Break out the brooms, folks, because the Milwaukee Brewers have completed their first sweep of the year.
Wily Peralta took the hill for the Brewers today, and promptly served up a solo shot to Joey Votto in the first inning to give the Reds a 1-0 lead. That didn’t last long, though, as Milwaukee would storm back with a 5-spot against Reds’ starter Rookie Davis in the bottom of the inning. Jonathan Villar and Eric Thames lead off with singles and then were driven home on a 2-run double by Ryan Braun. A Travis Shaw single would put runners on the corners, followed by a Hernan Perez sac fly to make it 3-1. Jett Bandy then hit a single to score Shaw, and Nick Franklin hit a single of his own to put runners on first and second. Orlando Arcia then hit an RBI double to give the Brewers a 5-1 lead after one inning.
The Brewers kept their collective foot on the gas over the next few innings, scoring a run in the second on a fielder’s choice by Shaw, 2 runs in the third on homer by Arcia, and another run in the fourth thanks to an RBI double by Bandy. With another 9 runs on the board today, the Brewers have now outscored their opponents by a margin of 120-104 on the season.
Wily Peralta picked up his fourth win of the young season, but he was far from sharp during today’s game. Big Wily lasted 5+ innings while tossing 100 pitches, allowing four solo home runs: the one mentioned by Votto, one to Adam Duvall in the 4th, and two to Scott Schebler, one in the fourth inning and one in the sixth. He allowed eight hits and those four earned runs overall, striking out 7 opposing batters while walking two. His ERA now stands at 5.19 on the season, and his FIP is sitting even worse at 5.79.
The Brewers received some quality outings from several members of their bullpen today, including a scoreless inning apiece from Carlos Torres, Jacob Barnes, Corey Knebel, and Neftali Feliz to close out the 9-4 victory. The win moves Milwaukee’s record back over .500 at 12-11, just 1.5 games back of the Cubs for the division lead in the NL Central. So far Milwaukee has played the league’s 9th-hardest strength of schedule (.523 opponent winning percentage), so it hasn’t simply been a case of them beating up on bad teams (h/t Travis Sarandos, who has locked his Twitter account).
Even though it was a blowout, today’s game didn’t come without a scare, however. After flying out to end the bottom of the 7th, Eric Thames was pulled from the game in the top of the 8th and replaced by Jesus Aguilar at first base. Thames walked gingerly off the field, but after the game Craig Counsell told reporters that it was a simple case of hamstring tightness for the Brewers’ breakout star and that it wasn’t anything that should be considered serious going forward.
Thames attributed tight hamstring to “wear and tear” of playing the game. Said he should be OK and in lineup on Friday. Team day off Thurs.
— Tom (@Haudricourt) April 26, 2017
The Brewers have an off-day tomorrow before beginning a three-game weekend series against the Atlanta Braves at Miller Park to close out the month of April. Cripes, can you believe the regular season is more than 14% of way over already?