Travis Shaw homers twice, Freddy Peralta pitches three perfect innings in 6-3 Brewers win

WP: Freddy Peralta (1-0)
LP: Zach Godley (0-1)
SV: Jake Petricka (1)

Box Score

Travis Shaw and Freddy Peralta were locked in today, and that helped the Brewers get to a strong win against the Diamondbacks.

Though Freddy Peralta has a bit of a hill to climb to make it into the rotation, he’s definitely keeping the pressure on with his performance. After a clean inning in his first appearance of the spring, Freddy Peralta made his second appearance of the spring. Today, he got three innings in the game, and he looked just as sharp. He faced the minimum nine batters, striking out three of them.

Meanwhile, the Brewers offense was locked in early, with the top six in today’s starting lineup also likely going to be in the Opening Day lineup. In the first inning, Christian Yelich nearly missed a home run and ended up with a double, but Travis Shaw didn’t miss. He hit a home run to center, giving the Brewers a 2-0 lead after one inning.

That wasn’t all for Shaw today. He hit another home run in the fourth inning, this time a solo home run to right field. In total, he was 2-for-3 on the day, driving in three runs.

Seven of the starters overall also had a hit in the game. Lorenzo Cain also had two hits and added an RBI, and Christian Yelich, Ryan Braun, Yasmani Grandal, and Hernan Perez also each had a hit.

The bullpen’s performance was a little more shaky today. Matt Albers pitched the fourth and did allow two hits, but got out of the inning scoreless. Junior Guerra followed with two innings and struggled a bit. In the fifth, he allowed a leadoff triple to Abraham Almonte, and then Wyatt Mathisen grounded out to put the Diamondbacks on the board. Andy Young also homered off Guerra to account for the second run he allowed. Guerra finished the day with two runs allowed on four hits, though he didn’t walk anyone and had two strikeouts.

Alex Claudio followed Guerra and pitched an inning, allowing a home run to Mathisen but nothing else. Taylor Williams got into a little trouble in the eighth with two singles and a walk, but Jamie Westbrook was caught off the base when Kevin Cron held at third and the Brewers got an easy second out. Mathisen struck out to end the inning.

The bench came in starting in the sixth inning, and they also contributed to the final score. In the eighth inning, Nate Orf hit a double to get on base, then Keston Hiura hit a home run to center to make it a 6-3 game. Jacob Nottingham also added a single to account for the rest of the bench’s offense.

Jake Petricka pitched the ninth and worked around a walk to strike out the side and secure a 6-3 win for the Brewers. They’re now 6-8 on the spring, and have a chance to get to .500 tomorrow. It’s a split squad day for the Brewers, with one squad traveling to face the Athletics and the other traveling to face an Angels split squad. The game against the Angels will be televised on Fox Sports Wisconsin, and the game against the Athletics will be on the Brewers Radio Network. Both start just after 2 pm Central.