This afternoon’s game between the Milwaukee Brewers and Philadelphia Phillies was billed as a pitchers duel between two of the best starting pitchers in the National League, Freddy Peralta and Ranger Suárez. It lived up to that billing, and both starters had scoreless outings even without either of them bringing their best stuff. But the Brewers in this game were frustratingly unable to come through when they had scoring opportunities, and while the Phillies weren’t much better, they did what they needed
to to win against a punchless Brewer offense.
Peralta’s afternoon got started with a strikeout of Philadelphia leadoff hitter Trea Turner on a foul tip. Kyle Schwarber got ahead 2-0 before Peralta worked the count back even, but Schwarber laid off the next two pitches, which were both off the outside of the plate, and drew a one-out walk. Bryce Harper got ahead, too, but he missed the barrel on a 2-0 changeup and flew out harmlessly to right field. J.T. Realmuto then struck out looking, and Peralta had a scoreless first.
Suárez got Jackson Chourio to chase a 1-2 curveball off the outside of the plate for his first out of the game. Suárez attacked the outside corner against Isaac Collins and threw four really good pitches, the fourth of which struck Collins out looking. Suárez got a generous strike call on a 1-1 pitch off the outside, so Contreras swung at the next one—which was even further off the plate—and doinked a single into center field. That gave Andrew Vaughn a chance, but he grounded into a 4-6 fielder’s choice to end the inning.
Brandon Marsh struck out looking to lead off the second inning, and got Harrison Bader swinging at a 3-2 fastball right down the middle for the second out. Max Kepler was next, and he jumped at the first pitch and hit a fly ball just beyond the reach of Collins down the right field line. He ended up at second base with a double, but Alec Bohm flew out to center and Peralta had another zero.
Caleb Durbin led off the bottom of the second with a ground ball down the third base line. Bohm got to it and tried making the high-difficulty play, but his Brooks Robinson-esque throw was not on line and Durbin was safe with an infield single. Today’s catcher Danny Jansen followed with a weak ground ball to shortstop that advanced Durbin to second but made the first out. Andruw Monasterio flew out to center, and Durbin advanced to third on the play, but Blake Perkins’ ground ball up the middle was deflected by Suárez to Turner, who threw to first for the third out. Still 0-0 after two.
Bryson Stott became Peralta’s fifth strikeout victim to start the third, though it took seven pitches and Peralta’s pitch count was beginning to be a concern after another long at-bat (46 pitches through the first out of the third). Turner grounded out to shortstop for the second out, and Schwarber did Peralta a favor by grounding out on the first pitch he saw, and Peralta was through three solid innings.
Joey Ortiz grounded back to Suárez for the first out of the bottom of the third. Chourio went after the first pitch and flew out to right field for a quick second out. Collins, though, got a mistake on an 0-2 sinker right down the middle and hit it over Bader’s head in center for a two-out double. But Contreras grounded out on the first pitch he saw, and Suárez was also through three scoreless innings on an efficient 41 pitches.
Peralta issued a walk to Harper to start the fourth, and then ran into some bad luck when Realmuto, who’d fallen behind 0-2 but worked back to a full count, hit a little flare into shallow right field that dropped only because Harper was running and Monasterio had to cover second base. Marsh struck out on three pitches, though, and Peralta got Bader to strike out as well. Kepler took strike one but then four straight balls, and walked to load the bases. That brought Chris Hook out of the dugout and gave Bohm an at-bat with the bases loaded, but Peralta struck him out to end the inning. Peralta was up to 84 pitches, though, after the traffic in the fourth.
Suárez got the benefit of a couple of 50/50 strike calls against Vaughn to get ahead 1-2, but Vaughn lined a solid single to right on the next pitch. Durbin tried to bunt on the next pitch but pushed it foul, but lined a single into left a couple of pitches later. Like the Phillies in the top of the inning, the Brewers had runners on first and second with nobody out in the fourth.
Jansen was next and somewhat curiously dropped down a bunt, but he bunted it right at Harper, who had crept in, and Harper got the slow-footed Vaughn at third base for the first out. Monasterio popped up just past the infield dirt, invoking the infield fly rule, and Suárez was one batter away from—like Peralta—getting out of the jam. That batter was Perkins, and he struck out looking. Good scoring opportunities passed for both teams.
Peralta got two quick outs to start the fifth on a Stott flyout and a Turner groundout. Schwarber then popped out to shallow right, and Peralta was through the fifth on only eight pitches. Suárez, likewise, put up another zero: after an Ortiz strikeout, Chourio drew a one-out walk, but Collins hit into a double play to end the inning.
Peralta’s eight-pitch fifth could’ve bought him another inning, but he was pulled after five innings and 92 innings. He didn’t allow a run in five innings and allowed just two hits. He walked three and struck out eight, which inflated his pitch count, but the Phillies clearly weren’t comfortable against him. With five more scoreless innings, Peralta hasn’t allowed a run in any of his last five starts, last surrendering a run in the fourth inning on August 5th. That makes 29 straight scoreless innings.
