The Milwaukee Brewers’ six-game homestand started with a loss but they can leave for the road on a five-game winning streak by beating the Colorado Rockies on Sunday.
Milwaukee has taken the first two of the weekend series, including Saturday’s 5-0 win, and can get the sweep when the Brewers send Chad Patrick (3-7, 3.72 ERA) against fellow right-hander German Marquez (3-9, 5.79) in the finale.
Patrick, who was the starter on Monday in a 5-4 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates, will bookend the homestand. The rookie has appeared in 17 games (16 starts) this season but has yet to face the Rockies.
Patrick has the tough task of following Quinn Priester’s strong start on Saturday. Preister held Colorado to one hit in seven innings and struck out a career-high 11. Milwaukee has won four of the first five games in the season series.
The Brewers have put up 41 runs in the five games between the teams and are averaging 8.1 runs in the season series, and Milwaukee’s offense has been humming over the past nine games overall. The Brewers are averaging 8.6 runs and are 8-1 in that span.
“There’s only one way for this team to play, and that’s with an edge,” manager Pat Murphy said. “They have to be relentless, and they’ve probably got to put a little more into it than any other team, because we have to collectively build small victories throughout the game. We can’t become emotionally attached to the result, but rather emotionally attached to how we do it.”
To get the sweep, Milwaukee will have to beat Marquez, who has pitched well over the past month despite getting roughed up (six hits in four innings) by the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday night.
Over his past six starts, Marquez is 2-2 with a 2.93 ERA, including six shutout innings at Washington on June 18.
In six career starts against the Brewers he is 2-2 with a 4.21 ERA.
Colorado is coming off its ninth shutout loss this season and managed just one hit.
“Sometimes you run into a pitcher like that,” interim manager Warren Schaeffer said Saturday of Priester. “But the past month has been good. The guys have been progressing, individually, and as a team, trying to use our whole game and battle with two strikes. Just doing all the things we’re talking about. Guys are buying in. The month of June is going better but we still have to get better.”
The past few games, Colorado has been without catcher Hunter Goodman, its best offensive player this season, due to hamstring tightness. The team has not placed Goodman, who leads the Rockies in average (.287), home runs (14) and RBIs (48) on the injured list, so he could be back in the lineup on Sunday.
-Field Level Media
