The Brewers as an Inning

So, the Brewers.

As collapses go, that looks nice and spread out. There’s a definite negative slope, but, you know, it could be steeper. You get the vibe from the graph that the Brewers’ decline has been steady and gradual. But there’s the thing about the x-axis, and about how this shows only two weeks. Lately the Brewers have shot themselves in the foot. In their haste to bandage the wound, they’ve accidentally shot themselves in the other foot. With their hands busy trying to stop the bleeding, they’ll just apply the iodine with their mouth-

Working a little to the Brewers’ benefit is that their slide has overlapped with Oakland’s slide, and Oakland has fallen from a loftier position, so the attention’s divided. But the Brewers don’t care about the attention they receive; they care about not being awful, and since this slide began they’re last in the NL in runs scored and first in the NL in runs allowed, where “first” is another word for “last”. They’ve lost 13 of 14 games, and Tuesday’s could’ve been the worst of the losses. Tied 3-3 in the bottom of the eighth, the Brewers had the bases loaded with nobody out. Eight pitches later, a scoreless frame was complete. Then in the top of the ninth, Francisco Rodriguez had two outs and two strikes on Giancarlo Stanton. Nine pitches later, a walk, a steal, and two homers had the Brewers all but defeated. You’d think that all the losses feel the same, but every loss is a snowflake.

Before the slide, when the Brewers were 15 games over .500, they had an 88% chance of making the playoffs, and a 66% chance of making the NLDS. According to the last time I checked the page today, now they’re at 17% and 8%, respectively. They’re still very much alive in the hunt, but a man being chased by a pack of wolves is still a very much alive man, for the moment. The man, like Brewers fans, would be in a panic. Not even a few minutes ago, this was a beautiful stroll through a meadow. You never expect a ferocious pack of wolves, or a devastating losing skid.

We all get what it means to be in the Brewers’ present position, but to look at it differently, I want to try out an exercise I tried out just last September, on the then-slumping Rangers. That is, I want to convert the Brewers’ playoff odds to situational win expectancies, and express their skid as a partial inning. It’s just a different way of saying “hey this sucks”, but it’s also a different way to understand the stress and the nervousness and the frustration. Let’s create a fictional ninth inning, mirroring what the Brewers have done for the last two weeks.

We’re going to start with the date right before the 1-13 slide. All the numbers are approximated, and to keep things simple, I’m using overall playoff odds, even though winning the division is very different from winning the wild card. If you don’t quite yet get the concept, you will very quickly.

(August 28 was an off-day.)

AUGUST 25

• Brewers win, 10-1
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 88%

We’re joining a game in progress, and we’re joining an inning in progress. The good news for the Brewers: it’s the top of the ninth, and they’re ahead of the opponent 6-2. That’s a pretty comfortable lead. The bad news for the Brewers: there’s nobody out, there are runners on first and second, and the pitcher has fallen behind. The tying run still hasn’t come to the plate, and the Brewers just need to record three outs before they allow four runs. About eight times out of nine, that’s totally doable. Better to be in this position than trying to overcome this position.

AUGUST 26

• Brewers lose, 4-1
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 86%

Now things get a little more nervous, because the batter has walked, loading the bases with nobody out. Relative to when the pitcher was behind in the count, it’s not that traumatic, and the odds are still greatly in the Brewers’ favor, but now the game could conceivably be tied with one swing of the bat. Bat swings happen in an instant.

AUGUST 27

• Brewers lose, 3-2
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 79%

And now the pitcher’s in trouble again. Again, the pitcher has fallen behind in the count, and while counts are just transition states between starting points and ending points, the count now more greatly favors the batter. A walk is more likely. A hit is more likely. Basically, a non-out is more likely, and the Brewers need to start getting outs. The good thing about a big lead is that it gives you wiggle room, but you don’t want to push it.

AUGUST 29

• Brewers lose, 13-2
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 70%

Base hit. Two runs. Corners. The ball was struck well, on a fastball over the plate, and it was fortunate the ball didn’t get through the gap and make it to the fence. So, kudos to the outfielder, but now the lead’s been cut in half, and still there aren’t any outs on the board. Tying run’s on base. Go-ahead run’s on a walk to the plate.

AUGUST 30

• Brewers lose, 3-1
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 64%

You know what relievers aren’t very good at? Controlling the running game. And, there’s a stolen base, right there. Now the tying run’s in scoring position. All it takes is a single. Or even two ordinary outs. Not that a tie would be the worst thing in the world, since the Brewers still get to hit, but it sure would be nice to not lose the lead that was established over the previous two and a half hours.

