MILWAUKEE \u2014 Pat Murphy doesn\u2019t sound like the manager of a team with the best record in the major leagues as he discusses what the Milwaukee Brewers have accomplished thus far.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019ve played great,\u201d the two-time reigning NL manager of the year<\/a> said Wednesday. \u201cWe haven\u2019t really jelled. We haven\u2019t really come together.\u201d<\/p>\n The Brewers\u2019 results tell a different story.<\/p>\n Milwaukee appears well on its way to earning its eighth playoff berth in the last nine seasons as it chases a fourth consecutive NL Central title. The Brewers won three of four from the two-time defending World Series champion<\/a> Dodgers last weekend and trounced Seattle 22-0<\/a> on Tuesday before their four-game winning streak ended with a 7-5 loss<\/a> to the Mariners on Wednesday.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s so much that I see that needs to improve, yet you look up and everybody\u2019s saying, \u2018Wow, I love the way you play,\u2019\u201c Murphy said before Wednesday\u2019s game. \u201cAnd I look funny and I look behind me, and I see if they\u2019re talking to someone else. Really? Maybe I\u2019m too critical. Maybe I\u2019m missing something. I don\u2019t know. I do trust the team.\u201d<\/p>\n They\u2019ve been rewarding that trust.<\/p>\n Surviving a 17-day grind<\/p>\n The Brewers just completed a 17-day run that included no days off, one complete West Coast trip and part of another. They went 10-7 during that stretch.<\/p>\n After losing three straight games at San Diego last week, the Brewers responded by winning a series with the Dodgers, who swept them<\/a> out of the NL Championship Series<\/a> last year. After finally getting a day off Monday, the Brewers delivered their 22-0 blowout of Seattle that matched the most one-sided shutout in modern MLB history.<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cI think it says we\u2019re a good baseball team,\u201d first baseman Jake Bauers said. \u201cI think in tough times it can be easy to lose sight of that, but we have the right people around to bounce back when things get tough, and we have the right people around to continue to play winning baseball.\u201d<\/p>\n Milwaukee has needed to stay hot to remain ahead of the Chicago Cubs, who have won 11 of their last 16 games and are 4 1\/2 behind Milwaukee in the NL Central standings. The Brewers and Cubs face off in a four-game series Aug. 31-Sept. 3 at Wrigley Field before meeting again for three games in Milwaukee from Sept. 7-9.<\/p>\n During that grueling 17-day run, the Brewers encountered some criticism for their inability to acquire two-time AL Cy Young Award winner<\/a> Tarik Skubal. The Brewers made a strong push<\/a> to land Skubal, only to see the Detroit Tigers send him to the Dodgers<\/a> instead.<\/p>\n Having NL Cy Young Award front-runner Jacob Misiorowski<\/a> and Skubal fronting a starting rotation in a playoff series would have given the Brewers perhaps their best shot at making the postseason breakthrough that has eluded them during the franchise\u2019s longest run of sustained success. The Brewers haven\u2019t reached a World Series since 1982 and have never won it all.<\/p>\n Continuing to win without adding Skubal<\/p>\n Logan Henderson, an outstanding rookie pitcher the Brewers chose to keep rather than including in a trade last month, outdueled Skubal in Sunday\u2019s series finale at Los Angeles. The 6-2 victory<\/a> improved Henderson\u2019s record to 7-2 with a 2.70 ERA.<\/p>\n The Brewers pivoted after the Skubal trade by acquiring former St. Louis Cardinals right-hander Dustin May, who is seeking to become the latest in a growing list of starting pitchers to improve after joining the Brewers. Left-hander Kyle Harrison, who also is thriving in his first year in Milwaukee, attributes that trend to Milwaukee\u2019s pitching coaching staff of Chris Hook, Jim Henderson and Juan Sandoval.<\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019re so good at just knowing who you are as an individual and knowing what you need,\u201d Harrison said. \u201cShoot, yeah, they\u2019ve been doing it for a while now, too, so it\u2019s pretty cool to have those guys you can trust and rely on.\u201d<\/p>\n The Brewers believe they have the makings of a quality playoff rotation with Misiorowski, Henderson, Harrison and May. Milwaukee has withstood injuries that knocked two-time All-Star Brandon Woodruff<\/a> out for the season and prevented Quinn Priester<\/a> from pitching at all this year.<\/p>\n Milwaukee\u2019s lineup has produced the fewest homers in the big leagues, yet the Brewers remain among the top five teams in scoring. Bauers\u2019 breakthrough season has helped the Brewers overcome down years from 2018 NL MVP Christian Yelich and three-time All-Star William Contreras.<\/p>\n Without naming names, Murphy said: \u201cI watch some of our leaders that might not be getting the results, but the way they handle everybody else is pretty impressive.\u201d Murphy added that might be one of the keys to this team\u2019s success.<\/p>\n Another is simply the ability to continue competing even when things aren\u2019t going smoothly.<\/p>\n \u201cMaybe that\u2019s the secret,\u201d Murphy said. \u201cMaybe this team still plays well enough to be close when they\u2019re not at their best.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MILWAUKEE \u2014 Pat Murphy doesn\u2019t sound like the manager of a team with the best record in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":862048,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[58195,16738,3979,64,63,591,44,85,39,12216],"class_list":["post-862047","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-app-sports","tag-app-top-stories","tag-associated-press","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-mlb","tag-news","tag-sports","tag-top-stories","tag-wisconsin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/862047","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=862047"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/862047\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/862048"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=862047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=862047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=862047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}