MIAMI -- Whether the Brewers are feeling homesick or not, they found out once again Saturday that opposing ballparks aren't as friendly to them as Miller Park.

The Florida lineup put a hurt on Milwaukee, beating the Brewers, 7-2, on Saturday night at Dolphin Stadium.

The Marlins got on the Brewers early, as Doug Davis (9-8) gave up seven runs on eight hits over 3 2/3 innings. The loss was Davis' second straight after a streak of four wins in a row.

Davis got into trouble right away, giving up three runs in the first inning. After yielding an RBI double that put the Marlins up 7-1 in the fourth, Davis' night came to an end. It was his shortest outing since a three-inning effort against the Royals on June 24.

"Doug just never could get it going," Brewers manager Ned Yost said. "He struggled with his command from the very onset. He just battled from the first pitch on."

The Brewers' only runs off Marlins starter Dontrelle Willis, who allowed seven hits over seven innings, came on sacrifice flies by Kevin Mench and Jeff Cirillo in the third and sixth innings, respectively.

The loss put the Brewers 4 1/2 games behind the Reds in the National League Wild Card race. Despite the gap, there is still hope for a run, as the Cardinals and Reds -- ahead of the Brewers in the NL Central -- continue to have their woes.

"We've got an eye on the Wild Card, we've got an eye on the division," Bill Hall said. "Cincinnati and St. Louis aren't playing that good, so we've just got to get on a roll."

The loss also dropped the Brewers' record on the road to 23-41, as opposed to their home mark of 39-26. Milwaukee continues to struggle to explanation the disparity between its home and road records.

"You wonder all the time, but there should be no difference -- the game's the game," Yost said. "I don't know why we don't play as well on the road as at home. We'll have to continue to work to rectify that."

Reflecting the club's frustration, David Bell was ejected from the game in the ninth inning by home-plate umpire Greg Gibson after arguing a called third strike.

The Marlins took an early lead when Miguel Cabrera hit a two-run double in the first inning off Davis. Cody Ross added an RBI single to left, extending Florida's lead to 3-0. A sacrifice fly by Hanley Ramirez and a solo homer from Mike Jacobs gave the Marlins a 5-0 lead before Mench's sacrifice fly in the third.

Florida added two runs in the fourth inning. Jeremy Hermida scored on Ramirez's fielder's-choice groundout to shortstop, while Dan Uggla hit an RBI double that put the Marlins ahead, 7-1.

"I didn't really do my job tonight. I fell behind hitters," Davis said. "These guys are swinging the bats really well right now, so you can't [fall behind] when a team's swing the bats like this. I just couldn't really find a release point tonight, and that's why I fell behind a lot."

The outing reflected the inconsistency Davis has experienced this season. After winning four straight decisions, Saturday night marked the right-hander's second straight loss. Before his four-game winning streak, Davis had not won more than two games in a row.

"He's definitely struggled to maintain some consistency," Yost said.

The quicker he's able to erase Saturday's game from his memory the better, as far as Davis is concerned.

"It's just one of those games that you want to forget about," Davis said. "The five days before I get out there again is going to seem like two weeks. I'm just real anxious to get back out there and move on."

For the second straight night, the Brewers bullpen came in and stifled the Marlins, as Derrick Turnbow, Rick Helling and Geremi Gonzalez threw 4 1/3 innings hitless innings. But also for the second straight night, the lineup was unable to get the team back into the game.

If the Brewers hope to pick up a split of the series, they know they'll have to find a way to click on all cylinders.

"We've got to just come out and play our game," Hall said. "We've got to pitch good, hit good and play good defense. That's what it's all about. We'll just look to get out of here with a split of the series and move on to Houston."

I'm still moving up. Watch out

 MILWAUKEE -- A sweep of the Rockies capped a 5-2 homestand and rekindled the Brewers' postseason hopes. They may still be relative long shots, but after Saturday, you can't call them "sleepers" anymore.

The resurgent Brewers will be the focus of "This Week in Baseball," presented by Pepsi, a half-hour show that airs Saturdays on FOX at 11:30 a.m. CT (12:30 p.m. ET).

The TWIB crew picked a good day to equip Brewers rookie first baseman Prince Fielder with a wireless microphone, and fans will ride on Fielder's burly shoulders as he yanks a game-winning single to beat the Astros at Miller Park on Aug. 18. The Brewers' National League Rookie of the Year candidate was hitting .282 entering the weekend, with 23 home runs and 66 RBIs, second best on the team to fellow budding star Bill Hall.

"It was just luck that we had a mic on him that day," said Meredith Eckert, the show's producer. "He was so pumped up. It was a great way to end our shoot."

