My belief is gone, but I remain hopeful

[wisportswriter]

I just don't think the Brewers will win the Central ... haven't for a couple weeks now. But I will cheer them to the (hopefully-not-so-bitter) end, and I remain hopeful they will prove me wrong.

 

Here's one postgame quote from J.J. Hardy that helps keep my hope alive:

 

"It's fun playing games like this. We're going to have to go out and play good ball the next two months."

That's after the loss that sent the team out of first place (sort of) for the first time since I was getting spring allergies instead of fall ones. That's encouraging.

We may be going bonkers over this collapse, but the players aren't. Hopefully they've got something left in the tank to still pull this one off.

[brewcrewman17]

I just don't think the Brewers will win the Central

 

 

Keep the faith, man. They're still in first place (albeit tied now), and there's two months of baseball left - There's so many different things that could happen. The team continues to score a pretty decent amount of runs, and a stetch of good pitching from the bullpen and the rotation could lead to another stretch of .600+ baseball pretty easily.

[GenoSeligPrieb]

No surprise (I'm a Cynic, after all), but I've lost confidence in this club even getting a Wild Card this year.

 

Too many meltdowns by our pitching, and a lack of...spirit?...determination? when they need to go for the throat and get that extra run home as often as possible. It has been proven again and again, that if we race out to an early lead, that our pitching can not be relied upon to hold it. And that's the hallmark of a non-playoff team.

 

I'm coming to accept this now, and honestly, I'm not as angry. Just resigned to our fate....

[brewmann04]

My problem is if they can"t win on the Road they are not making the Playoffs or do they deserve to make them.
It been a nice suprise seeing the Brewers ride first palce but you can see over the Past few months they are not the same team and with the Cubs playing so good. IMO it was only a matter of time.

[igor67]

The obvious problem here is that there were just as many strong opinions 6-8 weeks ago that things were pretty much wrapped up with our big lead. Even if the Cubs did start playing better. If you look at as much data as you can the race really looks a lot more like a coin flip. This goes back to some of those late April and early May columns were the JS was saying most Brewer fans were waiting expecting the team to nosedive. Well that secret fear appears to be realized. The difference still exists though that this is a much better team than the previous decade of collapsers ever was.

[GenoSeligPrieb]

"You guys are acting like we lost the division already!!...Try to be optimistic people, that is the only way I can stay sane being a Brewers fan "

 

We ARE in 2nd place, and behind in the Wild Card, ya know...

 

And as for being optimistic? Optimism entails a strong emotional investment in a team that's simply not balanced enough to make the playoffs. Of course, I still hope they somehow prove me wrong, and I don't EXPECT them to fall below .500 yet. But living and dying with every gut-twisting loss, when you're dealing with this franchise, is neither healthy nor sane.

 

I expect...not much from a club that can't extend/hold leads. Watching them lose to the Nationals, Pirates, Cardinals and Reds so often means they're just not ready for prime time. So, yeah, I'll cheer them on, hope for the best, and all that...but they'll only let me down again, as they have for 25 years now.

[bklynbrewcrew]

I have pretty much lost all faith in the team at this point. I watch these games now and even when they have a big lead i expect something bad to happen. This is the most frustrating season in a long time because I feel like this team has the talent to win the division but is falling apart at the seams.

[brewmann04]

we would all love to see the Brewers make the Playoffs ,But unless they turn it back around and Post their April Record i don"t see them Catching the Cubs. Say what you want about the Cubs they have made up an 81/2 game lead and now playing better baseball than our Crew. ( That just the Facts)

Hopefully the Crew can put it all together but it not looking overall promising.

[MillerPark]

we would all love to see the Brewers make the Playoffs ,But unless they turn it back around and Post their April Record i don"t see them Catching the Cubs. Say what you want about the Cubs they have made up an 81/2 game lead and now playing better baseball than our Crew. ( That just the Facts)

Hopefully the Crew can put it all together but it not looking overall promising.

Wow! Right now, they're virtually tied with the Cubs, so there's no "catching" to do yet! Come on people, we're not behind the Cubs! But in all fairness, I know what you meant.

 

 

 

[moofnelson]

It's hard for me to have a lot of faith in this team. In the last five games they've had leads of 6-0, 5-0 and 5-0. They've lost all of those games. Couple that with their crappy play on the road against rotten teams and it leads one to believe that this team just doesn't have what it takes to make the playoffs. Many on this site keep screaming "YES, but were STILL in 1st place!!!" Well, they're watching a different team than me in the last few months. The Brewers have ripped defeat from the jaws of victory way too many times.

[GenoSeligPrieb]

As I said last night, this season is no longer worth getting so worked about. The Brewers don't play like a playoff team, so we shouldn't be distraught if they fall out of contention. If they rebound and find religion and start playing like professionals, then great. And if they were getting screwed on bad ump calls, or were just missing the foul pole on long drives, that would be more maddening to me, because it would have demonstrated that they at least had a fighting chance.

 

But they're behaving as if they've never been through major pressure before, which is true. Maybe there IS something to that whole veteran-ness and playoff experience angle? I'm not saying you have to load up your team with Miguel Cairos and Lonnie Smiths, but we have a roster loaded with a lot of very inexperienced players and it's starting to show...