Milwaukee Brewers: What We Saw On Opening Day 2017

The Milwaukee Brewers 2017 season appeared to start on the right foot with presumed 2017 ace, Junior Guerra, on the hill. He looked sharp in his first few innings, he was commanding his pitches well. He only made one mistake to former Brewer Mark Reynolds, who took Guerra over the wall for a two-run homer.

Once the damage had been done he seemed to settle down and he flashed the impressive stuff that he had shown during the 2016 season. However, once he dropped down a  sacrifice bunt during this first at-bat, and he strained his right calf, sending him on his first trip to the newly introduced 10-day disabled list.

It is avoidable injuries like this that show why the designated hitter needs to be adopted into the National League.  After all, not every team has their own Madison Bumgarner blasting home runs.

From there, the game took a turn for the worse for the Milwaukee Brewers. They found themselves down 4-0 as  Colorado Rockies ace John Gray looked like the second coming of Nolan Ryan.  The young core of the Brewers looked baffled as they could not find a solution to hit the 97 plus mph fastball Gray was casually tossing over the plate…until the fifth inning that is.

Being down early looked to present a challenge for this young Brewers team, as they put together a nice five-run rally in the fifth inning to claw their way back into contention.

Seeing that chemistry the team displayed made it seem like this team could be clicking with each other a little sooner than we thought.

Last season the Brewers were cursed with a horrendous defense that had fans everywhere pulling at their hair, and most wanting to run down the street screaming with some of the costly mistakes that would end up handing over so many close games.

Sadly, today was no different. They did make an occasional play here and there, especially the awesome cut-off throw from Orlando Arcia, but the play that really stung though was in the top of the sixth inning when Corey Knebel came in to get out of bases loaded jam.

Knebel ended up getting a ground ball for what should have been an inning-ending double play, but Jonathan Villar, who struggled all day defensively, couldn’t turn it and allowed the game-tying run to cross the plate. This was just the beginning of Villar’s mind-boggling mistakes that would cost the crew two runs and eventually the game.

Next: 3 Brewers Prospects You Need To Know

Overall it was a good effort from a young team, but it just shows that the current Milwaukee Brewers roster needs time to get in sync with each other in order to start delivering wins.