ATLANTA -- Andrew Vaughn just keeps hitting, and the best-in-baseball Brewers just keep winning.
Vaughn, the best July addition you won’t find in any Trade Deadline roundups, homered and drove in two more runs in a 5-4 win over the Braves at Truist Park on Wednesday to finish Milwaukee’s three-game series sweep and a perfect 6-0 road trip.
Blake Perkins hit his third home run of the trip, a two-out, two-run shot in the fifth that gave the Brewers their first multi-run lead of the night, and four pitchers made it hold. They started with left-hander Jose Quintana, who earned his first quality start since the All-Star break and ended with All-Star closer Trevor Megill shrugging off a two-out solo homer in the ninth on the way to his 26th save, making the Brewers the first 70-team win in the Majors.
They reached that plateau in 114 games, faster than any team in Brewers history. The 2021 Brewers reached 70 wins in 119 games to set the old mark. The 2011 and 1982 clubs needed 121 games. The 2018 Brewers, who played to within one game of the World Series, didn’t notch regular-season victory No. 70 until their 127th game.
This year’s club did it by getting red hot on the road, winning each of the last seven road games, 12 of the previous 13, and 24 of the last 30. Wednesday’s win cemented Milwaukee’s fifth perfect road trip of at least six games in franchise history, and the first since the 2015 club did it twice before the midseason selloff that produced this current era of regular-season success.
“I don’t think they would even realize it,” manager Pat Murphy said. “I don’t think they look at it as home and away, they look at it as, ‘OK, there’s a ballgame tonight.’
“Maybe you call it unawareness. That uncommon thinking about it is bliss. It’s beautiful.”
Right in the middle of it all once again was Vaughn, who was hitting .211 for the White Sox’s Triple-A team when the Brewers traded for him in June. Now, after being called back to the big leagues just before the All-Star break, Vaughn, who reached safely three times on Wednesday in his seventh multi-RBI effort in 22 games with Milwaukee, is the biggest threat in the Brewers’ lineup.
It’s not a complete surprise; Vaughn was the third overall pick in the 2019 Draft and hit at least 15 home runs in each of his first four seasons in the Majors, but the contrast between his start this season with Chicago and his current run with the Brewers is rather stunning:
With White Sox
48 games
193 plate appearances
.189/.218/.314
5 home runs
19 RBIs
With Brewers
22 games
90 plate appearances
.377/.444/.701
7 home runs
28 RBIs
No, the Brewers did not anticipate quite this level of production, even though they liked his promise enough to acquire him. The trade was a vehicle to unload veteran starter Aaron Civale, who’d requested he be dealt rather than accept a move to the bullpen after the Brewers called up top pitching prospect Jacob Misiorowski in mid-June. With the trade, both players got a change of scenery.
Vaughn has made the most of it, insisting he’s made no wholesale changes to his swing or his approach. But he impressed Milwaukee’s trio of hitting coaches with his discipline, swinging at better than 10 percent fewer pitches outside the strike zone during his Milwaukee tenure compared to earlier this season with Chicago.
Do the Brewers believe this is sustainable?
“I do,” lead hitting coach Al LeBoeuf said when Vaughn was off to a hot start last month. “Like I tell all of them, you’re only as good as the pitches you swing at. He consistently commands the strike zone, and when he does that, he’ll square the ball up because of his bat-to-ball skills. It’s no accident this guy was the third pick in the Draft.”
But it’s not just Vaughn.
Outfielder Isaac Collins tallied three more hits on Wednesday as his NL Rookie of the Year resume gets better by the day. And Perkins, who was activated from the injured list on July 18 after a long comeback from a fractured right shin, went 3-for-5 with a pair of extra-base hits, two runs scored and two RBIs before Murphy got him off his feet in the ninth inning as a precaution.
“I just have to grind through it this year and do whatever I can to stay out there on the field so I can be a part of this,” Perkins said. “Honestly, it doesn’t feel much different than the previous couple of years. These are the same guys, the guys I know. I know what they’re capable of and I know who leads the clubhouse and it’s just business as usual. One day at a time. Win tonight. It’s the same motto.”