AUGUST 31

• Brewers lose, 15-5
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 57%

Sometimes pitchers hit batters intentionally. This one was unintentional. They all count the same. So now the bases are loaded, and it’s starting to feel like a full-scale meltdown. Go-ahead run’s on base. And hey, he moves pretty well!

SEPTEMBER 1

• Brewers lose, 4-2
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 51%

Ball one. Fine pitch idea, but lousy execution. The bullpen’s active, but it takes time for pitchers to get ready, and there’s no relief coming for this particular at-bat. Gotta throw strikes. Gotta not throw bad strikes. But, gotta throw strikes.

SEPTEMBER 2

• Brewers lose, 7-1
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 49%

Ball two. What did I say about strikes? Throw them. Strikes, I mean.

SEPTEMBER 3

• Brewers lose, 6-2
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 45%

Ball three. Still a two-run lead, but that’s almost a one-run lead, if that, and this is on course for catastrophe. The bases are loaded, the pitcher has to throw a strike, and the hitter is looking for a fastball. So do you show him the fastball? Do you show him something else, even though you have less confidence in your ability to spot that pitch in the zone? Might he chase out of the zone? Is this why some baseball players say they’re afraid of over-thinking things on the field? Just throw the baseball. The most important thing is throwing the baseball, to a good place.

SEPTEMBER 4

• Brewers lose, 3-2
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 39%

Walked him. Threw the baseball to a bad place. Now it’s 6-5. Still nobody out. Still a lead, but it sure as hell doesn’t feel like it. Lead’s gone on a slow grounder. Lead’s gone on a routine fly. Lead’s gone on a ball in the dirt. Lead’s gone on an errant pick-off. Lead’s gone on a balk. So many ways for the lead to be gone.

SEPTEMBER 5

• Brewers win, 6-2
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 47%

Great pitch for strike one. And another great pitch for strike two! Almost an out, and you can start to see a way out of this. Get a strikeout here, and then a double play allows you to escape. Or you could get another strikeout, or you could get a grounder right at someone, or you could get a lazy pop, or-

SEPTEMBER 6

• Brewers lose, 5-3
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 33%

Sacrifice fly. The two-strike pitch caught too much of the plate, and the batter got it in the air. The game’s tied, and to make matters worse, the runner from second also moved up 90 feet. So while there’s finally an out, that go-ahead run is closer than ever, and it doesn’t take a lot to bring him home. Do you pitch for the strikeout, or do you pitch for the double play? Is it possible to do both at once?

SEPTEMBER 7

• Brewers lose, 9-1
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 26%

Pitching for the strikeout, there’s a low breaking ball, but the pitch finds the dirt and skips away from the catcher. The runner on third holds, because the ball never bounces away that far, but the runner from first bolts for second and slides in safe, basically eliminating the double-play possibility. So. Would’ve been nice for that to not happen.

SEPTEMBER 8

• Brewers lose, 6-4
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 18%

Grounder’s pulled down the line. The first baseman makes a good stop, turning a hit into an out, but both runners advance on the play, putting the Brewers behind 7-6. Still, the inning isn’t over, but attention has fully turned to the bottom half, when the Brewers will need to mount a rally. And, who could rally after such psychological devastation?

SEPTEMBER 9

• Brewers lose, 6-3
• Playoff odds/win expectancy around 17%

And a walk puts runners on the corners. Everyone’s thinking about the bottom of the ninth, but the Brewers still have to get there first, and they don’t need to make their situation worse. Better to have to rally from one than to have to rally from two. Don’t let it get to two.

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This is the Brewers’ situation, in a way. They’ve allowed a good position to erode, and now they don’t just need to stop the bleeding — they need to turn things around quickly and play exceptionally well. Ending the skid isn’t good enough. They’ve given away too much. They need to mount a comeback in what little time is left. This with an ailing Ryan Braun and a recently-ailing Carlos Gomez. The same talent is there that put the Brewers in first place for so long, and they’re obviously not as bad as the last half-month, but the situation’s turned desperate. You don’t even need to believe in momentum to arrive at the conclusion. The Brewers aren’t tied for anything. They’re trailing, with 17 games to go.

I will say this much: between the end of June and the start of July, the Brewers lost 11 of 12. Immediately following that, they won six of eight, so they’ve bounced back from something like this before. They still have games against the Cardinals. They still have games against the Pirates. They also have winnable games against the Cubs and the Reds, so this could still end as a hell of a story. 17% means one out of six. The Brewers could be back in playoff position in a couple of days.

But, you know. We seldom see collapses like this on the team level, but we’ve all seen collapses like this on the game level. They’re difficult collapses to erase, and they’re difficult collapses to forget. There weren’t a whole lot of people who picked the Brewers as a playoff team before the season got started, but this isn’t what anybody had in mind. No sane person would ever have anything like this in mind.