Labor Day is always a bittersweet day on the baseball calendar. It serves as the unofficial end to summer with cooler temps starting to roll in, which is always a little sad from a baseball attendance and travel perspective knowing that the season is nearing the end. However, it also kicks off the most exciting couple of months' worth of action of the entire year. The "dog days of summer" are fleeting fast, and teams summon every last bit of strength and grit to make it through the final 25 games of the regular season - and for 12 lucky teams, the postseason. My Milwaukee Brewers are in the midst of their most prolific regular season in franchise history, in which we are on pace for 100 wins and are all but certain to be one of those 12 playoff teams once again in 2025. I say this every year around this time, but it bears repeating just how impressive an era of Brewers baseball we're in right now, and I try to savor it every day. Barring some unforeseen tragedy, this is going to be their 7th postseason berth in the last 8 years, with at least 4 and hopefully 5 division titles during that span - and for a team that is dead last in market size and consistently in the bottom third in team payroll, that is nothing short of remarkable. The Brewers are 4th in all of MLB in total wins since the start of 2017. We're at a point in Brewers history where we expect to win, and given all of the horrible years we struggled through during my formative years, I try not to take this stretch for granted. The fact that I'm still steaming from back to back losses to the Jays and Phillies, who are the 2nd and 3rd best teams in baseball right behind us, when we still have a miniscule magic number of 10 with a month left to go in the season, and coming off a 21-9 August which included a 14-game winning streak, tells you all you need to know about expectations this year. Being a Brewers fan nowadays is about balancing being grateful that we have gotten to watch competitive baseball for nearly a decade with no signs of a window closing, with the fact that simply making it to the postseason is no longer good enough.
We are in an era of Brewers baseball that emphasizes run prevention and fundamentals over strikeouts and homeruns, and it finally feels like every team with a payroll under $300M is starting to catch up to that philosophy. That was especially evident these last two days watching us play the Blue Jays and Phillies. The Jays are pretty much a carbon copy of the Brewers - play great defense, great rotation pitching to contact, run the bases really well, high on base percentage with not a lot of slug, a fair amount of positional versatility and depth, and the bullpen is just a who's who of castaways that are kind of the weak link. The Phillies on the other hand are a bunch of beef cakes set in their positions who mash their way to victories and are loaded with arms that can strike you out, and lots of big name free agents and trades. Neither way is necessarily wrong, it's just that the Phillies way of doing things costs a lot more, because homeruns and strikeouts still equal WAR, which equals a big pay day. The Brewers simply cannot afford to go out and sign Kyle Schwarber, and they have to win in the aggregate and in the margins with speed, taking the extra base, and doing the little things right. They lead all of baseball in 4+ run innings, and a large portion of those have just been hits strung together rather than one or two homers. It can't be overstated how difficult it is to win that way in today's game with everybody throwing 95+ with movement, but the Brewers do it consistently. Other than our bullpen, there are just not a lot of holes in our team, and their style of play is fun to watch and very "next man up" mentality. I think Pat Murphy is the perfect manager for this team and has installed a work ethic and mindset on this team that makes you feel as a fan like they're always trying, they're always in the game, and they're always having fun, which is all you really want as a fan. Nobody likes to pay hundreds of dollars to go to a game to see people strike out 4 times, or not hustle running to first, to lose their focus in the field, or to get blown out 10-1. I can't even remember a year where I never wanted to miss an inning or ever turn a game off, because I always feel like they have a chance to win. And if I can feel that through the TV as a fan, then you know the other team feels that too, and that's kind of the point. "Relentless" or "undaunting" or "pesky" as Murph would say.
I'm not even sure anymore what my point was when I started writing this post other than just brain-dumping how proud I am of this organization, but I guess I'm just trying to say that the Brew Crew has a style of play that matches up well with anybody, and it gives me higher hopes than in recent years that we can make a deep run in the playoffs. Hindsight is 20/20 and I've probably said that before, but I sincerely believe it. It's been interesting to watch how the team's core strength has shifted from hitting during the late 00's/early 10's, then shifted to a dominant pitching staff during most of the Craig Counsell era, and now is starting to shift back towards hitting with stellar defense mixed in during the Pat Murphy era, all while quietly ascending to the #2 overall farm system. If we can just keep this team bandaged together and hungry the last few weeks of the season, I'm really excited to see some Uecker Magic this October.
Erik - 9
Peter - 28
touch with baseball when his childhood heroes Robin Yount, Paul Molitor, and Jim Gantner retired but the Great Home Run Chase of 1998 reignited his passion. As a student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Erik became involved with the campus chapter of Habitat for Humanity. With this group Erik traveled to Portland, OR and Baltimore, MD to work on construction projects and help the group raise $25,000 to partially sponsor a house in Milwaukee. Also at UWM, Erik met Peter Nagel. The two attended their first Brewers game together during Opening Weekend 2003. Despite their failure to ignite the coals at their first tailgate, the two had a blast and were soon making weekly trips to the ballpark. Erik has gone on to several colleges and changed careers several times, and has moved all the way out to New Hampshire, but has always stayed true to his baseball roots by holding part-time stadium usher jobs. To this day he looks back fondly on his incredible cross-country journey.