Instead of Peralta, it was Aaron Ashby in the sixth. He quickly got groundouts from Harper and Realmuto, and after issuing a walk to Marsh, he struck out Bader to end the inning.
Contreras drew a walk to start the bottom of the inning and Vaughn followed with a double to the left field gap, and the Brewers were in business in the sixth. But Durbin hit a ground ball right at the drawn-in Stott for out number one, Jansen hit a fly ball out to center that wasn’t deep enough to score Contreras from third, and Monasterio grounded out to third base to end the inning. It was a pretty awful display of situational hitting for the second straight inning, and Suárez was through six scoreless, though he probably shouldn’t have been.
Milwaukee turned to Tobias Myers as Ashby’s replacement in the seventh. With one out, Bohm hit a fly ball deep to the right field corner, and Collins dove for it but it was out of his reach (he probably could’ve caught it with a better read off the bat). Bohm ended up at third with a triple, and immediately after the Brewers had squandered their opportunity, the Phillies had their best chance to score. Myers got ahead of Stott, but on a 1-2 pitch he hit one hard on the ground to the right side, but Vaughn made a really nice pick, looked Bohm back to third, and tagged the base for the second out. Myers got ahead of Turner, too, but he fouled off a couple of 0-2 pitches before looping a single into left on a splitter that was about six inches below the zone. Not much that Myers could do about that one, it was just Turner showcasing his A+ hit tool, but it was a bitter two-out pill that made it 1-0 Phillies.
Murphy went back to the bullpen and brought in the lefty Rob Zasryzny to face Schwarber. A wild pitch on 0-1 advanced Turner to scoring position, but Schwarber rolled out to second for the third out. No matter the outcome of the series, Brewers pitching did a great job with the MVP candidate Schwarber.
The Brewers, now trailing, needed to find the big hit (or sacrifice fly or RBI groundout) that had thus far eluded them. The Philly pitcher in the seventh was David Robertson, making his second appearance of the series after giving up two runs on Monday. After Perkins struck out, Brice Turang entered as a pinch-hitter for Ortiz but flew out to Marsh in shallow left for the second out. Chourio grounded out to short, and Robertson had a 1-2-3 inning.
Zastryzny struck out Harper to begin the eighth, struck out Realmuto to continue the eighth, and got Marsh to pop out to Monasterio to end the eighth. It was a great four-out appearance for Zastryzny. Lefty Matt Strahm was on for Philadelphia in the eighth, and he got the first out when Collins flew out to center. Contreras battled for seven pitches but struck out swinging at a backdoor slider. Vaughn fell behind 0-2 on another questionable called strike but lined his third hit of the game, a single, to right on the next pitch. Murphy pinch-ran for Vaughn with Jake Bauers, who took second on a passed ball and advanced to third when Realmuto’s throw after the passed ball in question sailed into center field. That gave Durbin a major opportunity to tie the game with two outs, and he got a hanging slider on 1-2, but got under it and popped out to end the inning.
The top of the ninth saw the Brewer return of Joel Payamps, making his first appearance in the majors since the Brewers designated him for assignment in late May. The first batter he faced did not help his confidence: Bader smoked a double down the left field line on Payamps’ second pitch. Kepler was next, and he grounded out to shortstop but advanced Bader to third. Payamps got a big strikeout of Bohm for the second out, but Stott went after the first pitch and lined a double into right that gave the Phillies a big insurance run for a 2-0 lead. Turner grounded out to end the inning but the Brewers would now need two ninth-inning runs from the bottom of their lineup to tie this one.
They’d need to do so against the Phillies’ big trade deadline acquisition, the fireballer (and former Twins closer) Jhoan Duran. Jansen was retired on a tapper back to the mound for the first out. Monasterio put a charge into a 3-1 pitch but Bader got up and possibly robbed Monasterio of a home run with a leaping catch at the wall, a ball that traveled 405 feet and, according to Statcast, would’ve been a home run in half of the ballparks in the league. Sal Frelick pinch-hit for Perkins with two outs, and he had a typically pesky Frelick at-bat but ultimately struck out on a 101 mph fastball and the game was over.
The Brewers were 0-for-10 with runners in scoring position in this game. Their afternoon was encapsulated by the fifth and sixth innings, back-to-back innings in which they had two on and no out and were unable to score. Milwaukee will flush this one down the toilet and, hopefully, bring a healthier starting lineup to Pittsburgh tomorrow night. The silver lining for the Milwaukee offense was Vaughn, who has had a difficult month but had three hits, including a double, today.
Peralta pitched well enough to win again but was let down by his offense. His scoreless inning streak is now in historic territory: he is just three innings short of Teddy Higuera’s franchise-record 32 inning streak, which he did in 1987. Ashby and Zastryzny had good outings today as well, and Myers was rather unlucky to have allowed a run in his outing. Payamps will surely wish his return to the majors had gone better. We’ll see if he gets another opportunity.
The Brewers travel tonight to Pittsburgh, where they’ll start a three-game weekend series tomorrow at 5:40 p.m. central time. The Pirates have been a different team at home, lately, but Milwaukee will at least avoid NL Cy Young favorite Paul Skenes, who was on the bump today against the Dodgers.
