A seemingly-innocuous base running play at the time proved pivotal for the Brewers in Sunday's loss

There would be no four-game sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals, a rare feat around these parts.

The Milwaukee Brewers couldn't capitalize on an early 3-0 advantage and dropped Sunday's series finale with the St. Louis Cardinals, 4-3, to snap an eight-game win streak over their redbird rivals. A win for the Brewers would have marked the third four-game sweep of St. Louis in franchise history and the first since July 2008.

Here are three takeaways from the game.

Brewers had Miles Mikolas on the ropes and didn’t put him away

As Rhys Hoskins rounded third with two outs in the first inning, it was difficult to envision the Brewers would only finish with three runs. Hoskins was 90 feet away from making it 4-0 and Cardinals starter Miles Mikolas was fully on the ropes when third base coach Jason Lane gave Hoskins the windmill.

Hoskins was thrown out at home plate by leftfielder Alec Burleson, keeping the score at 3-0 and allowing Mikolas to get out of a 42-pitch inning.

That would be the last real scoring threat the Brewers had in the game; they had only one at-bat with a runner in scoring position the rest of the way.

Mikolas settled in immediately after the first. He threw nine pitches in the second inning and five in the third. His fourth inning was relatively easy, too, at just 11 pitches.

“He’s a veteran,” Brewers manager Pat Murphy said. “I know Miles very well. He’s a veteran and we let him off the hook. Got thrown out at the plate in the first inning when he was at 40-something pitches. That could have obviously gone the other way, but a veteran like him, that’s why they paid him all that money.”

The only plausible scoring threat Milwaukee put up against Mikolas the rest of the way came thanks to a pair of two-out singles from William Contreras and Christian Yelich.

Outside of those two batters, who combined to go 4 for 7 with a walk Brewers hitters went 3 for 25 with a pair of walks for the afternoon.

“We didn’t execute,” Murphy said. “Offensively and pitching, it wasn’t a great ballgame for us.”

Revisiting the decision to send Hoskins

The Brewers’ modus operandi on the bases is to be aggressive with two outs. That’s why you will rarely see a runner held at third base on a base hit when the inning is one batter away from being over.

From that lens, the decision to send Hoskins with two outs in the first makes sense. Whether the right call or not, it’s how the Brewers typically operate. Even though it backfired Sunday, it more often than not works out.

“Two outs and a soft hit ball to left field,” Murphy said. “It took a great throw and got it on a bounce. Took a great throw.”

But does the context of the inning change that calculation? Should it?

If Hoskins, who didn’t get a great jump on the ball anyway and whose sprint speed is only in the 16th percentile in baseball, is held at third, Mikolas is forced to throw more pitches. The veteran right-hander was already over the 40-pitch mark in the first, which is generally considered to be the precipice of the danger zone for a pitcher in a single inning. Blake Perkins may not have done any more damage, but if he had gotten on base that almost certainly would have spelled the end of Mikolas’ day.

Heck, maybe Cardinals manager Oli Marmol yanks Mikolas before Perkins steps in.

“Whenever you can score a run, you do,” Murphy said when asked if the context of Mikolas’ pitch count factors into the decision at third base.

Bryse Wilson struggles with command

For the first time since entering the starting rotation on April 17, Bryse Wilson had a rough go of things.

His final line was still respectable – two runs over four innings – but there was spotty command and a parade of traffic on the basepaths on the way there. Wilson walked five and allowed five hits but was able to strand seven runners in the first three innings.

“You can’t walk five guys,” Murphy said. “You can’t walk five guys in three outings. He’s had a little hiccup here and there and then settle in. But he gave us four innings with two runs. It’s not the end of the world. He did make some big pitches in big times. But you gotta play a complete game sometimes to beat a time. They left 13 on base, so it could’ve been worse.”

Wilson had a 1.35 earned run average through his first four starts of the year.

Only 42 of his 80 pitches Sunday were strikes as he struggled to locate any of his five pitches with the exception of the sinker. Wilson had only nine called strikes, including none on 26 cutters thrown.

The poor command was due to a mechanical issue where Wilson’s lower body fires early and his upper body is left chasing. It led to a bevy of fastballs missing up and to Wilson’s arm side, as well as cutters yanked gloveside. Wilson struggled with the same problem in his last start and identified it between outings but was unable to correct it on the mound Sunday.

“I just wasn’t able to fix it today,” Wilson said. “We were able to battle and keep the team in the game. Obviously not what I wanted but it’s a simple fix. I just have to be able to make that fix in-game whether it’s hitter to hitter or inning to inning, I have to be able to fix that.”

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Rhys Hoskins' baserunning play vs. Cardinals proves to be important