Brewers1982.com

A Little Breathing Room

BOSTON — Still holding your breath, Brewers fans?

From the first hit — a single by Paul Molitor to open the game — to the last — Charlie Moore‘s infield squibber to the pitcher in the ninth — it was good to see Harvey’s Wallbangers remembered how to bang walls. Last night, the Crew pounded out 17 hits off three Red Sox pitchers en route to a 9-3 win over Boston at Fenway Park, which means the Brewers and their fans could breathe a little easier.

1982 Topps Don Sutton — Don Sutton takes the hill for the Brewers.

Just as important as the Brewers’ win was the Orioles’ fall-from-the-lead 9-6 loss to the Tigers in Detroit. The Crew now leads the O’s by three games with six to play and Milwaukee’s magic number is now 4 (any combo of Crew wins/O’s losses totaling four means our beloved Brewers are AL East champs).

Really, though, Milwaukee’s magic number — with apologies to the man who wears No. 4, Molitor — is 19. The Kid has been The Man in the AL, and all of baseball, this season. On Tuesday, he showed why he will walk away with the AL MVP.

Yount went 3-for-5 with a homer and three RBI to help power the Crew. It was his 59th multi-hit game of his incredible season and hopefully is the start of a huge week for Yount, who was 5 for his last 24 entering Tuesday night’s game.

Then again, in pounding out 17 hits, everyone — except Stormin’ Gorman Thomas, who took the collar — got well. They can keep it going tonight as John Tudor (13-10) takes the mound for the Red Sox. The Crew kicked the stuffing out of Tudor on June 26 in Boston, banging out five hits, including homers from Charlie Moore, Cecil Cooper and Ben Oglivie, in four innings.

More of the same tonight would be nice. Don Sutton (3-1), who has been dandy since Harry Dalton pilfered him from Houston on Aug. 31, takes the hill for the Crew. Game time is 6:35 CT.

Brewers Bang on Fenway Walls

September 28 Leave a Comment

Brewers 9, Red Sox 3
Brewers now 93-63 (1st by 3.0 games)
Box Score | Season Schedule

BOSTON — As Rob Peterson noted yesterday in his series preview, this week may be the most important of any for the Milwaukee Brewers franchise. Coming off of two straight losses to the pesky Baltimore Orioles, the division lead has been cut to two games with seven left to play.

Of course, holding on for those seven games will be no picnic. Unless the Orioles are the ants looking to carry away our basket of playoff goodies. The first three will come versus the third place Red Sox and final four against those same Orioles. All on the road.

So it’s clear we’re getting into must-win mode here. At the very least, it’s hold-on-tight-and-close-your-eyes mode. Though Boton’s dead, the Brewers’ bats still needed to come alive to reverse recent misfortunes and build upon their dwindling AL East lead. A 9-3 win tonight at Fenway Park helped some of us open our eyes and watch more comfortably.

No one thought it would be easy. Sending mid-season addition and least accomplished starting pitcher Doc Medich to the mound at Fenway Park didn’t inspire confidence. The top priority coming into this game was to score and score often. Harvey’s boys needed to acquaint themselves regularly with the Fenway walls.

Thankfully, that is exactly what happened. Paul Molitor singled to lead off the game and stepped on the plate moments later after Robin Yount hit a 1-1 pitch from Chuck Rainey onto the light standard overlooking the big screen above the Green Monster.

“Hell, he’s been doing this all year,” Gorman Thomas said of Yount’s performance, “why would he stop now?

“He’s having a great hear. More power to him. I hope he stays as hot as he is the rest of the year. It’s just another feather in his war bonnet. He only has about 150,000 as it is.”

Indeed, Yount is having an MVP-type season. But with two down and two on, Roy Howell — a name rarely mentioned when speaking of this record-breaking offense — came through with a clutch RBI single to give Medich a 3-0 lead before he stepped on the mound.

Given the lead, all Brewers fans asked of Medich was to keep the offense in the game. Pitch six innings and hand the ball over with a chance to earn a victory. It wasn’t pretty (three earned runs on five hits and five walks in six innings), but Doc did what was asked of him.

“I didn’t have good stuff,” Medich told the Boston Globe. “I had to struggle for six innings, but when you get those runs…”

Of course, when fans complain about the inconsistent and often unreliable Brewers pitching, in most cases they are referring to the gaping hole left by the ailing Rollie Fingers. Once considered a seven inning game if the Brewers handed the ball and lead to Fingers, relievers have provided little, well, relief since his absence. A bullpen consisting of Moose Haas, Jim Slaton, Dwight Bernard, Jamie Easterly, Jerry Augustine and Pete Ladd has failed far more often than is acceptable.

The painful realization is that with Fingers, first place in the AL East would be long sewn up by now. Thankfully for the Brewers and their loyal fans, the offense handed Moose Haas a 9-3 lead in the seventh inning.

The Brewers bats were too much for Boston’s pitching on this night. It was an offensive onslaught focused on three innings: Three runs in the first, two in the fourth and four in the sixth. But it was the way they scored that was most impressive.

