Series Preview: Arizona Diamondbacks @ Milwaukee Brewers

The Brewers return home tonight after a 7-3 road trip that was more successful than most of us could have imagined. The team is still pitching well, but the bats woke up on the 10-game voyage out west.

Now they hope to keep it going in the friendly confines of Miller Park. While the team has been an impressive 18-10 on the road, things have been a little more mixed in Milwaukee. They’ll hope to improve on a middling 10-9 record at home, although 3 of those losses came in one series to the Cubs in April. You can’t just take those losses out, of course, but outside of that series the Brewers are a more respectable 9-6 at Miller Park.

Luckily, the Brewers are facing one of those teams they recently beat up on that previous road trip. The Brewers pretty thoroughly crushed the Diamondbacks just last week, and that familiarity may end up paying off.

After losing 2 of 3 to the Brewers, the Diamondbacks went on to get swept by the Mets in New York. They’ve now lost 10 of 11 and enter the series at 25-21.

Probable Pitchers

Monday - 6:40 p.m. CDT
Zack Greinke vs. Chase Anderson

Tuesday - 6:40 p.m. CDT
Matt Koch vs. Jhoulys Chacin

Wednesday - 12:10 p.m. CDT
Zack Godley vs. TBA

Greinke may not have the zip on his fastball he used to, but he’s evolved his approach to still find a way to be successful into the late years of his career. He held the Brewers to one run over 6 innings last week in the desert and hasn’t allowed more than one run in a start since April 30th. We’ll see if that changes in Miller Park, where he tended to struggle with the home run ball as a member of the Brewers.

The Brewers were able to rough up Koch for 8 runs in 4.1 innings last week, the first truly bad start he’s had all year. It was an all-team effort against Koch in that series finale, with everyone but Jett Bandy in the lineup getting a hit that afternoon. That included four players who went deep against him: Travis Shaw, Domingo Santana, Christian Yelich and Tyler Saladino (although that one wasn’t quite “deep”).

Zack “The Other Zack” Godley isn’t quite pitching up to the level he did last year, when he put up a 3.37 ERA/4.07 FIP in 155 innings. He’s still been solid this year, but the strikeout rates have taken a bit of a tumble, from 9.6 K/9 to 8.4 K/9, all while his walks have also increased. In his last start, he managed to hold the Mets to 1 earned run over 6 innings, although he did give up 3 runs overall while walking 4.

Statistics courtesy of Baseball-Reference