Who Are These Brewers?

Things I never thought I'd see this season but happened at Miller Park tonight:

*An intentional walk to Jason Kendall (hitting .173) to get to Craig Counsell (hitting .250)

This couldn't have been most shocking. The entire crowd simultaneously scratched their
heads when this IBB was issued. I understand pitching matchups and righty vs. lefty, but
Jason Kendall can't hit the broad side of a barn these days, whereas Craig Counsell has a
hard-earned reputation as a clutch hitter. Why pass up on Kendall to get to lil CC?

*Jorge Julio having a 1-2-3, 14 pitch (10 for strikes) and one strikeout inning

There's no one who wanted Swindle sent down over Julio when Trevor Hoffman was brought
up after injury. Julio's ERA prior to tonight was 10.80 over just 5 innings. He had given up
four earned runs last week in Philly, walking three of the first five batters he faced. When he
was up in the bullpen while the Pirates' lead was just 3-1, everyone around me was worried.
Then the Brewers gave up more runs and the game seemed out of reach at 5-1. Why not
bring in Julio at that time, right? We never expected this outcome.


*Corey Hart taking not one or two, but three walks (He of the quote last October: "I'm not going to sit there and walk, though.")

*A Brewers manager risking outs on the bases by sending Corey to steal not once, but twice, with Braun at bat and less than two outs.

*Intentionally walking Prince Fielder - 0-4 on the night and hitting .225 on the season with 3 HR - to get to Cam, who was on base twice tonight, had an RBI and is hitting .313 with 5 HR on the season.

While Prince has started to heat up lately, Cam's walk/strikeout ratio is crazy lower than it's
been the rest of this career (.92 this season, compared with .38 last year and .46 for his
career) and he's striking out just once every five or so at-bats, way up from once every 3.13
ABs .
last season and once every 3.59 ABs over his career.

*Another comeback win.

After the way this season started, despite our proclivity last season for dramatic wins, I have
had little-to-no faith in this team's ability to hold teams or score our own runs. It would have
had to have been an extremely optimistic Brewer fan that felt the team could pull out the
extra-innings win in Houston after having come back a few times already.

*Jorge Julio getting the win!