Brewers in 2016: What to Expect

Fangraph’s projections came out yesterday, and among the 6 worse teams projected, sat the Brewers, including 5 other teams in the NL. The Brewers are expected to go 71-91 and finish last in the NL Central. Which given that the Brew Crew is going through a rebuild, this wouldn’t surprise me at all. One of the few seeming bright spots in the projections is that the Brewers are expected to improve in run differentials (maybe those sneaky computers know more about the impact of Chris Carter then some Brewer’s fans).

While this may sound crazy, I actually think this is a good thing. Now before you complete throw a fit at me, just hear me out. First, they’re projected to be one of the 6 worst teams in baseball and finish last in the NL Central. Anything better than that is an improvement, literally, the only place to go is up from here-nowhere else.

There’s still time to trade Lucroy away from some prospects (Stearns has some cards left to play and here’s to hoping we get some starting rotation prospects, Garza is old and frankly I don’t trust him).

Ranting aside, what can we realistically expect from the Brewers next season? Well not much, but we can start somewhere.

Offense

Ryan Braun may hold almost every batting record in franchise history, but it feels like he always has a sore lower back (when you have carried an offense your entire career-its expected that your back will eventually be sore), realistically he’ll probably have a down year. Then you have Khris Davis and Chris Carter-lots of dings and whiffers there. An offense can only carry a team so far.

Defense

Given that the current projected rotation has an ERA over 4 (and like I said before an offense can only carry a team so far) the rotation is going to end up leaving the bullpen in a sour spot and brewers fans even sourer.  I’m expecting plenty of games of cussing out Garza and throwing my arms up in disgust.

More from Reviewing the Brew

• Brewers: 4 Players Who Must Step Up for the Crew to Make the Playoffs
• Brewers: Yet Another Huge Promotion For Top Prospect Jackson Chourio
• Brewers Making Colossal Mistake With Corbin Burnes’ Contract
• Which Players May Be In The Final Month Of Their Brewers Careers?
• Brewers: Where Does Devin Williams Stand In NL Reliever Of The Year Race?

71-91 seems like a reasonable finish to me, I wouldn’t be surprised if they finish worse than that, but again, they only thing left for the Brewers to do is go up, and given that they’re rebuilding, my expectations aren’t high.