Brewers are calm before the Game 6 storm

MILWAUKEE -- The Milwaukee Brewers' plane ride back to Wisconsin on Friday night might have felt a lot like their return from Phoenix a little more than a week earlier. That feeling, though, was probably different than what most would assume. After losing two of three NL Championship Series games to the Cardinals in St. Louis, the Brewers return to Milwaukee facing elimination but remain calm, as they've been here before. Battling the Diamondbacks in the NL Division Series, Milwaukee took a 2-0 series lead into Phoenix only to squander the advantage with two bad games at Chase Field. Their trip to St. Louis went just as poorly, as they won only Game 4, but the Brewers feel even more relaxed and confident returning home now after how they performed in the face of elimination during the NLDS. "This is really the same situation," Brewers manager Ron Roenicke said Saturday. "Hopefully it's going to be two of them in a row." Roenicke's remarks made clear the difference in situations from the NLDS and now: The Brewers must fight off elimination on two straight nights. They must get a bounce back outing from slumping starting pitcher Shaun Marcum. They must score runs before the Cardinals get into their now dominant bullpen. But this is just how the Brewers have done things this season. Nothing has been easy. They built a big lead in the NL Central, only to surrender most of it before winning the NL Central. They needed until game 162 to earn home field advantage in the playoffs. They needed five games to beat Arizona in the NLDS. And now they hope to need seven to advance to the World Series. "We've done it all year, and it's certainly not the ideal script but it's worked," Roenicke said. "I think every time we're pushed we play well. Certainly we're being pushed right now. Weve got two games against a team that's playing really good." It's true Milwaukee has played well with it's back against the wall, as when a short-rested Zack Greinke pitched the Brewers to the win that sealed home field advantage. Or when Nyjer Morgan drove in a tenth-inning run to push the Brewers to the NLCS. The Brewers now need Marcum to perform with the pressure on, despite his coming off a string of bad starts that have contributed to the tight spots they've found themselves in. Marcum said Saturday he feels confident he can avoid another bad day, and clearly recognized the magnitude of his Sunday start. "This is definitely the biggest game of my career, probably all the guys in the clubhouse, too, except for the few that have won the World Series," Marcum said. "So definitely a big game, but it's baseball. It's another game. You've just got to take it at that. "We can't put too much pressure on ourselves. We've just got to go out there and play the game, play the game the right way, do what we've done all year, play every out as hard as we can and go out there, and like I said earlier, have one of the best games of the year tomorrow." Milwaukee also needs the likes of Ryan Braun and Prince Fielder to come through in the clutch as they've done so often, getting the big hits at the times the Brewers need them the most. Really, the Brewers must be firing on all cylinders Sunday to avoid making Monday the start of their offseason. It's once again fitting that the Brewers do things the hard way, though they'd certainly like to be up a game instead of down. Still, they remain unfazed by the task at hand. "Obviously it's more challenging to win two games, but at least we've been there before, we've experienced it," Braun said after Friday's loss. "We came out and played a great Game 5 in the NLDS so hopefully we can do the same thing for Game 6 and 7 at home."No 'Yo' Sunday: Roenicke said Saturday that as the Brewers try to avoid elimination Sunday, starting pitcher Yovani Gallardo would not be available out of the bullpen. "'Yo' is not an option," Roenicke said. "We have to win tomorrow and the next day. I don't know why I would bring back 'Yo' tomorrow when it would hurt us for the next day." Gallardo, who pitched Game 3 of the NLCS, is set for Game 7 should the Brewers win Sunday. It was asked more than once if he might start Game 6 on short rest, but Roenicke stuck with Marcum. "If we were even up (Sunday) I would say, 'Yeah, 'Yo' has a chance to be in our bullpen,'" Roenicke said. "Unfortunately we're not in that position."