A Schelling For Your Thoughts

Underrated. That’s the term some many have used to describe Brewers catcher Jonathan Lucroy.

As in, the most underrated catcher in baseball. Or, among the most underrated players in the major leagues.

The most recent use of this description came Wednesday afternoon via ESPN baseball writer Jerry Crasnick. A scout he talked to took it a step further, calling the fifth-year catcher the “most underrated player in the National League.”

Underrated or not, Lucroy is emerging as a star for the Brewers and may be the most important player on the roster at the moment.

The team has been battered by injuries of late, with third baseman Aramis Ramirez on the 15-day disabled list with a hamstring injury, right fielder Ryan Braun working his way back from an oblique injury and center fielder Carlos Gomez serving a three-game suspension while resting an ailing back.

That leaves Lucroy to carry a bigger load.

The good news for the Brewers is that Lucroy can do it. He’s off to a good start as the club’s biggest offensive threat over the last week.

Lucroy is 7-for-20 over his last six games with one home run, six RBIs and two walks, and he delivered a key two-run bases-loaded single in Tuesday’s victory over the Pirates. For the season, Lucroy is batting .311 with two home runs, 15 RBIs and 12 doubles.

His 1.2 WAR entering Wednesday’s game was second only to the Giants’ Buster Posey among NL catchers.

Much of that is due to Lucroy’s above-average defense behind the plate, but the fifth-year catcher continues to improve at the plate each season, while increasingly becoming an important presence in the Brewers’ clubhouse.

As the Brewers look to maintain their spot atop the NL Central standings with a thin lineup, Lucroy’s production will be key.

He’s not quite the K-Rod of old, but Francisco Rodriguez is as dominant as ever. And so is the Brewers’ bullpen.

Over 16 appearances, the 32-year-old closer has converted all 13 of his save opportunities, giving up just seven hits and four walks over 16 innings with 23 strikeouts. This week, he made four appearances, picking up four more saves while striking out five batters and allowing three to reach base.

Rodriguez has been the team’s best pitcher this month and the best closer in baseball. But he’s not the only Brewer dominating in relief.

Milwaukee’s bullpen is fourth in the league with a 2.45 ERA and 1.08 WHIP through 28 games. Opponents are hitting just .205 against Brewers relievers, with a .268 on-base percentage, numbers that are good for third and second in the league.

Joining Rodriguez in delivering spectacular results so far has been 25-year-old right-hander Tyler Thornburg and 24-year-old lefty Will Smith. The two have formed one of the most dominant young pitching duos in baseball, combining to allow just two runs on 13 hits over 27 innings.

Thornburg has struck out 17 batters with five walks, while Smith has 18 strikeouts against eight walks.

Putting together a good bullpen is far from an exact science. What may look like a good bullpen on Opening Day could fall apart by June 1. This year, Brewers general manager Doug Melvin appears to have gotten it right. And it’s paying huge dividends in Milwaukee.

Look at the lineup the Milwaukee Brewers put out Wednesday afternoon.

No Ryan Braun. No Aramis Ramirez. No one batting over .300.

Instead, they had catcher Jonathan Lucroy batting third and both Caleb Gindl and Logan Schafer starting in the outfield.

That is not a recipe for Major League success.

Many times last season, the Brewers filled out lineup cards much like this. Some even worse. And that was one of the primary reasons they won only 74 games and finished in fourth place, 23 games behind the National League Central champion St. Louis Cardinals.

With Braun on the shelf and Ramirez hitting .089 (5-for-56) over his last 17 games, the middle of the Brewers lineup is a mess. Lucroy’s no slouch, but he’s no Braun, either. And the Brewers weren’t exactly leading the league in offense before Braun’s injury.

No, the Brewers have been a middle-of-the-pack team at the plate this season, with pitching among the league’s best. But as the pitching has slipped a bit recently, the lack of offensive firepower has meant six losses in their last eight games.

Braun will return. And Ramirez will return to form at the plate. But the Brewers’ current rough stretch shows that their success — and any other teams’ — can be derailed quickly by the prolonged absence of a star player.