Sure, they hit their home runs, scoring two on Yount’s first inning homer and three when Simmons hit one out in the sixth. But they also scored two in the fourth when they popped four singles, forcing manager Ralph Houk to remove Rainey and go to his bullpen far earlier than he preferred.

In all, the Brewers offense smacked 17 hits, and the pitching was plenty good enough to win. Haas pitched three scoreless innings in relief, allowing only two hits to the suddenly punchless Red Sox and Fingers was not missed on this night. It was his first save of the season and the second of his career.

Just as important for Brewers fans was the news out of Detroit. A paltry crowd of 7,755 watched their fourth place Tigers come from behind to score the final four runs and beat the Orioles 9-6.

Now the worst case scenario is going into the final four games in Baltimore with a one game lead. Should we still be worried?

“We can’t look at going into Baltimore with a one game lead,” Yount responded, “or things like that. We really have to play them one at a time. They’re all big games. We have to win tomorrow as much as we did tonight.

“But I’ll take a win when Baltimore loses every day of the week.”

With six games to go, the Brewers’ lead in the division is now three games. We can breathe a little more easily. But would it be asking too much to have a five game lead before the Crew gets to Baltimore?

Maybe. Probably.

Player of the Game: Time and time again this season, whenever the Brewers need a win, Robin Yount has stepped forward. Tonight, “The Kid” hit a first inning, two-run home run that set the tone for a team losing confidence. Yount had three hits in all, driving in three and scoring two.

Now with 27 home runs, a .331 batting average, 111 RBI and a league leading 202 hits, 45 doubles and .573 slugging percentage, the question must be asked: does Robin Yount have any reasonable competition for the league’s MVP award?

Don’t worry, we’ll answer the question, too. No. Robin should, and will, be M-V-P.

Boston’s Dead

September 28 1 Comment

BOSTON — They needed to be perfect. If you’ve followed the American League this season, you knew that wasn’t possible in the second half for the ’82 Red Sox.

Boston, which once held a five-game lead in the division on June 23, entered their game against the New York Yankees seven games behind the Milwaukee Brewers with seven games to play. The Red Sox had to win out and the Crew and O’s had to vanish from the face of the Earth, and not just from yesterday’s schedule as the Crew and O’s had the day off.

1982 Donruss Doc Medich — Doc Medich takes the mound for the opener of a series that means much more to the Brewers than the Red Sox.

Thanks to an epic beat down from their long-time nemesis, the Red Sox’s quest for an AL East title came to a screeching hawlt with a 10-3 loss at Fenway.

After a promising start in which they took a one-game lead into the All-Star break, the Red Sox have gone 39-35 and this week are playing for nothing but pride. This isn’t too surprising. For a franchise that hasn’t won a World Series since 1918, that’s often all Boston plays for. It may be another generation or two before the Red Sox win a World Series. I’m guessing somewhere around 2018.

Let’s not pile on the freshly dead, though, as the Crew still needs to take care of the Sox in Boston for these next three games. Brewers fans hope the Tigers take care of the O’s in Detroit as the Orioles, who had yesterday off as well, sit two games behind in the AL East.

Tonight’s game starts at 6:30 p.m. CT with Doc Medich taking the hill for the Crew against Chuck Rainey, whom the Brewers have owned this season. (See also: Game preview.)

Best Week Ever?

September 27 6 Comments

BOSTON — Welcome to the most important week in Milwaukee Brewers history.

You could argue the final week of the 1981 season and the postseason series against the Yankees represented the most important week ever, but once you opened your mouth, I’d shake my head, look at you with pity, raise my hand and then put a finger to my lips… a clear sign you should shut the hell up.

1982 Donruss Robin Yount — Can Robin continue his magical season by carrying the Crew through the final seven games?

It would be understandable for you to argue about last season and remember it fondly — a second-half AL East title, which gave the Crew its first-ever postseason appearance, and an MVP and Cy Young for Rollie Fingers — but last season was an aberration. With Bowie Kuhn exercising what he thought was Solomon’s wisdom by splitting the season in half, he turned a Major League season into one with a minor-league feel.

This season, though, if the Crew hangs on and wins the AL East in a full 162-game season, no one can point to it as a fluke. Winning a division — not to mention having an MVP candidate in Robin Yount and Cy Young candidate in Pete Vuckovich — after a complete slate, no critic can question that accomplishment, especially in that division with the New York Yankees, Boston Red Sox and, the Crew’s nemesis for the week’s final season, the Baltimore Orioles.

A total of 140,679 fans saw the O’s take two of three games this past weekend from the Brewers at County Stadium. With a chance to put the Birds away, the Crew was outscored 12-4 in the final two games of the series and lead the Orioles by a mere two games with seven games — including four in Baltimore — to play.

