Important Series for the Brewers/Pirates

A win is a win and a loss is a loss no matter what day you get it on, but this series carried a little more weight for the Pirates.

Your Buccos have some lofty expectations to try and live up to in the second half thanks to the incredible first half they had. It's pretty key for them to get off to a good start in the second half, especially against a division opponent. Obviously if they start slow they are still very much in the race, but it would be nice for the Pirates to win their first series out of the gates.

That's not the reason that this series is more important than the average one though.

The Brewers are five games under .500 and the trade deadline is 18 days away. The Brew crew plays three division rivals (Pirates, Cardinals, and Reds) in nine of those 18 days before the deadline, so these games will do a lot to determine what they do at the deadline. If the Brewers win all three series and find themselves in contention, there's a good chance that they'll hold on Zack Greinke and the rest of their players, and maybe even be buyers at the deadline and strengthen their club. They have the talent to compete, and making a trade could push them that much closer to the top of the division.

On the other hand, if the Brewers get beat up a little bit by the Pirates, Reds, and Cardinals, they'll be out of the race and will almost certainly be sellers at the deadline. That means Greinke is gone and the Brewers don't have much of a chance going forward. In my opinion, it's in the Brewers best interest to trade Greinke regardless, just because they probably won't be able to keep him past this year and it's important for smaller market teams to get something for their stars when they can't keep them any longer. Despite that, the Brewers have a really key couple weeks of games coming up here, and the Pirates road could be made a lot easier by Milwaukee struggling through those games.