MIL
CINMilwaukee owns the best record in baseball; Cincinnati is running out of September to prove it belongs in the same sentence. Friday's tilt at Great American Ball Park is exactly the kind of game that decides which story is true.
Brewers -153Milwaukee's the best team in baseball right now, and Cincinnati is trying to win games without three regular infielders. That gap is real, and it's the kind of thing that shows up over 9 innings even when the final score is close. The Brewers are worth backing here even at a short price.
Shane Drohan (7-5, 3.75 ERA) gets the ball for Milwaukee against Rhett Lowder (6-8, 5.14) in a Friday evening matchup at Great American Ball Park. Drohan is coming off a win over Texas in which he worked 5 innings and allowed just 1 run on 6 hits, and multiple reports out of Milwaukee have flagged him as a pitcher who's specifically given Cincinnati trouble in past outings. Lowder, meanwhile, has quietly strung together some of his better starts of the season, including a 5-inning, 3-run outing against the Cubs his last time out.
Cincinnati's lineup has taken hits everywhere on the infield. Ke'Bryan Hayes and Spencer Steer are both on the 10-day injured list, Michael Toglia is done for the season after shoulder surgery, and Eugenio Suarez is considered day-to-day. That's a lot of everyday at-bats getting redistributed for a club trying to string together wins down the stretch, and the sportsbooks have Milwaukee as a clear favorite today to reflect it.
None of that means Milwaukee's arrived unscathed, either. The Brewers' bullpen has lost multiple arms to season-ending procedures, and the offense looked unstoppable in one game against the Cubs and unrecognizable in the next. Both rosters show up bruised in their own way — how each front office has plugged the gaps is a big part of what decides this series.
