Don't Give Up Just Yet

Ben Sheets returned to pitch the Brewers to a win over the Cubs tonight and combined with a Cardinals loss, the standings move right back where they were on Tuesday morning: Cubs in first, Brewers 1.5 games back and St. Louis two games back. (If you don't understand how baseball standings and 'games back' are calculated you may find some insight at this University of Toronto Mathematics Network web page or you may end up hopelessly confused.)

The unfortunate thing about the Brewers two-month swoon is that no one around these parts is enjoying the fact that it's very nearly September and the Brewers are in the thick of a pennant race. By the way, going strictly by run differential the Brewers should actually be 6.5 games behind the Cubs.

Anyway, I suspect that many fans were lulled into thinking in June that the Brewers were a lock to win the division because a) they were playing so well and b) the rest of the division stunk. Of course, you don't win baseball pennants in June because the season lasts 26 weeks not 12. The Brewers were winning a little more than they statistically deserved and began to regress to the mean. Then things got ugly as the starting pitch went and stayed south and the bullpen fell apart.

The Brewers have lost 14 games in which they were ahead by 3 runs or more including 4 or 5 games when they were ahead by 5 runs - unheard of stuff. But the fact remains that if they can just play a little over .500, then they will be in the race coming down to the final week of September. The Brewers have 30 games left to play. After tomorrow, the Brewers do not play a team with a winning record until September 20th.

If they can make some hay in the next couple weeks, it's going to be some riotous if nerve-wracking fun. If they can't beat the Pirates, Astros and Reds, then they deserve to finish in 4th place anyway. I'm guessing they will just enough to keep things interesting. Seventeen wins out of thirty games might just do the trick.

And if the Brewers do falter, we all know it's The Cardinals and not the cursed Cubs who will be there to pick up the trophy. And I can definitely live with that.