Second inning sinks Brewers as Adrian Houser's struggles continue against Blue Jays
The Milwaukee Brewers finally debuted their ballyhooed "Brew Crew" City Connect uniforms on Friday night.
From there, it was all downhill.
Adrian Houser surrendered five runs on six straight hits to open the second inning and the Brewers never came close to digging out of that early hole in falling to the Toronto Blue Jays, 9-4, at American Family Field.
The right-hander was tagged for a season-high-tying nine hits in all as he continued his downward trajectory. In his last six starts, Houser has compiled a 6.34 ERA and WHIP of 1.59 while going 1-4 over that span.
"Very frustrating," is how Houser described his body of work over the last month or so.
"I’m not pitching up to my standards. I’m not pitching up to what I need to be pitching at and I’m not helping this team the way I need to be. I’m very disappointed in myself. I just need to keep working and going at it and get things turned around."
Box score: Blue Jays 9, Brewers 4
Toronto's second-inning barrage was as sudden as it was decisive.
Each of the Blue Jays' first six batters reached base via hit, with Alejandro Kirk, Teoscar Hernández and Raimel Tapia singling, Matt Chapman clearing the bases with a double, then Lourdes Gurriel Jr. doubling and Cavan Biggio singling.
The first five hits were all scorched at 98.8 mph or faster as well, with Chapman's double clocking in at 109.1.
"Just missing here and there on the fastball," Houser said. "I got the ground balls like I wanted to, but I wasn’t able to get it in like you have to do to get that weaker contact to get double plays or ground-ball outs."
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Houser finally regained his bearings enough to generate a pair of ground balls and escape the inning, but the 5-0 deficit with Alek Manoah (8.2, 2.00 ERA coming in) on the mound didn't bode well for the Brewers' chances.
And indeed, Milwaukee's offense did little against the right-hander despite having baserunners on against him in each of the first five innings.
The big opportunity came in the third when a pair of Manoah walks and a Chapman error loaded the bases with two outs. But Rowdy Tellez came up short against his former team with the bases loaded, as he grounded out to shortstop.
"He shoved it down our throats," Tellez said. "He got out of situations. He made pitches. You know, he’s a dog on the mound. I only played with him for, like, a month, but the guy comes at you. I just think I kind of let us down there by not being able to put together a good at-bat with the bases loaded with him on the ropes."
Singles by Jace Peterson and Jonathan Davis netted the Brewers their first run on Christian Yelich's groundout in the fifth.
Houser (4-8) rebounded to last six innings, allowing three singles and a walk in his 102-pitch outing. He also tied a season high by allowing five earned runs and a walk and struck out three.
"He’s battling," said manager Craig Counsell. "There’s no question he’s not where he wants to be. He gave us six innings tonight, and so that’s a positive sign from it. But when you string together a bad run of six hitters and they all do some damage, there’s going to be a crooked number on the board.
"We’ve got to avoid that to limit runs."
Toronto put the game well out of reach in the seventh when Biggio took Trevor Kelley deep for a leadoff homer and Alejandro Kirk then pulled a two-out, two-run shot just inside the foul pole in left field that made it 8-1.
Tyrone Taylor homered to open the bottom of the seventh and after a Vladimir Guerrero Jr. RBI double made it 9-2, the Brewers capped the scoring with two more runs in the bottom of the frame.
"We got on base a lot, we had traffic, but I think that was the big thing is that when we did get on base, (Manoah) limited us to soft contact," Tellez said. Manoah allowed five hits and was charged with two runs to go along with an uncharacteristic three walks and six strikeouts over 6⅔ innings.
"I just think we could have been better as a group when it comes to putting together good at-bats, and a lot of that starts with guys like me in the middle of the lineup who didn’t do our part tonight," Tellez continued.
The loss was the Brewers' first to Toronto in Milwaukee since May 24, 2017.
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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Second inning sinks Brewers as Adrian Houser's struggles continue
