SPORTS LINE
GREEN BAY PACKERS
$50,000,000 vs. $1,000,000. Wow! Love sits out while Willis carries the ball, or has others carry it for him. He rarely throws the ball, taking last week’s game back to the fifties, or even earlier. Somehow the Pack won anyway as Willis gets ready to be again applied to the gaping wound Love has left behind (as he sits on the bench). Sunday came and Malik Willis started his second straight game with the Packers. This time against his previous teammates. The Titans gave up on Malik Willis and traded him to the Packers. It may have been the most important move the Packers made after Jordan Love was injured in Week 1. Willis accounted for 275 yards of total offense and a pair of touchdowns in the Packers’ 30-14 victory over the Titans. Malik Wills throws for 202 yards and a touchdown and runs for 73 yards and another score as Green Bay improves to 2-1.
The win had to feel good for Willis who was traded by the Titans in late August to the Packers. In addition to eight sacks today, the Packers now have seven. These are the highest numbers in the NFL as of last Sunday. The Green Bay Packers might do very well to keep Love on the bench quite a bit longer. What an advantage in the league, to have two excellent quarterbacks instead of one. Now Green Bay, when Love comes back, can let their quarterback risk more by running the ball.
The Milwaukee Brewers. The Milwaukee Brewers clinched their second consecutive National League Central Division title last week. While the Oakland A’s beating the Chicago Cubs, 5-3, in the afternoon secured the title for the Brewers, their public celebration came after their ninth-inning, 2-1 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies at American Family Field. “I think this should be celebrated,” Brewers manager Pat Murphy said. “I think this is greatness for this 2024 team. They should never forget what they did. They weren’t given anything. They earned it all themselves, and I couldn’t be happier.” The Milwaukee Brewers have grown accustomed to clinching playoff berths just about every year, but this latest celebration differed from the rest because it was so unexpected. Milwaukee became the first major league team to reach the postseason Wednesday afternoon when the Chicago Cubs’ 5-3 home loss to the Oakland Athletics enabled the Brewers to wrap up the division crown.
The party began in earnest Wednesday night after Jake Bauers’ ninth-inning RBI single gave the Brewers a 2-1 victory over the Phillies. Blue-and-gold streamers fell into the American Family Field stands as the team gathered in shallow center field. That led to a champagne-soaked celebration in the locker room before players returned to the field to pose for a team picture while receiving a standing ovation from the fans who stuck around. Although the Brewers have made a habit of outperforming preseason expectations, the odds seemed stacked against them even more than usual this year. Craig Counsell, the winningest manager in Brewers history, left for the rival Cubs last offseason. Corbin Burnes, the 2021 NL Cy Young Award winner, was traded to the Baltimore Orioles. Two-time All-Star right-hander Brandon Woodruff didn’t pitch all year as he recovered from shoulder surgery and two-time NL reliever of the year Devin Williams missed the first half of the season with stress fractures in his back.
All-Star outfielder Christian Yelich and pitchers Wade Miley and Robert Gasser went down with season-ending injuries. None of it stopped Milwaukee. Milwaukee benefited from the leadership of Murphy, who had been Counsell’s bench coach since 2016. Rather than following Counsell to Chicago, Murphy stayed in Milwaukee and got his first full-time opportunity as a major league manager two weeks before his 65th birthday. The Brewers took over first place for good at the end of April and never looked back.
