The Milwaukee Brewers have already done plenty to announce themselves this season, but that hasn’t softened the edge inside the clubhouse.
At 50-31, Milwaukee just became the fastest team in franchise history to reach 50 wins. The Brewers also sit with the second-best record in baseball and continue to hold first place in the National League Central. Still, the mood around the team isn’t celebratory after a stretch that includes a 5-5 mark over the last 10 games and back-to-back losses to the Chicago Cubs.
On Monday, before the Brewers opened their series, manager Pat Murphy made it clear the group isn’t brushing that off. He said the club is actually "pretty pissed" about how it has played lately.
"We've just set the standard so high," Murphy said. "That might be unrealistic.
But we're going with it. It might be unrealistic and it might be, you look at something like that and you'd think we'd all be celebrating.
But we're all pretty pissed about how we've played lately. You know, we don't exactly talk about runners in scoring position because it's the thing we talk about.
You don't put more pressure on it, you talk more about the process. ... We just have set the standard so high of playing well each night and we quite frankly, haven't done that."
That kind of blunt honesty fits Murphy, a two-time National League Manager of the Year Award winner. It also matches the way the Brewers have operated for years: no cruising, no getting comfortable, no acting like a good record is the finish line.
The Brewers have the best starting rotation in baseball and have carried the best offense in baseball throughout June, but the recent skid has clearly rubbed them the wrong way. Rather than leaning on the numbers and assuming things will work themselves out, Murphy and the team are treating the last 10 games like a standard that wasn’t met.
That mindset has been part of Milwaukee’s formula in the National League Central. The Brewers have won three straight division titles and are on track for a fourth. They haven’t built that run by chasing headline-grabbing moves or depending on splashy additions to do the heavy lifting.
Instead, Milwaukee keeps developing from within, bringing young players through the system and then asking them to play the game the right way once they arrive. That means small ball, advancing runners, stealing bases and all the little things that keep stacking wins.
The Brewers may already have 50 wins in the bank, but Murphy’s message says the bar in Milwaukee is higher than that. The team has not played to its potential over the last 10 games, and the frustration is real.
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Several college arms are expected to be within reach, and that is where the debate starts to get real. Tennessee right-hander Tegan Kuhns, Arizona State left-hander Cole Carlon and Mississippi right-hander Cade Townsend all fit the kind of upside that can pull a club off its usual path, which leaves Milwaukee weighing whether to stay with its recent draft tendencies or finally take a pitcher in the first round again. [Read more 🡒]