There was an Easter Sunday brawl, the cover literally being hit off a baseball and pitchers rocking out to ’80s band Wang Chung.

It was a wild week for the Brewers.

And if you got caught up in all the craziness — or if you were too busy taking selfies at Miller Park with Hank — you may have missed the fact that the Crew continued to roll, going 5-2 over the last week by winning three of four in Pittsburgh and two of three at home against the San Diego Padres.

The brawl and who was more at fault between Carlos Gomez and Gerrit Cole makes for an entertaining discussion, to be sure. And Brewers catcher Martin Maldonado quite literally hitting the cover off the ball Friday night is something you may never see again.

But the biggest story should be that this team, a team most projected to finish fourth or worse in the National League Central, just might be the best in baseball.

They certainly have been so far, and their 16-6 record is no fluke. But can the Brewers sustain this pace?

Certainly, they won’t continue to win 72 percent of games. But if the pitching stays strong and they avoid any major injuries, this Milwaukee team appears to have the pieces to win about 85-90 games and potentially take the division. At the very least, the Brewers look very much like a playoff team.

April was supposed to be the toughest month of the season. Instead, the Brewers are breezing through it.

With 23 of the first 32 games against 2013 playoff teams, this team had its work cut out for it. Milwaukee has answered that challenge early, going 11-5 against teams that made last year’s postseason.

So far, so good. But don’t go booking your World Series trip just yet.

The good news for the Brewers? They have the best record in baseball through 15 games.

The better news? After three more games this month, they don’t face the Cardinals again until July.

Milwaukee’s nine-game winning streak came to a screeching halt Monday as kryptonite came to town in the form of the defending National League champs.

The Cardinals have stymied the Brewers recently much the same way the latter did in winning 69 of 93 games against the Pirates from 2008-12. Since the two teams met in the 2011 National League Championship Series, St. Louis has won 25 of their 37 games.

That includes a pair of losses this week in which the Brewers’ hot bats suddenly went cold and their league-best pitching staff gave up 10 runs in two games after having allowed just 29 in 12 previous games. But after salvaging the final game of the series against St. Louis on Wednesday, the Brewers get 10 games against the Pirates, Padres and Cubs — each of whom is under .500 so far.

They’ll look to build off the momentum of that victory and start another winning streak in Pittsburgh before returning home for six games against San Diego and Chicago.

The Brewers will send Yovani Gallardo to the mound Thursday for his second straight start against the Pirates. Gallardo settled for a no-decision Saturday in the team’s 3-2 victory, tossing six innings while giving up two runs on six hits. He also struck out six with a walk.

Gallardo’s career 1.89 ERA at PNC Park is his best at any ballpark in which he’s made five or more starts. A win would be his sixth in Pittsburgh, which would be his most in any city outside Milwaukee.

Ryan Braun loves the boos. Which is good, because they’re only going to get louder when the Brewers travel to National League Central cities like Pittsburgh, Chicago and St. Louis.

But as long as Braun keeps hitting the way he has this week in Philadelphia, his Milwaukee teammates may learn to embrace the boos as well.

Braun emphatically answered any questions about how a lingering thumb injury might affect his power on Tuesday, belting three home runs, including a pair of three-run blasts. It was an impressive performance that came in the middle of an even more impressive week for the Brewers, who have yet to lose a road game this season.

After all the pomp and circumstance that came along with the World Series celebration on Opening Day in Boston, the Brewers thoroughly dominated the Red Sox en route to a three-game sweep at Fenway Park. With two more wins in Philadelphia, the Brewers moved to four games above .500 for the first time since Oct. 3, 2012, when they finished the season 83-79.

Milwaukee will look for a second straight sweep on Thursday night at Citizens Bank Park, with Marco Estrada squaring off against Cliff Lee on the mound. When they return home on Friday, the Brewers will begin a stretch in which 20 of their next 23 games are against NL Central opponents, including a six-home homestand against the Pirates and Cardinals.