Brewers Start the Second Half Off Right

How about a Brewers post from a game that was completed nearly 24 hours ago? I would have done this sooner, but I was subscribing to magazines...

The big story from the Brewers 9-6 win over Cincinnati last night has to be Prince Fielder. He may have only had one hit, but it was a powerful one in the form of a 3-run home run in the 3rd inning. Naturally, that should calm everyone's suspicion that his Home Run Derby victory may screw up his swing for the second half, but I'm not surprised he's already homered this soon after the contest.

Prince swung the bat the same way in the contest as he does in the games, putting his entire body into the ball going for power. Sure, he can scatter the ball across the outfield with the best of him, but it's not like the swing we saw Tuesday night was anyone new. Prince hacks like that all the time, and I think that Derby victory is going going to improve his confidence and his home run totals. Refreshing to see the home run, nonetheless.

Despite the power, I'm going to give the Player of the Game to Braden Looper. Somebody named Braden needed to have a good Thursday, because my boy Braden got kicked off Big Brother last night. Not cool. Let's just say you're lucky you got the Head of Household Ronny, because you're going down. But I digress.

Looper gets the Player of the Game with a decent performance on the hill - 5.1 IP, 3 ER, 4 K - but he really gets it for going 3-for-3 at the plate, with an RBI. Anytime you get that kind of performance from your pitcher you have to commend those efforts. I mean, Looper only had three hits the entire season up until last night, and I have no idea where that outburst came from.

Actually, everyone had a good night at the plate, with the exception of Craiggers who was the only one not to get a hit. As my good friend Shep noted, Hardy, Hart, the pitcher, and Kendall had consecutive hits at one point, which had to be the first time this season that that happened. Hardy went 2-f0r-3 with 3 RBI by the way, a strong candidate for Player of the Game as well.

Game two of the four game set is just a couple of hours away now at 6:10CT. Another different lineup tonight, with Campiece hitting in the two-hole:

2B Craig Counsell
CF Mike Cameron
LF Ryan Braun
1B Prince Fielder
3B Mat Gamel
RF Corey Hart
SS J.J. Hardy
C Jason Kendall
RHP Jeff Suppan

I-I-I just wanna know where the gold at.