ATLANTA — So, are the Brewers finished lighting the world on fire? Or are they just getting started?
They’ve been torching all comers for the bulk of the last two months, playing 19 games over .500 (31-12) since May 24. Impressively, they managed to shift into an even higher gear heading into the All-Star break, winning their last seven games — three of them against the mighty Dodgers — by a combined score of 40-14.
And now — the really scary part — they can let a vastly improved starting rotation take things from here. It includes towering rookie Jacob Misiorowski, an all-world talent whose face-searing fastball made him the talk of the All-Star Game. It also includes Brandon Woodruff, the longest-tenured Brewer, who last week returned to the mound for the first time since 2023 and, over two starts, allowed only three runs while striking out 18 and walking zero. Add them to ever-reliable All-Star Freddy Peralta, owner of 11 wins and a 2.66 ERA, and the Cubs’ one-game lead in the National League Central somehow looks even punier.
We know the Cubs are good. They have baseball’s best run differential — plus-119 — to prove it, a big reason they’re still the betting favorites in the division. But should they be?
Just saying, the Brew Crew might never lose again.
“We have to keep doing it,” Peralta said. “I don’t know, I can’t tell you if we’re going to lose or win, but we’re doing all the right things right now.”
And know this — whether or not the Central puts two teams into the postseason, the Brewers want that division banner.
“Winning the division is really fun,” Peralta said. “We’ve been doing it for a lot of years.”
The Cubs haven’t won a playoff game since 2017. Their only division title since then came in 2020, an accomplishment in a 60-game season that hardly holds up to scrutiny. Since 2017, the Brewers have won the division four times, made six trips to the postseason and won eight playoff games — mostly on second-year Cubs manager Craig Counsell’s watch, needless to say — but even they haven’t won a playoff series since 2018.
The Central has been in the shadows for a while. A classic two-horse sprint to the finish line could change that. The Dodgers have the biggest superstars and all the glitz. The NL East has a heavyweight slugfest between the Phillies and Mets. But both the Cubs and the Brewers (plus-81) have better run differentials than any of those teams — the top two in the league, matter of fact — which must mean World Series opportunity is in the air.
“I mean, I hope so,” Cubs All-Star Pete Crow-Armstrong said. “That’s the idea.”
The story of the Cubs for the next two weeks will be the July 31 trade deadline. How big will they shove in? How far will they go to reward an unrelentingly supportive fan base deserving of the front office’s boldest efforts?
Meanwhile, they have to keep winning. Offensively, they should remain the division’s best team — by far — no matter who else adds whom at the deadline. And though how you’re playing always matters more than whom you’re playing, the Cubs do have an easier second-half schedule than the Brewers based on opponents’ records.
“We’re going to do our best to try and stay at the top of our division,” All-Star Justin Tucker said.
And what about the Cubs’ own rotation? All-Star Matthew Boyd rejects the notion that it’s a danger area, for a couple of reasons.
One, Boyd’s second-half forecast calls for a dominant, ace-like run by fellow lefty Shota Imanaga, who missed seven weeks in May and June due to a hamstring injury.
“We missed him while he was hurt,” Boyd said, “but we’re so happy he’s back, and I think he’s even better coming back from injury than he was before.”
Two, Boyd dismisses any concerns about his own second-half availability and workload in his first full season since undergoing Tommy John surgery in 2023. Boyd didn’t pitch in the All-Star Game after blanking the Yankees for eight innings in his last start, when Counsell went to the bullpen for the ninth despite Boyd’s pitch count sitting at an ideal 85.
“I’d say there’s zero concern,” Boyd said. “And it goes for everything else. You want to pay attention, and we have lots of things we can pay attention to: pitch metrics from velocity to shape and spin; biomechanical movement, where they see how I’m moving to make sure I’m moving in the right ways; numbers that measure my grip strength every five days. We have a lot of good eyes on me. The Cubs are taking good care of me.”
