The divine laws of baseball are written, they are clear, and they are immutable.
The ball shalt always find you.
Thou shalt verily respect the streak.
And when thine own hometown kid turned player and manager who was born a Brewer leaves for history’s richest managerial contract with thine divisional archrival, thine own team shalt be destined to face his new team in the playoffs.
For two clubs who’d never faced off in a postseason series, this felt inevitable. Craig Counsell, the prodigal son, returning to face a Brewers fandom who won’t be remotely as forgiving as the father in that parable. And while that Counsell storyline might have the sizzle, the steak is about so much more.
Because it’s not like Brewers fans were going to have warm fuzzies for the Cubs under any other manager. Moreover, as Brewers star Christian Yelich quipped during Friday’s calm before the storm, “It’s not like ‘Counse’ has exotic blitz packages.” No, there’s no benefit of inside information to either team here.
And here’s the thing: The Brewers didn’t forge the best record in franchise history just for a shot at their former manager. Nor did they do it to jab a stick in the eye of the Cubs.
“We’re here to win the World Series,” Brewers All-Star reliever Trevor Megill said. “The Cubs are just the team that we have to play first.”
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Sure, there’s a segment of Brewers fans that didn’t want this Cubs series, folks who hoped the Padres might spare them from it, and not because San Diego is an easier team to beat. Rather, their thinking goes, if the Brewers had to lose, better it be to a random Padres club in a soon-forgotten postseason footnote than to be reminded of the result in every future Cubs series. Others dreaded a postseason iteration of the “Wrigley North” phenomenon in which fans in royal blue nearly outnumber fans in navy.
But greatness is not born of such fearful approaches. Or, as the blunter saying goes, scared money don’t make money. And these Brewers, by all evidence, are here to be great.
For whatever anxiety might be floating among the fanbase, the Brewers show no signs of it. In the runup to the series, they’ve been their typical Zen-like selves, which served them so well en route to 97 wins and the best record in baseball. Manager Pat Murphy’s sporting a new Uecker tattoo, and his laid-back dry wit remains ever-present at press conferences. Catcher William Contreras penned a Players Tribune article titled No One Better Than Us.
This is a team that believes in themselves, because nobody else will. And this is a team that makes the most of their own resources, because other clubs have so much more.
Of the eight teams remaining, the Brewers have, by far, the lowest total team payroll, $121 million. Only Detroit joins the Brewers with a payroll less than $200 million. And the National League gauntlet to the World Series means getting by the Cubs at $211 million, the Phillies at $290 million and the Dodgers at a whopping $350 million.
In spite of all that, this has all the appearances of Milwaukee’s best chance at a World Series since 1982. The qualities of their pitching, hitting and defense are all reflected in baseball’s best run differential of plus-172. Their chemistry is unmatched, as is their belief.
It all points toward an ultimate goal here of something far greater than beating Counsell and the Cubs.
It’s to do what the Brewers have done all season – continue making history as the best club in franchise history.
And it’s to do the one final thing that the Brewers have never done.
