Brewers must remedy these 2 early season flaws to make another postseason run

After an 0-4 start, things were not looking good for the Milwaukee Brewers. The pitching staff was less than superb, but a series win against the Royals began to turn things around. Milwaukee has a strong pitching staff, but is dealing with more injuries than the team expected to have this early in the season. Without the run support, the Brewers were embarrassed in their season opening series in New York. Since then, the pitching has turned around, but there are a few key things on the offensive side of things that are holding this team back.

Even with a 3-2 extra innings win and 1-0 shutout, neither of those games should have been as close as they were. Milwaukee's hitters have been a bit quiet to start the season, and they're still waiting for that clutch at bat that has highlighted this team in the past.

Brewers simply have to hit better with runners in scoring position and avoid baserunning gaffes

The first major thing that needs to improve is driving in runs especially when it comes to prime scoring chances. Milwaukee's numbers with runners in scoring position are absolutely dreadful. While they got the win against Kansas City in the 3-2 11 inning game, there was no reason for that game to be as close as it was.

With runners on second and third with no one out in the bottom of the seventh, Milwaukee was unable to drive in a run. Turang, Chourio, and Yelich all came up empty handed. There was a key moment in this inning that will be mentioned later, but either way Milwaukee had three great hitters up who failed to make an impact. This was even a scheduled day off for Yelich, but he came in for the pinch-hitting appearance.

If that wasn't enough, Milwaukee had the bases loaded in the 10th with the score tie 2-2. Chourio already got the free runner across with a double, and now he was at third with Yelich at second and Contreras at first. Both Yelich and Contreras were intentionally walked (the decision was made to walk Contreras with a 3-1 count), but Frelick, Bauers, and Capra couldn't drive in the winning run.

Without a doubt, that was the most frustrating hitting performance for the Brewers this season. It doesn't matter how bad they lost in New York; they had multiple chances to get the job done early in their home stadium but came up short.

One of the most remarkable statistics so far this season is the Brewers have only hit solo home runs. They are one of eight teams in the league that don't have a home run with RISP. Overall, they rank just 23rd in the league with their .186 batting average. With a slugging percentage at just .220, that puts Milwaukee as the third worst team in all of baseball there.

The team does have double digit hits with RISP, but 11-69 is a less-than-ideal percentage. There are only 11 teams with more plate appearances than Milwaukee, 10 of which are hitting .219 or better.

Milwaukee will take the wins no matter how they get them, but there is still so much room for imrpovement. Their bats will begin to come alive as the season progresses, but another major factor so far has been the baserunning gaffes.

There's no doubt that this team prides themselves on their small ball, as proven with the Brice Turang walk-off bunt a few games ago. A trio of Brewers players have two steals on the season, with three more adding one themselves. While they are a perfect 7-7 in terms of stealing bases, there are two key occasions recently where players have been thrown out at home.

Once again, the extra innings win over the Royals needs to be spotlighted. Garrett Mitchell had a chance to score on a Brice Turang ground ball, but decided to stay put as there were no outs in the inning. He waited just three pitches to test his luck on a Jackson Chourio ground ball to third, who immediately threw him out at home.

Just one game later, Rhys Hoskins was also gunned out in the seventh inning. Hoskins went for it on a Collins' ground ball to short but was thrown out with ease. Yes, the Brewers won both of those games by one run, but it sure would be nice to have some extra insurance runs on top of that.

It's still very early in the season, but Milwaukee has those two major areas to work on. No team wants to hit under .200 with runners in scoring position, and there will certainly come a point this season where a key baserunning gaffe could cost them the game.

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