Game 21: Cardinals 7, Brewers 3

Box Score

My seething hatred of the St. Louis Cardinals and the Brewers' proclivity to lose to them has inspired me to once again fire up this blog. I have a few points going forward before I vent about today's game.

First, some of my posts are going to be very short. Writing about baseball is very difficult because there are a lot of games and many of them are not very interesting. The length of each post will depend on the game, how I reacted to the game, and how much time I have.

Second, I'm going back to the original format because it better suits the demands of the blogging about a baseball team. With that established, let's dive into another Brewers loss to the Cardinals.

There was a point last season where the Brewers could count on the taking at least 2 of 3 against St. Louis any time they played. But since August of last season the Cardinals seemingly have a perfect understanding of how to defeat the Brewers and the ability to consistently execute their game plan. This is evidenced by the Cardinals improving to 4-1 against the Brewers while outscoring them 40-18. I'm at the point where I expect the Brewers to lose every game they play against them.

Today's game was reasonably close. The Brewers had the bases loaded with the game tied at 3-3 in the top of the 6th. Had the roles been reversed St. Louis would have summoned a pinch hitter who would go on to have a 9-pitch at bat that would result in a softly-hit grounder with eyes that would score two runs. But the roles were not reversed, and consequently the Brewers did not get the big hit and the Cardinals took the lead for good in the bottom half of the frame.

With the victory the Cardinals are now 5.0 games up on the Brewers. This is not particularly concerning because it's still April and the Cardinals have some players that are succeeding at an unsustainable rate. For example, look at the ERA of their starters:

Kyle Lohse: 1.62
Jake Westbrook: 1.30
Jaime Garcia: 2.49
Lance Lynn: 1.33

Now, it's possible that this will turn out to be the best rotation of all-time, but I tend to doubt it. There is a regression coming for St. Louis, but it will not do the Brewers much good if they are hopelessly buried when it happens.

Looking ahead I expect the Crew to lose tomorrow and I expect to be extremely frustrated as I watch it happen. Or maybe not. Sooner or later the high leverage hits are going to swing in the Brewers' favor and the Cardinals' domination will end. You'll be able to tell when that happens by the length of my posts.