Fielder said later that he channeled low-key Red Sox outfielder Manny Ramirez in that at-bat. He did some neck rolls. He looked in the stands. He "pretended I was going to fall asleep."

Whatever he did, it worked.

"You always want to be in that situation," said Fielder, a rookie being asked to play a much larger role for the Carlos Lee-less Brewers. "The key for me is to know you're in that situation but not get too excited. You have to try to relax. You can't be over-tense in that situation."

The Brewers have not been the focus of "This Week in Baseball" since July 2004, when another Rookie of the Year candidate, outfielder Scott Podsednik, took fans along for a "day in the life" piece and All-Star closer Dan Kolb showed off his collection of muscle cars. They were the first Brewers featured on the show since Geoff Jenkins and Richie Sexson showed off the new Miller Park in 2001.

This time, the Brewers will be the main focus of two segments of the show, including one that "highlights the top five things you might not have known about the Brewers," Eckert said. Hall wore a microphone for the show, and he and Fielder talk about their friendship. The TWIB crew also features right-hander Tomo Ohka's annual charity tour, in which he brings 12 disadvantaged kids to the United States from his native Japan. The show will also spotlight some in-game chatter from Brewers first base coach Dave Nelson.

The Major League Baseball Productions crew happened to catch the Brew Crew on an upswing. Coming off a series win at Pittsburgh, the team split a four-game series with Houston, then swept Colorado. Entering Friday's games, the Brewers were 4 1/2 games behind the National League Central-leading Cardinals and 4 1/2 games behind the Cardinals and Reds in the NL Wild Card standings.

"It's a little bit of luck and a little bit of planning," Eckert said of catching hot teams -- the show recently profiled the Twins and Phillies. "We've been pretty lucky this year."

In the "Pepsi Pitch, Hit, and Run" segment this week, the focus is on how players new to the big leagues make adjustments, and actor Tom Hanks' ongoing tour of MLB ballparks earns him this week's spot in "Chevrolet Front Row Fans." In "How 'bout That," presented by Gatorade, the single "Oh Yeah" from The Subways will be intercut to great plays of the week.

"This Week in Baseball," one of the longest-running sports shows on television, also airs during the week on New England Sports Network, Comcast Sportsnet Chicago, Mid-Atlantic Sports Network, Comcast Sportsnet West and Channel 4 San Diego. The show is broadcast internationally in Australia, Canada, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Japan, Latin America, Middle East, Netherlands Antilles, Nicaragua, Panama, Puerto Rico and Taiwán.

  They can do it. They will beat the good rookie for the Marlins tonight.

For once someone besides the Cardinals are in first place. The Brewers are not that far behind either, they just have to win the next two series.

We have had about five storms move through our area in the last two days now with who knows how many inches of rain.

 And continue theirs,  The Brewers picked a good time to get hot, but they are not the only ones.

After sweeping the Rockies for their seventh win in the last nine games, the Brewers travel to Florida for a four-game series against a young Marlins team that has won four in a row. Right-hander Dave Bush is scheduled to start Friday's series opener for the visitors against rookie right-hander Ricky Nolasco.

Milwaukee has won or tied each of its last three series, but it has not won back-to-back series since taking two of three from the Reds and sweeping the Indians at Miller Park on June 12-18. Now the team is taking a series-by-series approach.

"We've got to go to Florida and win three out of four if we want to stay in this. Then we go to Houston and we have to take two out of three from them," said shortstop Bill Hall, who hit his team-best 28th home run in Thursday's win.

"That's our focus: Win series. We feel like we'll be right where we need to be if we keep winning series."

Bush pitched into the eighth inning in his last start and delivered a key, two-run single on the way to his third win in four decisions. It was the kind of performance typical of Bush at home, but he has struggled on the road, going 3-5 with a 5.78 ERA in 14 appearances including 13 starts.

Since the All-Star break, Nolasco is 5-2 with a 2.70 ERA. In his last start, Nolasco battled for six innings, giving up three runs on nine hits in a loss to Atlanta.

The Marlins, who were off Thursday, are coming off a three-game sweep of Washington and have won four straight overall. Miguel Cabrera belted two home runs Wednesday and became the fifth active player to reach 100 career home runs before age 24, joining Albert Pujols, Alex Rodriguez, Ken Griffey Jr. and Andruw Jones.

At 23 years and 127 days, Cabrera is the sixth-youngest player in league history to reach that mark.

"He's just a great player, no doubt about it," Marlins manager Joe Girardi said. "He's been a great hitter since he came up in 2003."

