MILWAUKEE - Pat Murphy can look at the Brewers’ standing in the National League Central and see a lot of things within reach. A fourth straight division title.
The No. 1 seed in the National League for the second year in a row. Even 100 wins, which would be a first in franchise history.
He just doesn’t want his team thinking that way.
With the regular season entering its final month and a key run against the Cubs coming up, Murphy is pushing the same message over and over: stay locked in on the day in front of them, and nothing else.
“This is a really young team,” he said. “You can’t divide their attention on things like that.”
The Brewers gave him another result to like Friday night, beating the Rangers 6-1 at American Family Field behind three RBIs from William Contreras and seven strong innings from Logan Henderson. The win moved Milwaukee to 33 games over .500 and eight games ahead of Chicago in the division, both season highs.
Still, Murphy isn’t interested in the larger picture. Not the Brewers’ nine wins in their last 12 games.
Not their Major League-best 84-51 record. Not the three-game cushion they hold over the Dodgers, or the 3 1/2-game edge they own over the American League-leading Rays with 27 games left.
Those are numbers for everyone else to track.
Murphy would rather keep hammering the phrase he keeps coming back to these days: divided attention.
“Guys, I still say it. You guys laugh at me, but we’re not in the postseason,” Murphy said.
“When we get in the postseason, then we can plot: ‘OK, what’s next? Well, let’s get a better seed if we can.’
… It sounds simple. It sounds cliche.
But that’s mental toughness, to stay in the now.
“How do we stay in the now? It’s tough for me, and I’m supposed to be good at it.
So can you imagine how [it sounds] to a 22-year-old player, to stay in the now? ‘This idiot’s telling me to not have divided attention?
I’ve got cars to buy and awards to win, and I’m 22 and I want to get my numbers and I want to get a contract.’ There’s so much to divide their attention.
It’s very difficult, but that’s the journey.”
Friday’s game fit that mindset perfectly. Henderson kept the Rangers quiet, allowing only catcher Danny Jansen’s solo homer with two outs and the bases empty in the third. That was the lone hit he gave up over seven innings, and he finished with no walks and seven strikeouts.
Milwaukee handed him an early lead. In the first, William Contreras drove in a run with an RBI groundout, and Christian Yelich added a left-on-left RBI double off Rangers starter Cody Bradford.
Contreras later added two more RBIs to finish with three on the night.
Henderson has become a steady presence for Milwaukee, even if Jacob Misiorowski tends to grab the spotlight with the flashier velocity and strikeout totals. The Brewers have won 16 of Henderson’s 19 career starts since his Major League debut last April, and he still hasn’t allowed more than three runs in any outing.
That run puts him in rare company. Henderson and Zac Gallen, who did it in 23 starts from 2019-20, are the only pitchers since 1893 to allow three runs or fewer in at least 19 starts to begin a career, excluding openers or pitchers with relief appearances mixed in.
Among pitchers with at least 10 starts this season, only Misiorowski at 0.75 and Yoshinobu Yamamoto at 0.89 have a lower WHIP than Henderson’s 0.87.
“It’s a credit to everybody in the clubhouse. We’re all pulling on the same rope,” Henderson said.
Rangers manager Schumaker said before the game that Milwaukee is the blueprint for what he wants his own club to become, and after the loss he said the Brewers did exactly what they always do.
“We knew what they were going to do, and they did it,” Schumaker said. “They executed exactly what their game plan is, and they’ve been doing it all year, and that’s why their record is what it is.”
For the Brewers, that approach starts with the same message Murphy keeps repeating: one day at a time.
“I think this group does a good job of taking it one day at a time,” Henderson said. “‘Win today’ has been preached as long as I’ve been in the big leagues here, and even throughout the organization. We’re focused on today, and now that today is pretty much done, we’re focused on tomorrow.”
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