Brewers: Three Takeaways From The First Spring Training Game

It had been 149 days since they last played in a game, but the wait is finally over. Brewers baseball is officially back!

The Milwaukee Brewers defeated the Chicago White Sox 7-2 in six innings on Sunday to open Cactus League play today. Fans were back in the stands and Brewer bats were alive and well, signaling some sort of normalcy returning to the world.

Here are three takeaways from Sunday’s victory:

1. The Young Brewers Relief Arms Were Impressive

With the bullpen of the Brewers being a staple the last few years, it seems as though it will continue to be a strong suit for the foreseeable future. From prospects to major leaguers, it was a heck of a performance from those who entered in relief of Eric Lauer today.

Lauer struggled once again, going just one inning and giving up two hits, one walk and two earned runs off an Adam Engel home run. But those would be all the runs that the White Sox bats could muster as the Crew only gave up two more hits the rest of the game.

Justin Topa pitched the second inning and worked his way out of a jam, keeping the White Sox at two runs, striking out one.

The hard-throwing Angel Perdomo was summoned for the third inning, failing to surrender a hit and striking out Engel, who hit the earlier home run.

Miguel Sanchez, a player that has been in the Brewers farm system since 2016 came in next for Craig Counsell also throwing a scoreless inning punching out one Chicago hitter.

To finish the day, the number three and number six prospects on MLB Pipeline’s Top 30 Brewers Prospect rankings left Brewer fans excited. Southpaws Ethan Small and Aaron Ashby each went an inning, not surrendering a hit and Ashby striking out the side.

Ashby’s dazzling display even caught the eye of one Twitter sensation with his sweeping slider.

2. 2020 Brewers Slumps Look To Be A Thing Of The Past

Keston Hiura, Omar Narvaez and Avisail Garcia will all tell you that last season wasn’t anywhere close to what they’re capable of doing at the plate. Today, we saw some very encouraging flashes from them. As a group, they went a 4 for 8 with one walk, four RBIs, four runs scored, and two home runs.

Hiura’s was a no-doubter off Mike Wright in the first inning on an off-speed 3-2 pitch and he blasted it into deep left-center field to give the Crew an early lead.

Narvaez was tied for the most hits on the team for the day going 2 for 3 with a double to his name. He looked much more comfortable at the dish today and was in the two hole after Garcia.

Garcia had an all-around productive day. He had one outfield assist, gunning down Danny Mendick as he was trying to scamper from first to third on a hit. At the plate he showed some discipline, starting the game off with a walk and eventually scoring on the Hiura home run and also showed some pop with a towering blast over the batter’s eye in center field to give the Brewers a 5-2 lead.

If these three guys can turn it around at the plate for the Milwaukee offense this year, it could be one of the most dangerous lineups in the MLB.

3. The Brewers Flexed Their Muscle Today

In addition to the Hiura and Garcia home runs, Tyrone Taylor and Dylan Cozens also had some blasts of their own.

Taylor was another player that had a very productive day at the plate, going 2 for 3 and Cozens made the most out of his one appearance at the plate with a little help from 20 mph wind gusts, serving a ball to right-center field and in the hands of the fans.

It will be interesting to see if the home run really does trend downwards in the MLB this year after the circulating reports of the deadening of baseballs, but it’s a good start regardless for the Crew.

The Brewers failed to score seven runs in 51 of the 62 games they played in last year. And in six innings of play so far in 2021, they’ve already hit that number. Sunday was a great start for the offense.