Brewers Shaping Up
“Yelich Grounds the Halo’s Hopes.”
The Los Angeles Angels drove their buses over to American Family Fields on Monday afternoon, only to leave with a loss, 4-3 to the Brew Crew. Griffin Canning started pitching for the Angels, opening up a can of Brewers runs all over himself! Only striking out two of the Wisconsin boys, and giving up 6 hits and 2 runs in his 4 innings on the hill. Milwaukee is looking to close out spring training strong, with their fourth consecutive win on Monday in Phoenix.
DL Hall got the start on the mound for Milwaukee, working for 3 1/3 innings, allowing two runs and retiring 3. The coaches liked his secondary pitches and said he was exercising better command than he has other points this spring. “It’s actually been really good”, remarked Hall after. “It’s a lot better than I intended, to be honest with you. I knew it would be kind of tough… This is kind of my first time being myself again and getting to build up in spring training as a starter. I definitely expected it to be pretty hard but I’m actually feeling pretty good.” Don’t count on Hall to start out going deep into games, he’s working his way up to 4 innings currently and aiming to be at 5 by the end of camp. He flexed his curveball against the Angels, as he wants to use that more this year than last.
The Brewers charter flight doesn’t depart Sky Harbor airport for New York for another 8 days, but you can pre check-in for Christian Yelich. The marquee outfielder showed he’s ready for opening day, hitting 3 for 4 against the halos. In the bottom of the third, Christian launched a tape measure bomb over the berm in right field. With 3 regular season cycle games on record, it seemed like the day to add one to his spring stats. “That would’ve been pretty funny, but didn’t happen.” said Yelich. He also doubled in the first inning to score Garrett Mitchell, and crushed a single to left in the fifth! Asked how they felt so far, Christian replied, “At this point in camp I think a lot of the position guys would say they’re ready to go.. Now you just kind of work on playing with more volume and back to backs.”
Garret Mitchell has been a steady presence all spring in center field and at the plate, going 2 for 3 hitting, and contributing as a scoring runner, the man gets on base. Shortstop Willy Adames, and third baseman Sal Frelick added to the hits and runs column to give the Brewers the edge. Defensively, Sal Frelick had a quiet day at third after Oliver Dunn was bombarded a day prior at the position. After all 9 innings the converted outfielder saw a single smash into the hole between him and short. Frelick made a diving stop, but had no chance to finish the runner at first, probably should have yielded to Adames.
“He realizes that’s probably Willy’s ball but you have to know that before the play happens,” remarked skipper Pat Murphy. “That’s how he is. He’s aggressive.. All I’ve seen all spring is the ball goes in his glove.” Just another week and some days to go in the Cactus League, until the Brewers open up the 2024 season in New York against the Metropolitans. Stay Frosty!
