This was all pretty much to script.

Last 77 games the Brewers offense has scored 4.58 runs per game. Their wRC+ of 106 and WPA of -0.59 both rank 14th in MLB. The pitchers have posted a 4.28 ERA (22nd), 4.40 FIP (24th) and -1.91 WPA (22nd). Offense has mostly held serve, pitchers have flipped the script.

Hopefully this 3-0 start to the Garrett Mitchell era can kick off a third season that takes the Brewers beyond the first week of October.

 

[sveumrules]

Building out on the "at least two seasons so far" idea from above, here is a more broken up look at the stretch from May 31st through August 26th when the team went 33-41...

May 31 - June 11 (1-10)
O: 3.18 R/G | 77 wRC+ | -1.63 WPA
P: 5.99 ERA | 5.70 FIP | -2.87 WPA
(Offense was bad, pitching was worse)

June 12 - June 29 (11-5)
O: 4.94 R/G | 119 wRC+ | +1.46 WPA
P: 3.55 ERA | 3.65 FIP | +1.54 WPA
(Pretty even positive contributions from both)

June 30 - July 17 (6-10)
O: 4.69 R/G | 101 wRC+ | -1.42 WPA
P: 4.43 ERA | 4.59 FIP | -0.58 WPA
(Offense pretty much hit to their season totals by R/G and wRC+ but got killed in high leverage spots with that -1.42 WPA)

July 22 - July 30 (7-1)
O: 6.88 R/G | 148 wRC+ | +1.59 WPA
P: 4.03 ERA | 3.55 FIP | +1.41 WPA
(Offense crushing out of the ASB)

July 31 - August 26 (8-15)
O: 3.74 R/G | 88 wRC+ | -1.80 WPA
P: 4.00 ERA | 4.49 FIP | -1.70 WPA
(About equal blame on both sides following the trade deadline)

[brewcrewdue80]

1 run in 2 games in Arizona. A park I feel the Brewer bats typically do damage in.  You're at a time where you need a spark and it's lifeless. It's over for this team. Doesn't feel like 1 side feeds off the other. Pitchers put up 0s bats do too. Hitters put up 4-7 pitchers giving up 5+. 

 

[Robocaller]

2 hours ago, brewcrewdue80 said:

1 run in 2 games in Arizona. A park I feel the Brewer bats typically do damage in.  You're at a time where you need a spark and it's lifeless. It's over for this team. Doesn't feel like 1 side feeds off the other. Pitchers put up 0s bats do too. Hitters put up 4-7 pitchers giving up 5+. 

 

It's not over, but it will be if they don't start a winning streak soon.  I guess Mitchell isn't going to be our savior.

[mtrebs]

On 8/28/2022 at 9:50 AM, clancyphile said:

EXACTLY!

How does someone like Rowdy Tellez get teams to stop playing a shift? He makes them pay by blooping a single to left.

Runner on third, less than two outs? Squeeze play. When you have Burnes/Woodruff/Peralta, getting that run in matters,

This needs to be fixed at the next spring training, and if Counsell can't do it, it's time for the Brewers to find someone who can.

I’ve been saying this for years. It’s never going to happen because advanced analytics say it isn’t worth doing that. In my opinion these advanced analytics are one of the big causes for baseball’s demise. 

[NBBrewFan]

1 hour ago, mtrebs said:

I’ve been saying this for years. It’s never going to happen because advanced analytics say it isn’t worth doing that. In my opinion these advanced analytics are one of the big causes for baseball’s demise. 

Since the discovery of OBP x SLG (or OBP + SLG) I thought that if two players had a similar number, the one with the higher BA/OBP was better because they were giving away fewer outs.  Since a team (in most cases) has 27 outs to outscore the other team, not making an out is an important skill.  It just seems the Brewers want to improve the SLG while not being concerned with the fact that most players have a drop in OBP when they are focusing on increasing SLG.  Maybe they think that a 0.02 increase in slugging will only get you a drop of 0.015 in OBP so it's worth it, but they are ultimately strangling the game into a 2 true outcomes sport (HR or K) which is taking a game that used to have nuance and strategy and making a game with so little action it makes cricket seem like a high intensity sport.