MILWAUKEE — Despite his anger over the Brewers’ fade from contention, Milwaukee owner Mark Attanasio says general manager Doug Melvin will return for the 2015 season.
Milwaukee led the NL Central for 150 days but lost 24 of 34 games and was eliminated from playoff contention on Thursday.
"Frankly, I’m disappointed in the team, disappointed in the guys," Attanasio said Saturday. "They’re better than this, and they didn’t show it."
Attanasio and Melvin held a 20-minute news conference near the Brewers dugout at Miller Park to discuss the season. Melvin said the fates of manager Ron Roenicke and his coaching staff have not been decided.
"There’s a lot of euphemisms we’ve heard," Attanasio said. "We’ve heard heart. We’ve heard leadership. And we’ve heard urgency. We just didn’t get the job done. There was a job that needed to get done, and it didn’t get done."
Melvin said the team’s offence tail-off will be analyzed — the Brewers hit .229 in their first 24 September games.
"My biggest concern about the entire season is these losing streaks," Melvin said. "Why do we go 2-11 before the All-Star break? And we went 6-22 last May. … In the end, we’re going to be 81, 82 or 83 wins, which is probably going to be about six-to-seven wins away from making the playoffs."
Attanasio has owned the Brewers since 2004 but said this will be the first year he doesn’t address the team at the end of the season.
"I don’t because I’m too unhappy," he said. "What’s the point of another meeting dwelling on things?"
Instead, he said he was spending time meeting with individual players this weekend.
"I haven’t handled it well, honestly," Attanasio said. "I haven’t slept. Going into September, Doug and I were still working everything we could to get the team into the playoffs."
Milwaukee fell out of first place on Sept. 1.
"Frankly, into mid-September I believed in this team and thought they were going to turn it around," Attanasio said. "They just didn’t."
Melvin said it is too early to say whether the Brewers will make major roster changes. He doesn’t want players to feel too comfortable.
"First off, I want to find out who cares about winning and losing in the clubhouse," Melvin said. "If there’s guys in there who don’t care about winning, they probably won’t be here."
Ryan Braun, Jonathan Lucroy, Scooter Gennett, Carlos Gomez, Kyle Lohse, Wily Peralta, Matt Garza and Jonathan Broxton are among the players under contract for 2015.
Closer Francisco Rodriguez can become a free agent; third baseman Aramis Ramirez and the team have a mutual option; Milwaukee has a team option on right-hander Yovani Gallardo.
Roenicke’s contract is through 2015 with a team option for 2016. The coaches’ contracts expire on Oct. 31.
"It’s not that easy to really understand what happened," Attanasio said. "If it were we’d have a quick response today. It’s not like we’re delaying the decision because it’s uncomfortable. We’re delaying the decision because we need to do the work to really sort through what happened."
