Carlos Gomez's Injury Pushes Brewers Closer to the Edge of a Lost Season

The potential exists.

The Milwaukee Brewers proved as much last season when they spent 133 days at the top of the National League Central standings, finally relinquishing their hold on Aug. 31. When you ride the wave that long, it is not a fluke.

That is why many figured the Brewers to be NL Central contenders again this season, despite uncertainties in their rotation and with their superstar right fielder, Ryan Braun. But through nine games this year, the Brewers are looking a lot like the team that finished last season 9-22; they've lost seven while being outscored 48-23 so far in 2015.

MLB.com's Adam McCalvy illustrated the ineptitude thus far:

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#Brewers have lost each of first 3 series of the season for first time since '09. A rain shortened split at Wrigley saved 'em in '13.

— Adam McCalvy (@AdamMcCalvy) April 16, 2015"

And now one of the league’s best all-around players, center fielder Carlos Gomez, has hit the disabled list with a bum hamstring. Plop that on top of these facts: Braun has already missed a little time with a ribcage injury and has a .545 OPS. Jonathan Lucroy, third in the NL last season in FanGraphs WAR (6.2), is 4-for-30 without an RBI.

Now you can start to see the Brewers have some serious offensive issues, and that was with Gomez healthy.

They also have been a mess with runners in scoring position lately, going 5-for-27 in their series against the St. Louis Cardinals that ended with a 4-0 loss Thursday. They left 23 men on base in the three games, and for the season they are 14-for-64 (.219) with runners in scoring position. Six times this season, the offense has scored two or fewer runs.

Furthermore, the Brewers are a home run-reliant offense, but through nine games they are last in the majors with three. Neither Braun nor Lucroy has one.

Jeff Roberson/Associated Press

“We've got a lot of guys with a track record here, guys who can hit,” Lucroy told reporters Thursday. “Sooner or later we need to figure it out. We need to start doing it soon, stop playing around.”

They will have to do it without Gomez, who suffered a slight tear in his right hamstring while running the bases Wednesday night. He will be re-evaluated next week to determine if he will require more than 15 days on the DL before returning.

The loss is a huge gash to an already pummeled club. Gomez is one of the best defensive center fielders in baseball, and his 5.7 FanGraphs WAR ranked fifth in the NL last season. He hit 23 home runs, scored 95 times and had a .368 weighted on-base average, which was tied for 10th best in the league. His 34 stolen bases were good for fourth.

He did all of that from the leadoff spot, and as a base stealer and center fielder, much of his game depends on his legs being healthy.

“When you talk about a leadoff guy who can do what he can do, and in center field, it's concerning,” manager Ron Roenicke told reporters. “We know offensively we need to get things going, and we're losing a guy who has a chance to do a ton for you.”

The Brewers have been awfully prone to falling into huge swoons lately. During a 12-game stretch last June in which they went 1-11, the offense hit .202/.257/.320 with a .578 OPS and scored 33 runs—a 2.75 per-game average.

They remained in first place through that, but it was their slump that started at the end of August that did them in last season. Over a 19-game stretch in which they went 3-16 and went from a 1.5-game lead in the division to a six-game deficit, the Brewers hit .257/.324/.368 with a .692 OPS and scored 59 runs—a 3.1 per-game average.

While the offense wasn’t completely putrid during that time, the pitching certainly was. The Brewers had a 5.68 ERA in those 19 games.

Tom Lynn/Associated Press

The staff has not fared any better through the first nine games this season. While the offense struggles, so does the rotation, to the tune of a league-worst 5.40 ERA and second-worst 1.52 WHIP. And now it does not have Gomez running down balls in center.

The Brewers were one of the best offensive teams in either spring training league during March, hitting an MLB-best .295—once again reinforcing the idea that spring stats do not carry over into the regular season.

“I think about spring training when we were swinging it and everybody was doing well,” Lucroy told reporters. “How do you go from there to here?”

More importantly, how do the Brewers fix it before they free-fall into NL Central irrelevancy? Probably not with Gomez on the DL, which will be for at least another couple of weeks as the Brewers continue playing within the division for the next 16 games.

If things don’t turn around in those two-plus weeks, the Brewers might be out of contention by the time Gomez returns.

All quotes, unless otherwise specified, have been acquired firsthand by Anthony Witrado. Follow Anthony on Twitter @awitrado and talk baseball here.