From World Series hopes to playoffs missed
The apple will remain in the basket, untouched and unbitten, through the fall months and into winter, until the first taste of spring arrives as pitchers and catchers report.
You could blame the inconsistent hitting, the lack of a true impact bat, the pitching that couldn't maintain its 2021 standard, an infamous tradedeadline decision, a bullpen that melted down in a late-season slew of excruciating losses, or the depreciating defense. It all boils down to one central concept.
The 2022 Milwaukee Brewers weren't as good as we thought they'd be. And they certainly didn't play well enough to make the postseason.
A sparse crowd gathered at American Family Field on Monday night to watch the Brewers' run end in bittersweet fashion with a walk-off victory countered by a Philadelphia Phillies win to mathematically eliminate Milwaukee.
The Brewers came in needing a Hail Mary. They took care of their end of the deal, rallying against the Arizona Diamondbacks for three runs in the ninth and won 5-4 on Hunter Renfroe's walk-off single in the 10th inning. All of 10 minutes later, however, the team gathered in the clubhouse to watch the Phillies put the finishing touches on a 3-0 win in Houston, which, for once and for all, eliminated the Brewers from postseason contention with two games left to play.
"That's part of baseball," Brewers pitcher Brandon Woodruff said. "I wish we had a crystal ball and could predict how we were going to finish this out but you can't, so that's why you come to the ballpark and play. It's disappointing, just going the last four years and you know what it looks like this time of year and to not have that opportunity, it stings."
But never mind the performance Monday in which the Brewers scratched and clawed with their backs firmly pressed against the wall. This night was less about the swan song and more about how a team that had World Series aspirations could look so lost for the final four months of the season.
“Every organization will rue the opportunity when they don't make the playoffs,” said manager Craig Counsell, whose team is 85-75 with two games to play. “It hurts. It stinks. That's what it is.”
Without any hitter performing at anything remotely resembling a superstar level or with precious few bullpen arms that could be relied upon for highleverage innings down the stretch, with injuries to the starting staff that exacerbated a step backward from last year and, arguably, without any upgrades from within the organization or outside it to address their shortcomings, Milwaukee's formula couldn't come close to matching the 95 wins of 2021.
The Brewers had their typical postwin tunes playing in the clubhouse, but they also had to face a different kind of music.
“We don't really have anyone else to blame but ourselves,” leftfielder Christian Yelich said. “We just didn't get the job done. We didn't do what we had to do throughout the year and really, just the second half, to put us in a solution to be in the playoffs and win games consistently.”
The team that was on display for nearly the entirety of the summer and into the early days of fall looked nothing like the one that started the season 3218. After that start, which was the best 50-game stretch to open a season in franchise history, the Brewers could never piece it together. The fight they showed last Monday against the Diamondbacks was missing. It was, as Counsell described it, one step forward and one step back.
“It's not a 40-game season,” Counsell said. “There's going to be stretches of the season when you play really well. Every team can point to that but it's a 162 game season, it's a test. You have to earn it over 162. It doesn't matter what your record is over a certain point. It's irrelevant.
“That's a baseball season. Nobody sat there at a certain point in the season and said we got it made. Not even close. That's how it works.”
There's no way around it: This season was nothing short of a major disappointment for the Brewers. It's a lost year, one in which they possessed the best young starting pitching duo in franchise history as they crept another season closer to the nucleus of the team no longer looking the same.
“It's never the same group,” Yelich said. “You know that. Who that's going to be, you never really know. It's just a different group every season. Whether that's one or two guys missing, whether it's 10 guys who are missing, you never really know but it's going to be different. The story of this group this season is we came up a little bit short. And there's no telling where it'll be next year.”
The blame does not fall on any one specific player or coach or position group or front office member. But that doesn't mean there isn't ample fault to go around.
Yelich spoke to reporters for 10 minutes postgame and admitted he didn't play nearly to the level he expects of himself, or that others expect of him. There's no denying the fact. That type of soul-searching will serve the Brewers well, from down in the clubhouse on up to the front office.
The Brewers brass, led by president of baseball operations David Stearns, touted their organization-wide approach of taking bites at the apple to maximize their chances at winning a World Series by reaching the postseason as many times as possible. It, on the face, is a sound strategy due to the nature of the MLB postseason.
But there was a disconnect between that approach and how, for nearly the entirety of the off-season and then the trade deadline, the Brewers mostly stood pat, doing little to increase their chances of a bite at the 2022 fruit. A predominantly laissez-faire offseason gave way to a confounding trade deadline at which the roster was not improved.
Fingers will point to the trade of Josh Hader, which sent shockwaves through the clubhouse that coincided with the beginning of a two-month slide that the Brewers were never able to escape. Considering how the bullpen's performance down the stretch became one of the primary reasons the Brewers won't be playing playoff baseball for the first time since 2018, the Hader move opened the door for those kinds of questions. That's only fair.
It's also fair to mention that the greater issue was the group that remained was unable to meet expectations the rest of the way.
“I think it's an easy way out,” Yelich said. “You can kind of point your finger and say if we didn't do that, we would be in the playoffs but I really don't think that's true. I think the guys remaining in this room, myself included, didn't do a good enough job. We had opportunity after opportunity and we just couldn't capitalize. It's a tough feeling.”
The late-summer doldrums will be remembered in large part for the sheer number of debilitating losses Milwaukee suffered. Trying to pick which one was the low point is like asking who will and won't be back on this roster next year; it's a fool's errand. They delivered swift blow after blow, from a walk-off wild pitch to hand Pittsburgh a sweep immediately after the deadline to the collapse at Coors Field to the three crushing losses against Miami that effectively dashed the team's hopes.
“Every moment matters but we're always going back to those moments when I could have done something different, a player could have done something different, we all could have done something a little different to help us win,” Counsell said. “You do that to yourself in seasons like that, for sure. It's not going to change the result. It doesn't make you feel any better. You just have to accept it and move on.” Move on, the Brewers must.
As it stands, they have two years of club control remaining on the contracts of Corbin Burnes and Brandon Woodruff. The rest of the starting staff should return, as well, along with closer Devin Williams. The offense may look different when camp begins in February.
The Brewers will, in all likelihood, still have a roster that has legitimate hopes of contending for a division title and beyond. But, for now? The meaning of Monday's outcome is inescapable.
Outfitted with a talented roster that had championship aspirations, the Brewers, as an organization, didn't come close to meeting expectations both internal and external.
The somber tone reflected in the voices of Yelich, Counsell and Woodruff showed the team didn't have a dearth of effort or desire.
The Brewers instead lacked consistency, a potent enough offense, and a dominant pitching staff.
They failed to string together the types of winning streaks that playoffcaliber teams tend to rattle off.
They fell short.