'It's going to test us': Crew begins tough stretch with loss

LOS ANGELES -- Brewers manager Craig Counsell said he doesn’t view this single stretch of games against fellow first-place teams as a measuring stick of his own club. Whatever happens over the next week-plus against the NL West-leading Dodgers, the AL West-leading Rangers and AL Central-leading Twins won’t settle Milwaukee’s postseason fate one way or the other, not with more than a month of the regular season remaining.

But even if he’s right, there are still some lessons to be reinforced.

“You have to play a good game to beat them,” Counsell said after a 6-2 loss to the Dodgers at Dodger Stadium on Tuesday. “We found that out tonight.”

Third baseman Andruw Monasterio’s errant throw in the sixth inning was the opening the Dodgers needed to mount a tie-breaking, five-run rally that denied Milwaukee a chance to add a game to its 3 1/2-game lead in the NL Central on a night the Cubs and Reds both lost.

With that one error followed by a flurry of hits, one of Adrian Houser’s finest starts turned into a rather pedestrian entry in the box score: 5 1/3 innings, five hits, four runs (three earned), six strikeouts.

Just like that, the Brewers were reminded that against lineups like L.A.’s, or the one that awaits them in Arlington, Texas, this weekend, mistakes are swiftly punished.

“On the defensive side of the ball, I feel like we’re as good as anybody,” Counsell said. “That part of our game has won us a lot of games, and we need it. It keeps games close. We just didn’t execute [well] tonight.”

While Houser kept the Dodgers at bay through the first five innings, Brewers hitters had their own problems against flamethrowing Dodgers starter Bobby Miller. Topping 100 mph all the way to the last of his six innings, Miller surrendered a single to Christian Yelich leading off the game, followed by a William Contreras walk.

After that, Miller retired 18 in a row, allowing a lone run when Sal Frelick managed to make contact with a breaking ball way below the zone for a run-scoring groundout to plate Contreras. By then, Miller was already settling in.

And so was Houser, who retired the first nine hitters he faced before working around an infield hit and an error in a scoreless fourth. In the fifth, Houser yielded a run but kept the game a 1-1 tie. But in the sixth, the Brewers’ night came undone.

With one out, Will Smith hit a grounder to Monasterio’s left. He fielded it cleanly and spun around, knowing there was plenty of time to throw the catcher out at first base. But the throw was high.

“I just wanted to throw it hard,” Monasterio said. “It’s part of the game.”

The Dodgers pounced. Six of the next seven batters collected hits against Houser and relievers Hoby Milner and Bryse Wilson, including one loud double from J.D. Martinez against Houser that gave the Dodgers the lead. Among them, Kiké Hernández's soft bouncer up the middle against the reliable Milner, through a drawn-in Brewers infield, for two runs.

“Looking back on it, if we make the play for the second out it’s probably a different inning,” Counsell said. “Even after that, it’s four ground balls that go through. The chances of that seem pretty slim, but it happened. … It ended up costing us.”

Said Houser: “When you get a couple guys on and you don’t execute a pitch, they can get going. They showed us in the sixth. One pitch away, if I get that ball a little more in [on Martinez] and get a ground ball and be able to get out of there. They take advantage of mistakes and do damage.”

Houser, for his part, is putting some stock in the outcome of this week’s games against the Dodgers and Rangers.

“You’ve got two teams that are headed to the postseason, or they’re on that trajectory,” Houser said. “It’s a good chance to see how we match up to them. If we can keep on the pace we’re going and go to the postseason, it’s kind of a little push.

“It’s a little early-season playoff baseball, kind of. Some really good teams that are putting up a lot of runs and playing good baseball. It’s going to test us and show us who we really are.”