After a lackluster start, the Milwaukee Brewers are quietly one of the hottest teams in the National League right now. They're tied for MLB's longest active winning streak, securing five victories in a row after defeating the Philadelphia Phillies on Friday, and are now just 5.5 games back of the first-place Chicago Cubs in the NL Central. There's still more work to be done, but the Brewers are entering a race that appeared they had no business being in just a couple of weeks ago. The play of former MVP winner Christian Yelich is a big reason why the Brewers have turned their season around.
Yelich was the NL's MVP winner in 2018 and was the runner-up for the award in 2019, but since then, he's either struggled to stay on the field, struggled to produce, or both. Last season, Yelich had a .909 OPS and was an All-Star, but only played in 73 games, none of which came after July 23. In the four seasons prior, Yelich had a .768 OPS and had some trouble staying healthy.
Yelich got off to a slow start this season, but has been healthy, and has been catching fire, conveniently as the Brewers have started to rack up wins. He had three hits, including a pair of home runs in Friday's win, driving in four runs in the 6-2 win.
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Christian Yelich gives Brewers fans MVP flashbacks with perfectly-timed hot streak
Yelich's season numbers are far from stellar. He's slashing .220/.305/.416 with 12 home runs and 28 RBI in 55 games. With that being said, just a week ago, he was hitting .184 with a .606 OPS. He's raised his average by nearly 40 points and his OPS by over 100 points in just a week of time.
During this seven-game streak, Yelich has a pair of multi-home run games, three four-RBI games, and five multi-hit games. He's been among the best hitters in the sport over the past week. Granted, a week is far from a large sample, but does Yelich not look back to Brewers fans? I mean, this is legitimately as good as he's looked in years.
It was easy to forget about Yelich since he hadn't come close to replicating his MVP production in quite some time and hadn't been able to stay healthy, but when he's producing and on the field, he still has immense upside, as we've seen over the past week. Combining his breakout with eventual onslaughts from guys like Jackson Chourio and William Contreras, who have struggled this season, and the Brewers suddenly feel like a legitimate threat to Chicago at the top of the Central division.
Again, Yelich has to prove he can sustain this for a longer period for Milwaukee to be in the NL Central conversation, but the fact that he's showing Brewers fans that he still has this left in the tank has to get them excited for what's to come as long as he can stay healthy.