What in hell's name is up with the Brewers?

The Milwaukee Brewers are the hottest team in baseball, and no one can stop them. After their 4-1 win over the Pirates this afternoon, their record sits at 10-2 with a current 9 game win streak. Where did this come from? They've scored 57 runs, while just letting up 29; that's almost twice as many runs scored as allowed! To what should we attribute this hot start? Let's break it down.

Hitting

Carlos Gomez

This is a man with a plan. After last year's (supposed) coming-out party, he looked ready to build off it with additional protection in the lineup. But he looks like a completely different player. Up until the beginning of this year, he had averaged less than 14 homers per 162 games. Then again, it happened to Granderson. It happened to Ellsbury. Could Gomez be next? Through twelve games in 2014, he is on pace for (an incredibly unrealistic) 54 homers. No one has hit more than that since Ryan Howard hit 58 in 2006. While his level of production is much higher than career norms, it is not unusual for someone of his profile to make a jump like this. Even more assuring is that he is actually hitting fewer balls in the air compared to his career average. Once that number comes back up, we may see even more big flies. Watch carefully, but an early MVP candidate if he can keep it up.

Jonathan Lucroy

Another guy entering his prime with nothing to lose. 2012 was Lucroy's best year, but he only got 316 at bats that year thanks to a platoon with Martin Maldonado. When Lucroy took over the full-time role last year, everyone had high expectations. Unfortunately, his production fell across the board, and was a good (but not great, as everyone was hoping) catcher. This year he is proving everyone that believed in him throughout the 2013 season right, current posting what would be career highs in batting average, on-base, and slugging. Given his age, 28, it looks like this might also be legitimate improvement and here to stay.

Ryan Braun

Not really much surprise here. He has returned to pre-scandal form. His OBP is actually pretty low, so look for him to improve a little.

Mark Reynolds, Aramis Ramirez

HERE is where it gets interesting. At 35 years old, Aramis is well over the hump, and would theoretically be worse this year. His OPS is 26 points higher and his batting average is an amazing 94 POINTS HIGHER than his career marks. This shouldn't continue, and if it does, critics everywhere will be shouting "steroids." Reynolds is a different story. Given a normal age curve, he should be in the prime of his career (he's only 3 months older than Braun). According to previous research, though, his "type," the single-dimensional slugger first-baseman, doesn't age well. This is quite a conundrum when trying to determine whether to buy or sell this early prduction. For both of these players, age seemed to be taking its toll, but maybe they both have a little left in the tank.

Pitching

For pitching, I am going to group everyone together, because it's pretty easy to see what's going on. Pitchers are simply not letting runners on base. All five starting pitchers are putting up career lows in WHIP, and that statistic only has a year-to-year correlation of .442 (FanGraphs), meaning that only 44.2% of WHIP production is repeatable AKA skill-based. For a measure that is so closely linked to success to be highly based on random chance means that WHIP will fluctuate a great deal year-to-year. Bottom line: the Brewers' pitchers are getting lucky. It's not to say that this level of production will not continue. Only that it doesn't really mean they've all made leaps forward, and you shouldn't pick up every Brewers starting pitcher in your fantasy league.

Better Late Than Never

So I guess it's been a while, hasn't it? I really haven't had the time to come on here and write, but I'm going to give it another go, and see if I can. This post is basically going to be a catch-up on what I have been doing for the past year, since I haven't been writing, and then we'll start some actual stuff next time.

Hey look! The text here looks a little different than the rest. I've been trying to learn HTML, CSS, and JavaScript in the past couple of weeks, but I will lay off it for the sake of your eyes. So far it is going alright, but it is a little intimidating. I figured I might as well try to add another weapon to my arsenal of skills.

I also went to the PBEO Job Fair at the Baseball Winter Meetings in Orlando last December. It was an amazing experience, where I got to meet so many people that are very important in the baseball world. Through there, I got a job working for a team during spring training and for the single-A team that plays there during the regular season. I plan on going this coming December when it will be in San Diego. I will be graduating around that time, so I will be looking for a full time job (so if you have a position open, let me know!).

I have been excelling in my classes this semester, and while it is not over, I think it might be my best semester yet in terms of grades. I have enjoyed my Business Intelligence and Analytics class as much, if not more than I though I would. Through that class, I have been able to finally confirm that I want to be a data analyst for a major league team. Most of the careers that I thought I wanted to do ended up being terrible fits for me, but I have finally found the perfect one (I think).

Well that's about it for now. I will try to write every day, but we all know how hard it is to do anything every day.