OOTP 21 Season Sim: Brewers lose two series to familiar faces

We may be without baseball on TV right now, but that doesn’t mean we can’t play the Brewers’ 50th anniversary season anyway. Thanks to Out of the Park Baseball 21 — the latest installment of the best baseball sim out there — we’ll be bringing you the “results” of the last week of Brewers games every week.

Friday, June 5th - Red Sox 7, Brewers 6

The Brewers start the weekend in Boston, facing former manager Ron Roenicke and his struggling Red Sox, who came into the weekend with a disappointing 31-33 record.

Brandon Woodruff had a decent outing, limiting the Red Sox lineup to just 3 runs over 5 innings despite 5 walks, but Boston would walk it off in the 9th inning to send the Brewers back below .500.

Corey Knebel had another shaky 9th inning as he tried to get the game into extra innings. After striking out Mitch Moreland to start the inning, Knebel allowed back-to-back singles to Christian Vazquez and Jackie Bradley, Jr., putting runners at first and third with one out for Jeter Downs. The rookie infielder didn’t even have to take the bat off his shoulder, as Knebel uncorked a wild curveball in the dirt that got away from Omar Narvaez, allowing Vazquez to score the game’s winning run.

Saturday, June 6th - Red Sox 5, Brewers 3

The Brewers had a 3-2 lead going into the bottom of the 8th inning following a strong start by Corbin Burnes, but unfortunately the bullpen faltered for the second day in a row. Drew Rasmussen gave up 2 hits in that inning and eventually gave way to Jacob Barnes after only recording one out. Then Barnes proceeded to issue 3 walks and allow 2 hits of his own, the biggest blow coming when Xander Bogaerts crushed a 2-run double to give the Red Sox the 5-3 lead they would not relinquish.

If there was an offensive highlight for the Brewers, it was Keston Hiura hitting his 10th home run of the season, continuing a strong weekend after a slow start to the season.

Sunday, June 7th - Brewers 5, Red Sox 5

The Brewers get out of Beantown with at least one victory, thanks to a strong outing by Brent Suter — 5 innings and 2 runs allowed, dropping his ERA below 4 for the season — and 2 runs driven in each for Avisail Garcia and Omar Narvaez. It was Narvaez’s 2-run home run off Matt Shoemaker that capped off a 4-run inning for the Brewers in the 2nd.

During the course of the afternoon, the latest All-Star Game voting results were announced online. Narvaez’s strong start to the season has him in 2nd place in voting among NL Catchers, behind only Philadelphia’s J.T. Realmuto. Christian Yelich has also moved up to 2nd place among NL Left Fielders, trailing Washington’s Juan Soto.

Tuesday, June 9th - Brewers 6, Padres 3

After a Monday off, the Brewers returned home against a familiar face in Zach Davies. In the midst of a potential All-Star first half in his first year in San Diego, Davies limited the Brewers to 3 runs on 7 hits over 6.1 innings — a Very Zach Davies outing — but the Brewers were able to do their damage against the bullpen.

Keston Hiura came up big with a 3-run run home run in the bottom of the 8th inning off of Andres Munoz, helping the Brewers get back to .500 at 33-33.

Wednesday, June 10th - Padres 7, Brewers 4

Dinelson Lamet showed why he’s one of the most exciting young arms in baseball when he’s on, striking out 9 Brewers over 5.1 innings while the San Diego lineup piled on in the middle innings, before a pair of mild Brewer rallies in the 8th and 9th innings made the final score appear closer than it was for much of the game.

Brett Anderson — again — was only able to make it through 3 innings before leaving the game with a yet-to-be-disclosed injury. Josh Lindblom came in to relieve him, and strugglied mightily, allowing a total of 4 runs in the 4th and 5th innings, including former Cardinal Tommy Pham’s 12th home run of the year.

Avi Garcia homered for the Brewers in the 8th inning and Lorenzo Cain drove in a run with an RBI single in the 9th to cut the deficit to 3, but Garcia and Christian Yelich both struck out swinging with the bases loaded to end the game.

Thursday, June 11th - Padres 10, Brewers 0

Woof.

The Brewers’ bats could not get anything going against another bright young arm in Chris Paddack, mustering only 2 hits against him in 7 innings while he struck out 9 with no walks allowed.

A three-run home run by old nemesis Manny Machado off of Brandon Woodruff in the 3rd inning brought the biggest boos of the afternoon and gave San Diego a 4-0 lead that proved to be plenty.

Former Brewer Trent Grisham proved to be a big factor, scoring 3 runs hitting ahead of Machado and Fernando Tatis, Jr., who combined to drive in 5 of the Pads’ 10 runs.

The loss dropped the Brewers behind the Padres in the competitive NL Wildcard race.

Record over the last week: 2-4
Overall record: 33-35
Standings: T-2nd place, 4.5 GB in NL Central, 4 GB in NL Wildcard

Hitting Storyline of the Week: While other parts of the Brewers’ lineup have gone cold, Keston Hiura has finally turned things around after a slow couple of months to start the season. In the last week he’s gone 8-for-24 (.333) with 2 doubles and 2 home runs, driving in 7 runs to pad his team-leading total of 49 RBI. He’s now hitting .261/.328/.500 for an .828 OPS and 115 OPS+.

Pitching Storyline of the Week: With Brandon Woodruff once again struggling, Brent Suter may actually be the team’s best — or at least most consistent — pitcher right now. Suter now has a 3.99 ERA on the year, the best among the Brewers’ qualified starters. That isn’t saying much, of course, as Milwaukee has a 4.73 ERA among their starters as a team, ranking 12th out of 15 in the National League. If they’re going to stop treading water around .500 and break ahead of the rest of the pack in the NL playoff chase, they’re going to need better pitching beyond Suter.

Next week: vs. CIN (6/12, 6/13, 6/14), @ MIN (6/16, 6/17)