All of the talk this week surrounding YOUR Milwaukee Brewers is about whether or not they will fall victim to the Sports Illustrated cover jinx. Players have been asked (to which my fellow Twitter follower Nyjer Morgan "pleads the fifth.)
Ryan Braun spoke with Tom Haudricourt for a brief in the Journal-Sentinel and said, "I think it's great," said Braun. "It's great for the Milwaukee Brewers organization, it's great for the city of Milwaukee. For all three of us, we're proud to have the opportunity to represent this organization, the city of Milwaukee and the state of Wisconsin."
That's both sides from the players, who will never say the curse exists. The "Taking the Fifth" is about the closest you'll get to it. My take on it is, there might not be a jinx, but after the run they made, there is bound to be some market correction in the next couple of weeks that could make the gap between them and the Cardinals closer.
The start of that correction is already underway with the split in Pittsburgh in the four-games three days at PNC.
The next 16 games have some tests in them with the likes of the Cardinals in three-game sets both at Miller Park and Busch Stadium, plus the Phillies for four and the Rockies for two (all six of which at home). The fact that 12 of the 18 games will be at Miller Park, the other three of which include the Cubs this weekend, should help the Brewers keep from letting things get out of control, but I am thinking it might not be as successful of a run as they've had at home to this point. Although, every time I seem to think that, they seem to run off 8-1 homestands.
The other thing going in their favor is the move by Ron Roenicke (who is making a strong case for Manager of the Year, which I will make in a future post), choosing to skip Chris Narveson the next time through the pitching rotation with two off days (today and Monday) and go with just the Big Four in what has to be a move to push forward with the Magic Number at 22 entering Thursday night with hope of catching the Phillies for the best record in the National League.
So where will this market correction come in? Those nine games against the Cards in St. Loius and the Phillies and Rockies at Miller Park will test this team. You'd have to hope the offense can pull out of this current slumber, Tuesday's 11-run outburst not included. That could be the telling week in whether this team can catch Philadelphia for the top-spot in the NL.
That Phillies series will be the biggest regular season series this team will have played and all eyes will be on Miller Park. We'll have to see how the team handles those four games and the top-tier pitching they will see in the playoffs.
One would think Roenicke and pitching coach Rick Kranitz have already worked a couple weeks ahead to plan out the pitching staff for the Phillies series and skipping Narveson and utilizing him out of the pen helps maximize victories. With it a ways out, we'll have to wait and see.
Of course, the biggest question mark in this whole thing is the return of Rickie Weeks. One would expect him to return at or shortly after Sept. 1 from his sprained ankle. If he's able to come back in the No. 5 spot in the order and produce like he was prior to getting injured, what I just said will be nonsense. If he slumps, things might get a little tough heading into the final two weeks of the regular season.
No matter how it turns out, the last time they were on the cover, April 27, 1987 "Team Streak" fell flat and missed the playoffs. Well, this team WILL NOT be missing the playoffs, but I wouldn't be surprised with a little market correction bringing this team back to earth a little bit.
As you may have noticed there's no Nussie Hunter in today's section. I'm toying with the idea of doing away with the feature and focusing on just sports. What do you think?
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