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Strat Sim: Always Fun to Beat the Cardinals

Iconic baseball sim company Strat-o-Matic is helping fill our baseball void by running a simulation of 2020 baseball, and I am writing up the Brewer games.

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Over the weekend the Brewers took two of three from the Baby Eaters. Once upon a time I liked the Cardinals fine. My wife points out that they have cute, classy uniforms. Surely, they are a venerable, classic franchise. I’ve been to the new stadium, it was beautiful, and as a family we had a great time in the city and at the ballpark.

But one day a few years ago they started drawing crosses on the mound. Then there was Mike Matheny and his opinions. And Chris Carpenter existed, and they always overperformed (good on them, frustrating for us...), in general they seemed to ooze smugness and… and… despite myself, and not speaking well to my character, my feelings from them morphed from rivalry into genuine strong distaste, shall we say.

Many might not want to admit it, but the Cubs are kind of fun. When we’re playing them, I badly want to beat them. But if they’re in the playoffs and we’re not, I root for them. The Cardinals? Never.

So this weekend was a good one.

Friday, May 1st: Brewers 4 (14-18), Cardinals 2 (17-16)

"Scoreless until the sixth" is not something you have heard often during Brewers games this Strat season, with our starting pitching crazy leaky and lots of first inning outbursts which we then give away. However, the intermittently reliable Brian Anderson (ERA 4.46) was good in this one, giving us a chance to win. Paul Goldschmidt touched him for a sixth inning home run to start the scoring, but the Brewers crawled back on an RBI single by the surprising Ben Gamel (hitting .295) in the sixth, and a solo shot by him in the eighth. This is probably what we thought we were getting last year.

This game, however, was all about the bottom of the ninth. After Freddy Peralta (0.52) and Josh Hader (1.38) locked down the eighth and ninth, we took care of business quickly for a deeply satisfying walk-off win: Keston Hiura doubled off of Junior Fernandez to lead, and then, shades of that great game in late 2019, Ryan Braun stung the ball out of the park. The hometown fans went into a tizzy. Oh, yes.

Saturday, May 2nd: Cardinals 7 (18-16), Brewers 1 (14-19)

Into every happy story a little rain must fall. This game looked like most Brewer losses this year: a first inning lead (Luis Urias came all the way around on a double which Dexter Fowler first failed to pick up, then threw away) followed by a poor performance by a Brewer starter to give that lead back and then some (Josh Lindblom, 1-3, 6.21, allowed the first five batters to reach in the third). In all, Lindblom allowed twelve base runners in five innings. Sigh.

As a Brewer fan, this one was never particularly interesting; Dakota Hudson was great through seven plus; the Brewers had one at bat with a man in scoring position all game. Matt "Usual Suspect" Carpenter had four RBI; he seems to be back, at .313 with 9 homers and 23 RBIs.

Sunday, May 3rd: Brewers 9 (15-19), Cardinals 4 (18-17)

With Christian Yelich out for the series with a back injury, we had to get a little creative with the top of line up. It worked. Leading off, Gamel scored three times and pushed his BA over .300. Batting third and fourth following Urias, ‘Zo Cain and Hiura each went 4 for 5, with Hiura’s four RBIs pushing his season total to 31. Justin Smoak, still in there most every day despite being awful so far, went 3 for 5 in the five hole, driving in two and breaking the Mendoza Line (.209—but still just three homers and eight RBIs). Combined, this was good enough to overcome a shaky start by Eric Lauer (4.97), who had us down 4-3 when he left after his fifth and final inning.

Rookie Kodi Whitley, old friend / missed opportunity Tyler Webb, and poor Junior Fernandez (ERA now 10.80—you’re welcome any time, buddy) respectively gave up a pair of runs each to the Brewers in the sixth, seventh, and eighth as we inexorably put this one away late little by little.

As so often in wins this year, Peralta and Hader turned in scorching eighth and ninth innings. This was the nationally televised Sunday night game, and the announcers couldn’t get enough of Peralta—he never allowed a ball in play, walking Lane Thomas, but then gassing Tyler O’Neill, Tommy Edman, and Dexter Fowler. There is no doubt he’s having a breakout campaign. Fastball Freddy as set-up man may be my favorite things about the Brewers this year.

With four games in Miami next, (the Marlins, at 14-20, are improved but still bad), I am going to allow myself a little optimism.

Brewer stats through 34 games are here.

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Harvye Hodja also reports on (real) sumo at SumoTalk.com, and says stuff at IronRiverReview.org.