Good news: It’s officially the All-Star Break.
Bad news: The Brewers pitching staff gave up 14 runs today.
In recent history, the Brewers and the Pirates have played in the final series before the All-Star break, and it has never fared well for the team in blue and yellow. That trend continued in today’s series finale as the Brewers fell to the Pirates 14-5.
As we’ve seen consistently throughout this long road trip, the Brewers’ opponents were typically the ones taking the lead first. That happened at the bottom of the second inning as Ryan O’Hearn drove in the first run of the game on a double to right field. A couple of at-bats later, Jackson Chourio narrowly missed robbing a two-run homer, but instead it went over the wall for Henry Davis’s eighth of the year.
The Brewers offense showed life in the top of the fourth inning as Chourio hit a double to drive in Christian Yelich to cut the Pirates’ lead down to 4-1. Later, Gary Sánchez grounded out and drove in a run as a result to make it 4-2.
That was about it for the Brewers offense in what quickly turned into a nightmare. In the bottom of the fourth inning, everyone in the Pirates lineup reached base before there was an out recorded. At that point, the Brewers found themselves down 11-2. After the Pirates recorded the first out, they scored two more runs to extend their lead to 14-2.
For the Pirates, that was it in terms of offense. For the Brewers, they’d have to wait until the top of the eighth inning to get a two-run home run from Brice Turang and an RBI double from Garrett Mitchell to bring the final score to 14-5.
There’s no doubt that the pitching was the problem this afternoon. Beginning with Jacob Misiorowski’s scratch from the game, and the announcement of moving Brandon Woodruff to the 60-day injured list. As for pitchers who actually appeared in the game, Robert Gasser was knocked around and pulled after three innings as he gave up seven runs on eight hits and allowed two home runs. Jared Koenig took things another step further as he didn’t record an out after allowing five runs on two hits and two walks. Grant Anderson did complete one inning but gave up two runs on three hits in the process.
On the bright side of things, Bryse Wilson made his return to the Brewers by throwing three scoreless innings, allowing just two hits while striking out four batters. On the offensive side of things, Chourio had the lone multi-hit game on the day, and Turang had the home run with two RBIs. Braden Shewmake struggled in his debut with the Brewers as he went 0-for-2 with two strikeouts before being replaced by Andrew Vaughn.
As for what’s to come next, nothing. At least for most of the week. William Contreras will be the lone Brewers representative in this year’s All-Star Game in Philadelphia, and you can find that game on Tuesday on FOX at 7:00 p.m. The rest of the Brewers will get a much-needed break as they prepare to be back home Friday night as they start a three-game series with the Miami Marlins.
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