Loss follows familiar script
CLEVELAND - Craig Counsell wasn’t around for the end of the Milwaukee Brewers’ 3-1 loss to the Cleveland Indians on Wednesday afternoon at Progressive Field after being ejected in the eighth inning by homeplate umpire Quinn Wolcott.
But he’d already seen a familiar script play itself out.
Facing another topnotch pitcher in Carlos Carrasco, the Brewers were never able to put together any sort of rally despite outhitting the Indians, 9-6. The same thing happened a night earlier, when they managed just one run against Corey Kluber and two overall in a 3-2 loss.
Throw in decent starts from both Junior Guerra and Chase Anderson in the two games, and it was a frustrating two-game interleague set from almost every angle for the Brewers.
“Look, we pitched well enough to
win games here,” said Counsell, whose team has lost three straight for just the second time this season.
“They were featuring two pretty good starters and obviously a pretty good closer (Cody Allen), and we just weren’t able to do enough against the starters either to score runs or get them out of the games quick enough.”
Kluber scattered seven hits with seven strikeouts over seven innings in the opener, and Carrasco was just as good on Wednesday when he scattered eight hits – seven of which were singles – walked only one and struck out 10 over seven innings.
It was his second dominant performance against the Brewers in less than a month; he pitched a complete game with 14 strikeouts in winning at Miller Park on May 9.
After failing to score in a bases-loaded, two-out situation in the second, Milwaukee grabbed the lead in the third after Christian Yelich led off with a double, moved up on a groundout and scored on a single by Travis Shaw.
That, for all intents and purposes, was it for the offense.
Cleveland, meanwhile, tied the game in the fifth on a squib single against the shift, a hit that led to the departure of Anderson after just 41⁄3 innings.
Counsell went to the normally dependable Jeremy Jeffress at that point to face José Ramírez, and he drove in the go-ahead run with a double to right. Jeffress followed by walking both Edwin Encarnacion and Yonder Alonso, with the second forcing in an insurance run.
“José Ramírez is in the top of the league as far as offensive players right now, and it’s a tough spot for anybody,” Counsell said. “Really, the Brantley ball is the ball that got us in trouble. He hits a squibber, and hits it in the right place that it ends up we can’t get an out.
“JJ ended up working out of it by striking out two guys, but we didn’t have any margin as a pitching staff today.”
Counsell’s ejection came in the wake of a called third strike on Shaw in the eighth, and it left him befuddled.
“There was nothing brewing all day,” said Counsell. “I don’t know what I said. There was no profanity used.
“Once he ejected me, there were some words exchanged, but it wasn’t my intention to get ejected, by any means.”
It was the third ejection of the season for Counsell. Changing the focus, it was the fourth loss in five games for the Brewers on their current eight-game road trip that finishes this weekend in Philadelphia.
The trip got off to a bad start in Chicago, where they dropped two out of three to the lowly Chicago White Sox. Including the sweep in Cleveland, the Brewers have scored a 12 runs over the five games and now face a Phillies team that is 19-9 at Citizens Bank Ballpark.
“We just lost 3-2 and 3-1 to Kluber and Carrasco. Tough games,” Counsell said when asked to summarize the trip to this point. “They pitched well. It’s on to the next city.”