Fortunately for the Brewers, who start a three-game series in Boston tomorrow, the Orioles are still on the road as they head to Tiger Stadium in Detroit. Granted, anything can happen in that bandbox and the Tigers are 13-and-a-half games out, but Brewers fans have to hope the Tigers’ pride comes into play.

It won’t matter, however, if the Crew doesn’t take care of business in Boston, which is seven games back. The Brewers have gone 7-3 and battered the Beantown nine for 66 runs in 10 games in ’82. Runs shouldn’t be a problem for Harvey’s Wallbangers at Fenway. The question is, as always, the pitching.

Doc Medich (11-14, 4.89), who’s scheduled to open the series tomorrow, has been wildly inconsistent. All you need to do is look at the numbers. The Crew may need to summon all their offensive firepower to offset Medich’s mediocre mix of pitches.

As bad as Medich has been, Boston starter Chuck Rainey hasn’t been much better. Rainey is 7-4 with a 4.80 ERA, but the Crew has tagged him for 16 hits and 10 runs in 10 2/3 innings in two appearances. Rainey hasn’t made it out of the sixth inning in either appearance.

Regardless, the Brewers need to get to Rainey early to give Medich some breathing room in the game, and themselves, in the AL East.

Game time is 6:30 p.m. CT.

So what do you think? Is this the Brewers’ most important week ever? Leave us a comment below.

Brewers’ Lead Drops to Two

September 26 Leave a Comment

Orioles 5, Brewers 2
Brewers now 92-63 (1st by 2.0 games)
Box Score | Season Schedule

Why didn't Harvey Kuenn pinch run with Marshall Edwards instead of Bob Skube?

MILWAUKEE — Although the Brewers would lose this game by three runs, fingers would be pointed at third base coach Harry Warner after the game for a rally that ended too soon.

With one down in the bottom of the eighth, Robin Yount had just hit an RBI single to bring the Brewers to within a run. With runners at the corners, Earl Weaver went to Tippy Martinez to face Cecil Cooper.

Cooper hit a fly ball to medium center. Rookie John Shelby started back and then charged. Bob Skube, pinch running for Ed Romero, tagged from third. Shelby threw a one hop strike to the plate to nail Skube for the inning ending double play.

“If the ball is off line six inches one way or the other,” Skube would say after the game, “I’m safe. It was a perfect throw and it was still a close play.”

But the question being asked of Warner: Why was Skube sent in the first place?

“You… never come up and talk to me when something goes right,” an angry Warner responded. “That kind of play has happened right 40 times this year, but nobody talked to me then. You’re just a bunch of…. And you can print that!”

Warner may have had a point. And maybe we’re pointing the finger at the wrong coach. Why was Skube in to run when the speedy Marshall Edwards was also available for the job? Edwards may be only a shade faster than Skube, but it’s a shade that likely makes a difference.

In the end, the play probably didn’t matter. The Orioles added two more in the ninth and the Brewers failed to put together a rally. It wasn’t theirs to win.

But this… is a problem. The Brewers now lead the Orioles by only two games in the AL East. With only seven games to play, the Brewers finish up the season on the road. Next come three games at Fenway Park against the third place Red Sox. Then the Brewers finish up the regular season with four games at Baltimore.

“Losing two of three to Baltimore shouldn’t change any of our thinking, we are still two games up,” an optimistic Kuenn assured us. “And even though we lost two here it doesn’t mean the world is going to end. We have seven to play and so do they. And we play four against each other. We still have the big advantage.”

If you say so, Harvey. But it sure doesn’t feel like it.

Rollie Fingers Update: Fingers threw between 35 and 40 pitches before today’s game and said he felt pain but his forearm didn’t tighten up. “If I can take care of half the pain I feel,” Fingers said, “then I can go out there. I’ve worked with a little pain before but it is still too sore.”

Brewers Fall to Palmer

September 25 Leave a Comment

Orioles 7, Brewers 2
Brewers now 92-62 (1st by 3.0 games)
Box Score | Season Schedule

1982 Topps Roy Howell — It's never a good sign when Roy Howell is the extent of your team's offense.

MILWAUKEE — Well, that didn’t go quite as well.

For the second day in a row, the Brewers fell down 4-0 to the Orioles in the first inning. Yesterday, the Crew came back and annihilated Baltimore. Today, well… they didn’t.

“It started out the same,” manager Harvey Kuenn would say after the game. “It didn’t quite finish the way it did last night.”

With Jim Palmer on the mound, those four first inning runs were all the Orioles needed, and then some. Both runs came from unlikely source Roy Howell, knocking in two runs with two singles. The Brewers managed only two other hits.

Pete Vuckovich, who appears to be battling a field including Jim Palmer for the AL Cy Young Award, was not his typical self, allowing six runs on seven hits and four walks in 6 2/3 innings.

It was a poor game all around. It was bad timing. The Brewers have a chance to put the Orioles away. Instead of increasing their lead to five games, it’s now down to three. And there are five games remaining against these Orioles, four of which are in Baltimore.

Worried? A little. But a win tomorrow can make a big difference.