Overbay Traded to Toronto!
Back to Back Homers Seal Win
Back to .500
Dennis Jenders
With Back to Back shots on Tuesday night from Carlos Lee and Geoff Jenkins the Brewers finally reached the .500 plateau again this season. Leading the Brewers, now with 17 wins, Chris Capuano pitched a gem going seven innings allowing only one run on five hits. The Brewers defeated the Diamondbacks 3-1.
Capuano only trails Chris Carpenter, Dontrelle Willis, and Bartolo Colon in wins this year, the top two with 21 each. With Ben Sheets on the DL earlier this year and again with a torn back muscle it has been Doug Davis and Capuano that shouldered the load. Capuano leads all Brewers with 17 wins and Davis just got his tenth this past week. Through his seven innings Capuano found himself in trouble but was able to get out of it after walking four batters in the game and striking out seven.
Rookie J.J. Hardy helped Capuano out with a RBI single in the third to plate Damian Miller and give the Crew a 1-0 lead. It looked as if the game would could end that way until Lee stepped to the plate in the sixth and launched a line-drive shot over the left field wall off Javier Vazquez to increase the lead to 2-0. Not wanting to be outdone Jenkins, bad back and all, powered a shot to deep right-center field.
Jenkins seemed cautious running the bags and you could tell the back was really bothering. But his hot hitting has really lifted the Brewers in the second-half of the season. Along with Hardy and the resurgence of Lee the Brewers will need to continue the offensive tear to stay about the .500 mark the rest of the way.
"We're swinging the bats good now," Brewers manager Ned Yost said. "You know, we're getting good pitching, playing good defense and that's what's keeping us going."
With 18 games left on the season the Brewers still find themselves 5.5 games out of the Wild Card race but on the verge of the first winning season since 1992. If they simply split the last 18 games they will end at .500 exactly, but one more win would give them a winning season. But the season should be viewed as a positive step regardless. The team continues to fight out the close games and the pitching staff has solidified the team this year. With Ben Sheet healthy and possibly an addition to the rotation this team could have won quite a few more games.