Stop the 2011 Cardinals Talk

Posted by Justin Hull on Jul 25, 2012 in Brewers | 1 comment

There is nothing more annoying in sports then fans making irrational statements.  Brewers fans (in my opinion) may be the worse culprits of this.  A very passionate (since 2007 I add) fan base likes to throw their two cents about everything they can even though a good percentage of them have no idea what they are talking about.  Amidst all the chatter recently, their is one statement that stands out among everything:  “The 2011 Cardinals did it.”

Yes, the run that last years Cardinals team had was absolutely REMARKABLE!  On August 28th, they entered the day 10-games behind the Atlanta Braves in the NL Wild Card Race with 29-games left to play.  Over the final weeks of the season, the Cardinals rattled off a 21-8 record while the Braves sputtered to a 10-19 mark completing a monumental collapse.  Obviously, everyone knows how the story ends (unfortunately)…

So why not the 2012 Brewers???  TOTALLY DIFFERENT TASK!!!  I am not even going to waste my time getting into the teams/players because I don’t need to.  Here are the Wild Card standings entering play August 28th, 2011 (Note, ESPN takes into account the 2012 extra Wild Card rule, that is why there is a dash instead of 10-games back.  The math is easy).

Courtesy of ESPN.com

Notice, the Cardinals trailed only the Atlanta Braves and San Francisco Giants for the Wild Card spot.  By September 7th, the Cardinals passed the Giants for good making it a two team race…

Courtesy of ESPN.com

That brings us to 2012.  Yes, the last couple of days have created more doubters than believers amongst the Brewers faithful but lets take a look regardless.  The Brewers are 12.5 games behind Cincinnati after Tuesday, can we agree that dream is over?  However, the good thing (though it seems) is that the Brewers are only 8.5-games out of being a Wild Card team with the addition of the 2nd Wild Card.  Here are the standings:

Courtesy of ESPN.com

So they are closer than the Cardinals were with more time; hope should be alive, right!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

How Hope Sounds for the Brewers

Honestly, for Milwaukee to give a run at, lets say Atlanta, they need to erase the 8.5 game deficit.  Lets say 88-wins gets the 2nd Wild Card (I think that is fair).  Milwaukee would have to go 44-22 the rest of the way.  That is winning exactly 2 out of 3 the rest of the season.  At the same time, Atlanta would need to play no better than 34-31.  Feasible, yes.  HOWEVER, that would also mean that the Dodgers would have to go no better than 34-30 AND St. Louis would have to go no better than 36-29 AND Arizona would have to go no better than 38-27 AND the NY Mets would have to go no better than 40-25 AND Miami would have to go no better than 42-23…Yes, these are some lofty records for a few teams BUT that is EVERYTHING that needs to happen and maybe then some. And if you lower the expectations of what it will take to get the 2nd Wild Card, just flip the records around…I.E, 86-wins, Milwaukee would need to go 42-24, with Atlanta no better than 32-33 and Dodgers no better than 32-32 and so on…

St. Louis had 2-things they need to happen…1.) Catch San Francisco and 2.) Atlanta needed to collapse.  The Brewers have to outplay 6-teams.  They need 6-teams to falter.  6-TEAMS! Look at this last 9-game stretch, they take 2 out of 3 against the Pirates but still drop a game to Cincinnati.  They then took 2 of 3 from the Cardinals and gained no ground.  You can only control 1-team.  St. Louis had 3-games against the Braves in that stretch and they swept.  Milwaukee has 3-left vs the Braves, 0-left against the Dodgers, 6-left with St. Louis, 0-left against Arizona, 4-left against the Mets, and 3-left against Miami.  That means that only 16 of their final 66-games can they directly make up ground on teams ahead of them.  They need help.

Milwaukee’s situation is not similar to the Cardinals.  So stop!  When Milwaukee leap frogs 4-more teams and gets the situation similar, then compare and talk about it.  Think and research before you speak! Milwaukee needs a bigger miracle than St. Louis did last year.   As for some of the other stuff “fans” say that bother me, I will save that for another day.

Justin Hull is the host of the “Home Stretch” heard 2p-5p on 95.3 FM, WSCO Radio in Green Bay/Appleton Wisconsin.  Follow him on twitter (@jh1570) or facebook.