The Milwaukee Brewers lost their fourth straight game Saturday after Nolan Arenado’s walk-off home run gave the St. Louis Cardinals a 6-5 victory. The Brewers recent slide has dropped them below .500 on the young season. At 13-15, Milwaukee is now four games behind the first-place Chicago Cubs in the NL Central.

After the loss, manager Pat Murphy confirmed the team benched two players during the game due to poor performance, according to Brewers reporter Todd Rosiak on X. Outfielder Sal Frelick was removed for missing the cutoff man in the fourth inning and infielder Caleb Durbin got an early shower after he was picked off in the fifth.

“These are young players, and they’ve got to know there’s consequences for not playing right, or playing sloppy,” Murphy said of the benchings.

The Brewers’ sloppy play is proving costly

Apr 1, 2025; Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA; Milwaukee Brewers outfielder Sal Frelick (10) bobbles the ball as he attempts to make a play against the Kansas City Royals in the second inning at American Family Field.
Michael McLoone-Imagn Images

The Brewers have struggled with sloppiness of late as Milwaukee held a team meeting after dropping three of four games to the San Francisco Giants earlier this week. Murphy called it “The most unusually poor defensive series he’s seen in 10 years with the team,” per MLB.com’s Adam McCalvy.

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Former MVP Christian Yelich hasn’t been exempt from the Brewers' troubling start to the season. Yelich has struggled at the plate early on. While he’s shown signs of improvement of late, he’s still slashing just .227/.333/.412.

The former Gold Glove winner also committed a costly error in left field during Thursday’s series finale against San Francisco. Despite taking a 5-4 lead into the bottom of the eighth inning, the Brewers ended up losing 6-5 thanks in part to Yelich’s mistake.

After the loss to the Giants, Yelich acknowledged that Milwaukee needed to “clean it up.” But the team has continued to let sloppy play impact the game. And on Saturday mistakes in the field and on the base paths led to another disappointing loss.

Despite his error on the relay throw against the Cardinals, Frelick is off to a strong start at the plate this season. He’s slashing .303/.384/.414 and despite having just one home run in 28 games, Frelick often finds himself in the middle of the batting order. He once again batted fifth on Saturday before being benched.