Pitching matchup
MIL: RHP Dave Bush (9-9, 4.71 ERA)
Bush has gone 3-1 with a 3.46 ERA in August.

FLA: RHP Rickey Nolasco (11-8, 4.14 ERA)
Josh Johnson (11 wins), Nolasco (11) and Scott Olsen (10) are the first trio of rookies from the same team to win 10 or more games since Joe Black, Billy Loes and Ben Wade did so for the 1952 Brooklyn Dodgers.

Player to watch
Third baseman David Bell snapped an 0-for-16 drought by going 2-for-5 in Thursday's win with two runs scored and an RBI. He wasn't the only Brewer contributing; the team collected 10 hits in the game for the first time since July 30 and scored in the double digits for the first time since July 24. Let's do it!

I'm also climbing in the submissions bracket.

 MILWAUKEE -- Tomo Ohka had the offensive game of his life, but he needed some help.

Eight different Brewers scored at least one run and six contributed an RBI, including Ohka, who batted left-handed for the first time in his career and chipped in four RBIs in Thursday's 12-6 win over the Rockies at Miller Park.

"Utter disbelief," fellow starter Chris Capuano said with a smile of Ohka's afternoon with the bat. "Actually, when he tried it in the cage he had a pretty decent swing, so I guess it's not that much of a surprise. But I don't think anybody expected that kind of production from the nine hole today."

It was not just the nine hole. Geoff Jenkins scored three runs and Prince Fielder hit a three-run home run for the balanced Brewers, who built leads of 7-0 and 8-3 before the Rockies came back to make it a two-run game.

"It got a little hairy," manager Ned Yost said.

The Brewers' improved bullpen held Colorado scoreless over the final 3 2/3 innings, and the Brewers won for the seventh time in their last nine games and finished off a sweep for the first time since winning three straight over the Indians from June 16-22. They won all three games wire-to-wire, which was not bad for a team that has allowed opponents to score first 76 times this season, tops in the Majors.

"What means [something] is that we won all three games. That really means something," Yost said. "For us to get going, we needed a sweep somewhere. Two out of three is great, but you don't really make up much ground."

That's right, the Brewers are thinking postseason as the calendar nears September. And why not? If Ohka can have a four-RBI afternoon, anything seems possible.

He entered the game a career .130 hitter with 11 RBIs in six Major League seasons with at least one at-bat. All 230 of Ohka's previous at-bats came as a right-handed hitter, but he stepped across the plate on Thursday, surprising even the manager.

"Teammates were laughing," Ohka said. "Everybody just smiled at me."

It was a good move. Ohka was credited with a bases-loaded RBI on catcher's interference in a four-run Brewers second inning, grounded a two-run single to left field in the third inning and lined an RBI single to center field in the fifth. Both hits and all four RBIs came at the expense of losing pitcher Josh Fogg (9-8).

The Rockies made it a ballgame as Todd Helton hit a two-run home run and Fogg answered Ohka's offense with an RBI double of his own. With the Brewers leading, 8-3, right fielder Brad Hawpe pounded a three-run homer that knocked Ohka out of the game after 5 1/3 innings.

All six runs were earned against Ohka, who surrendered seven hits.

"My pitching was OK," Ohka said. "I made some mistakes, but not to every hitter. I made a couple of mistakes."

Said Yost: "Tomo did fine. The [home run] pitch to Helton was the pitch we wanted him to make; it was up and in and we were trying to get [Helton] to swing and he hit it. That's a pretty good piece of hitting."

It was 8-6 when the Rockies loaded the bases against reliever Jose Capellan with one out in the seventh inning, but Capellan struck out Matt Holliday and Brian Shouse induced an inning-ending line out by Hawpe.

After the Brewers extended the lead in the bottom of the seventh inning on a pinch-hit single by Brady Clark and Fielder's three-run homer, Dan Kolb pitched a scoreless eighth inning and Rick Helling worked around a hit in the ninth to preserve Ohka's win.

"I think everybody's got confidence in our bullpen right now," Yost said. "Even though it got close, we felt like we'd be OK."

Now it's on to Florida and Houston, where the Brewers will hope to stay hot. They are 23-39 on the road this season, a major reason for the team's sub-.500 record (62-65).

"That's a big win," said Bill Hall, who put the Brewers on the board with a solo homer in the second. "We all know what happened to Kansas City last night, and we knew we had to keep pushing."

The Royals scored 10 runs in the first inning Wednesday night but ended up losing to the Indians.

"Occasionally you'll have days like today, when everybody hits the ball hard," Hall said. "Even Tomo. It's fun when it happens."

  I'm still rising, almost to 120 accepted submissions