In need of big September, Brewers stumble

MILWAUKEE -- September is supposed to be the Brewers’ month, but it didn’t start out that way on Tuesday.

Christian Yelich extended his team lead with his ninth home run, but only after Josh Lindblom and the Brewers fell into a hole en route to a 12-1 loss to the Tigers at Miller Park that grew so lopsided, Orlando Arcia made his pitching debut in the ninth inning.

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Milwaukee was hoping for a more promising start to the month after ending August with three victories in four games against the Pirates. It was the start of Craigtember, after all, and Brewers manager Craig Counsell’s clubs had 20-7 records from Sept. 1 through the end of the regular season in each of the past two years to clinch spots in the postseason.

Of course, 2020 is different. While the Brewers did make a series of callups on Monday and Tuesday, there was no wave of reinforcements on hand like there would have been in any other season when rosters usually expand to 40 on Sept. 1. This year, the Brewers will have to find a way to surge with what they’ve got.

“This is a different season, this is a different playoffs,” Counsell said earlier on the homestand. “You’ve got to keep up and put yourself in a spot where you’re playing some games in the last week of the season where who knows what can happen. That’s our goal, is keep racking up some wins. It’s going to be a crazy last week of the season. I think we can tell that -- especially in the National League, the way it’s sitting now. We’ve just got to keep fighting.”

It was a losing battle Tuesday, when Lindblom became the first Brewers pitcher to top the 100-pitch plateau in a forgettable outing. He took the loss and saw his ERA tick up to 6.46 after allowing four earned runs on six hits in five innings and 101 pitches, burned by a two-inning stretch in the third and fourth in which Lindblom surrendered all of his runs and hits and walked home a run.

“I'm just my own worst enemy right now,” he said.

Lindblom yielded to a pair of pitchers making their Major League debuts, the sort of arms that Counsell has used to great effect down the stretch in recent years, turning the Brewers from a middle-of-the-pack pitching team to the National League leaders in ERA in each of the past two Septembers. First, Justin Topa touched 98 mph in a two-inning stint marred by Victor Reyes’ two-strike, two-out, two-run home run in the sixth (part of Reyes’ four-hit, five-RBI night) and Phil Bickford hit the first two batters he faced in what became a four-run eighth inning. The first of those hit batsmen, JaCoby Jones, left the game with a fractured left hand.

It wasn’t much better for Milwaukee’s offense, which entered the night with a .213 team batting average that ranked last in MLB. The Brewers’ best chance to make it a ballgame was in the sixth, when Yelich led off with a homer and they went on to load the bases with one out in a 6-1 game. Eric Sogard popped out in foul ground and Arcia flew out to shallow center field, and that was that.

The sequence played out in silence, another reminder that this was not your typical September. Late last week, after the Brewers were held to one total run while losing both ends of a doubleheader against the Reds, Ryan Braun gathered the hitters to talk about finding ways to create their own energy. At the same time, Brewers relievers formed something of a bullpen band headed by Brent Suter, who has been leading the percussion each day since.

Anything to create energy.

“We talked about it a couple of days ago before stretch. We just said, 'Hey, listen, our energy could be better, so let's turn it up a little bit,’” Suter said. “It can start out here in the bullpen; we can bring some energy, bring some noise to the guys. … Bullpen band in session, here we go."

It didn’t have the intended effect as the calendar flipped to September.

“We're still grinding,” Yelich said in the wake of last week’s meeting. “Obviously, we haven't been good so far. I think we know we're capable of doing more, and we've still got half the year to play.”