No matter the baseball team, it seems there is one road trip that is an absolute joke. One road trip where it feels like everything that could go wrong went wrong. This is how I felt with the Milwaukee Brewers’ West Coast swing where they finished 2-6 and fell out of first place on Wednesday. In two of those games, Milwaukee should have won which makes things more frustrating. Saturday was a win until Jimmy Nelson folded like a house of cards. And on Wednesday, Brewers went up two late only to have a costly misplayed pop-up come back to bite them resulting in an 8-7 defeat.

Player of the Game: Adrian Houser – This guy continues to be nails for the Milwaukee Brewers. We seem to get this every year with the Crew. A young, former starter who goes to the bullpen and becomes a complete beast. In 2017, it was Josh Hader. In 2018, Corbin Burnes held that title. This year, it is Houser. He came into the game early as Zach Davies could not get an out. Houser went 3.1 innings with no runs allowed, only one hit and four strikeouts. He was excellent for the Crew. You have to wonder if they will think about him for the rotation before the year is over.

Honorable Mention: Ryan Braun – I wanted to give it to Yasmani Grandal, but he could not come through in the ninth plus had the misplay that cost the Brewers the victory. We’ll give Braunie a shoutout instead who had a good game in his own right. Braun hit his 12th home run of the year in the first inning then added a two-run double in the third. He nearly hit his second of the day before Grandal belted his own three-run shot. Braun isn’t an All-Star, but he’s having an excellent first half with 12 homers and .266 batting average, .317 OBP.

The Thing I Liked: Brewers didn’t raise the white flag – It would have been easy for Milwaukee to say ‘fuck it’ yesterday. They had a flight to Milwaukee after this game and a game tonight. They could have easily passed the buck and moved to tonight’s affair with Cincinnati. Instead, they kept battling back in this one and even took the lead for a short moment. I commend that out of them and hopefully, the hot hitting of Wednesday will carry over this weekend.

The Thing I Didn’t Like: Zach Davies is crashing to earth – This is the third straight start for Zach Davies where he struggled mightily from the start. After a hot start to the year, it feels like the regression monster has arrived for him. Hopefully, Davies can figure out his issues and bounce back to his early year form. We see this from time to time in baseball. Guys will start out super hot then trail off and become normal again. Hope that this isn’t the case for Davies.

Next up: Brewers head home with Jimmy Nelson getting the ball in his third start of the year. He plays Cincinnati who is coming off a sweep of the Houston Astros. Now, the Reds can pitch, but they haven’t been able to do much hitting this year. Hopefully, Jimmy will be in control tonight. Tanner Roark gets the ball for Cincy. He struggled in his first start against Milwaukee this year, but he dominates at Miller Park.

Charlie.