Why the Phillies beat the Brewes

Well, the divisional series is over. I'm surprised neither Dave nor I posted our predictions, but just for the sake of information, I had predicted the Dodgers in 5, Phillies in 3(or 4 if Sabathia got rocked)*exact quote*, Tampa in 3, and Anaheim in 4. I'm going to try and break down each series and explain exactly why each team won. After that, I'll go ahead and put in my predictions for the championship series.

We will start off with the Phillies and Brewers. As soon as it was announced that Sheets was out, this series became a no-brainer. The Brewers starting pitching, outside of Sabathia, is abysmal. Before the acquisition of Sabathia, the Brewers ranked 7th in the NL in ERA and eighth in opponent's on-base percentage. The addition of Sabathia(and the fact that he pitched so many times in the second half) shot them up to first and fourth in those categories respectively. This obviously shows that outside of Sabathia, the Brewers are an incredibly hittable team. It certainly didn't help that in six regular season games, the Brewers lost five and gave up an average of more than five runs per game.

Using Gallardo as the starter for game 1 was not only an unnecessary risk, but one with an incredibly tipped hand. He had just returned from knee surgery and even the TBS announcers knew right away he would be on a strict 85 pitch count. Due to this, the Phillies showed more patience and had Gallardo knocked out by the fourth inning. The Brewers pen did not allow any additional runs, but the three that Gallardo allowed were all the Phillies needed to win the game.

In game 2, the inevitable happened. You simply can't pitch someone as much as the Brewers had been pitching Sabathia and expect him to come through every game. Sabathia was gassed and the Phillies attacked. These first two games really were the beginning of the end for the Crew, not only becuase they were down two games to none, but because their pen had been forced to throw eight and a third innings in the first two games.

Dave Bush had excellent stats for his home starts, so using him in game 3 was a good call. I think Sveum pulled him a bit early, however. He had only thrown 70 pitches and the bullpen then had to tack another three and third innings.

Game 4 was all about Jeff Suppan being terrible. Five runs in three innings is not what you expect out of a highly paid starter, especially in the playoffs. As much text as I just devoted to talking about the overuse of the pen in the last three games, Sveum would have been better off letting each reliever pitch two or three. The Brewers pen was actually unscored upon in the series aside from Mota in this game. Even if Suppan had pitched like a major leaguer, I think the overuse would have caught up with the Crew in game 5.

So, in four games, the Phillies outscored the Brewers 15-9, which isn't a blowout by any means but it is important to not that the Phillies pitching is what won them this series. Outside of Hamels, the Phillies look pretty weak, so this series can be viewed as a boost to their starting four. Their offense is ridiculous on paper, but the 15 runs is actually a pretty small number and may not be able to cut it against a better pitching team.

My prediction: Phillies in 3(or 4), Actual results: Phillies in 4