Series Preview: Milwaukee Brewers @ Miami Marlins

The Brewers have started to stumble toward the end of their season-high stretch of 17 games without a day off, but will hope to finish strong this weekend against a team that stole a series from them in Milwaukee a little more than a week ago.

If there’s any good news out of the Brewers getting swept out of Philadelphia, it’s that they’ve continued to stay competitive despite an offense that has started to sputter again with Christian Yelich’s extended absence. All four games in Philly were decided by 2 runs or less, and the Brewers frequently had chances to tie the game in the 9th inning. They’ll try to get over that hump this weekend in Miami, in a park that’s much less conducive to offense — meaning we could be in for another close, low-scoring weekend.

The Lineup

Miami has continued its own up-and-down performance since the last time we saw them, following up their series win in Milwaukee by getting swept in Washington by the Nationals, scoring a grand total of 4 runs in those 3 games. They then bounced back with a 3-game sweep of Arizona in south Florida, with the bats coming alive for 20 runs scored in their last 3 games.

I guess you could say they’re coming in hot, but those hot streaks have not lasted long for them this season.

Our old friend Jesus Aguilar has continued to find his power stroke lately, even if it has come at a cost to his batting average. Since hitting his first home run of the season 10 games ago, he’s put up an OPS over 1.000 with a .250/.354/.700 line. He homered twice in the last series against the Brewers, but will come into this weekend on a mini-slump after a tough-luck 1-for-12 series against the Diamondbacks.

Miguel Rojas has been hot over the last week, with the “team captain” going 8-for-20 with a home run, triple and 3 doubles in his last 5 games.

The Probable Pitchers

Friday will be a Bullpen Night for the Brewers, as they start the final stretch of this marathon portion of their schedule with no days off. Brent Suter will get the ball first against Trevor Rogers, who shut down the Brewers with a great performance the last time these two teams met and outdueled Corbin Burnes before going on to win NL Rookie of the Month. The young has his ERA down to 1.91 and has struck out almost 1 out of every 3 batters he’s faced this year.

The Marlins have yet to announce a starter for Saturday, but whoever it is will be facing Adrian Houser, who has been the victim of some bad luck and bad defense lately. He did put up a strong performance in his first outing against this Marlins lineup, though, setting his season-high for strikeouts with 7 over 5.2 innings the other week.

Sandy Alcantara will again take the ball in the series finale on Sunday, after allowing just a two-run homer over 7 innings against the Brewers last week. The 6’5” righty continues to be among the league’s hardest throwers, with a fastball velocity in the top 2% of the league at 97.6 mph on his four-seamer and 97 mph on his power sinker that has allowed very few opponents to barrel him up so far this season.

Statistics courtesy of Statcast and Baseball-Reference