Brewers owner Attanasio holding all 'accountable' for poor start, especially players
MILWAUKEE -- With the Milwaukee Brewers off to their worst start in franchise history at 2-12, chairman and principal owner Mark Attanasio made clear his frustrations are with the players and not manager Ron Roenicke or general manager Doug Melvin.
"Right now, my examinations are focused on how to improve our performance on the field," Attanasio said. "Relative to me, I'm not looking at the manager or the general manager right now."
Attanasio's visit to Miller Park was his first since the first series of the season. He expressed confidence in the team's ability to compete during his Opening Day press conference, which likely makes Milwaukee's franchise-worst start to the season even more frustrating.
The Brewers entered Wednesday's game against the Cincinnati Reds having scored the second-fewest runs in the majors (41) while carrying the highest team ERA in baseball at 5.31.
"It's brutal," Attanasio said. "You turn on the TV every night and expect to see something different, and I know one of these nights we will."
The club recently picked up a club option in Roenicke's deal that leaves him under contract through the 2016 season. A source recently told FOXSports.com's Ken Rosenthal that Roenicke is making $1.3 million in 2015 with likely a similar salary for 2016.
"I know how bad we've played," Attanasio said. "But we're 14 games into the season, and Ron didn't give up two grand slams last night. I think we have to kind of parse through it. Everybody needs to be accountable, but we have to look at what people are responsible for, and then hold them accountable for what they're responsible for.
"So Ron had Mike (Fiers) pitching, and Mike was still at a point in the game with 70 pitches that he should have been pitching. He needs to execute his pitches better. Martin Maldonado took some accountability last night. I liked seeing that. He didn't throw the ball, but he received the ball and he's a guy who hit a home run last night, and he's taking accountability. That's a good thing to see."
Attanasio said he recently had a correspondence with a fan in which he disagreed with the notion the Brewers brought back the majority of their roster only based on hope, wishing for good karma in order to compete.
"That's not the case," Attanasio said. "We did a huge amount of analysis. We've got 25 players, virtually every one of them is an established major leaguer, and by my count all but five are below their career norms. Maybe six if you want to count (Francisco Rodriguez) in the bullpen, which I count. Frankie is doing fine. But you have 20 of 25 guys below their career norms. That is not what you would expect, because the sport is so analyzable and predictable.
"What makes a major-league player special is he can perform pretty much the same level year in and year out. We've got a lot of really established major-league players here, with very few newbies at this point. So this was not something built on false hope. I believe (the team) will be better."
The Brewers are 11-34 since moving to 73-58 with a 10-1 victory in San Diego on Aug. 25, 2014. They lost 22 of their final 31 games to miss the playoffs in 2014 after spending 150 consecutive days at the top of the division.
At 2-12, Milwaukee is already seven games behind the St. Louis Cardinals in the National League Central. The Brewers are 2-9 against division foes, including being swept in Pittsburgh last weekend.
"They need to demonstrate -- each of these players needs to play to his expected [level]," Attanasio said. "They don't need to do more. I think Matt Garza commented on that and some others. Players don't have to do more, they just have to do their job and do what they're good at. Last year we had one of the top pitching staffs in quality starts, and this year we have two quality starts. The starters have to step it up."
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