Milwaukee Brewers:

Upstart team primed for a playoff run

There has been little to cheer about in the last couple of seasons for the Milwaukee Brewer fans other than the sausage races between the innings. The franchise has one pennant under their belts though. In 1982 the Brew Crew finished with a 95-67 record and won the American League East. Led by Hall Of Famers Robin Yount, Paul Molitor and Rollie Fingers, the Brewers squeaked by the California Angels in the ALCS 3-2. In the World Series the Brewers found themselves matched up against the National League champion St. Louis Cardinals. The two played an unorthodox series with each team beating the by double digits in two of the seven games. Milwaukee took a 3-2 series lead and only needed one win with two to go. In the final two games the Cardinals accumulated 27 hits, 19 runs and more importantly two wins. Last season the Brewers finished with a 68-94 record which earned them a place in the NL Central cellar and 20 games out of first place.

Milwaukee didn’t make very many off-season moves during this past winter. Their big signing of the winter was when the Brewers brought in outfielder Ben Grieve. He batted .230 with four home runs and 17 runs batted in during 55 games of service for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.

The batting order showcases a few good talents but none of them are quite as good as last season’s Rookie of the Year runner up Scott Podsednik. Some regard this center fielder to be the best lead off man in all off Major League Baseball and that’s including amazing lead off guys like Juan Pierre of the Florida Marlins and Ichiro of the Seattle Mariners. Podsednik batted a solid .314 with a .379 on base percentage, stole 43 of 53 bases, and scored 100 times. Batting in the two spot will be shortstop Craig Counsell. In the middle of the order are second baseman Junior Spivey, left fielder Geoff Jenkins, and first baseman Lyle Overbay. Rounding out the rest of the lineup are third baseman Wes Helms, right fielder Ben Grieve, and catcher Chad Moeller.
The Brewer pitching staff is loaded with young arms. Of the 14 pitchers they have on their staff four of them are over the age of 28 and only two of them are over the age of 30. The pitching staff is lead by the 25 year old flame throwing north paw Ben Sheets. Sheets finished his third season in the bigs with an 11-13 record and a 4.15 ERA. He is joined in the starting rotation by Doug Davis, Wes Obermueller, Victor Santos and Matt Kinney. The elder statesman of the group is Davis at the ripe old age of 28.

The Brewers play all their home games at Miller Park. The park opened up in 2001 and hosted the infamous All-Star game in 2002 that ended in a tie. This 42,400 seat park features the only fan shaped retractable roof in North America.

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