The Brewers accomplished something more rare than a perfect game
On Thursday night at Miller Park, the Milwaukee Brewers assaulted the Atlanta Braves with a barrage of hits and runs. In nine innings, they racked up 14 hits and 11 runs, which includes two doubles, a triple, and three home runs. For Milwaukee’s struggling offense, that’s a pretty excellent showing.
But that’s not why last night’s Brewers victory was so special. For just the 16th time in MLB history, a team scored in every single inning it batted. For comparison, there are 23 official perfect games in MLB history. So what the Brewers did on Thursday was rarer than the much-celebrated perfect game. The last team to score in every inning it batted? The Tigers on August 2, 2014.
Despite all those runs, this wasn’t an easy feat. In the second inning, their lone run scored when Manny Pina was caught stealing. They only reason they scored in the fifth was due to a bad pickoff attempt that allowed Orlando Arcia to make it to second. Arcia then ran home when Scooter Gennett hit a pop-up to shallow left field that Braves third baseman Adonis Garcia couldn’t handle. The ball deflected off his glove, and Jeff Francoeur grabbed it to nail Gennett at second and end the inning.
There was also a close call in the eighth inning, when Jonathan Villar was on first with two outs. Orlando Arcia came to the plate, and he had to either walk or get a hit (or get hit himself) to extend the inning and give the Brewers a chance to score. Arcia saw three pitches: a called strike, a ball, and the third one? That one was a hit. He lined to center, and when Ender Inciarte dove to catch it, the ball bounced way up and away from him. Villar scored from first, and Arcia parked himself at third for an RBI triple.
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Even though scoring in every inning is rarer than a perfect game, no one on the team really knew it was special (or even happening) until the whole thing was almost over. From the Wisconsin State Journal:
Just before the start of the ninth inning, Braves first base coach Eddie Perez made Chris Carter aware that Milwaukee had accomplished a rare feat. (…)
“I then looked up (at the scoreboard) and was like, ‘Oh yeah, we did score in every inning,'” Carter said. “I didn’t even notice that. That’s pretty cool. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that.”
It was probably better that way, so there was no pressure on anyone to get it done. When these Brewers tell the story of how they were the first team in franchise history to score in every inning they batted, they can say it happened without even trying.
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Liz Roscher is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email her at lizroscher@yahoo.com or follow her on twitter! Follow @lizroscher
