MIAMI -- All the little things added up to the roughest start of the season for Adam Conley on Tuesday night in Miami's 10-2 loss to the Brewers at Marlins Park. The left-hander, who flirted with a no-hitter at Milwaukee on April 29, saw several areas of his game that needed improvement.
The pitching line -- four earned runs allowed on seven hits in four innings -- told just part of the story. He also didn't hold runners on base, and at the plate, he couldn't advance a runner on third with less than two outs in the second inning.
"It sounds crazy, but I think I was actually better this time," Conley said, compared to his 7 2/3-inning hitless outing almost two weeks ago. "A lot of those hits were kind of just served out there, over our middle infielders' heads in front of our outfielders. None of the balls were really tattooed. At times, I think I got myself into bad counts."
From the first batter, the Brewers sent a message. Jonathan Villar singled, stole second and scored on Ryan Braun's single.
The Brewers swiped four total bases off Conley on Tuesday night.
"I don't know if they were seeing something or what," Conley said. "But I did one slide step. So they were kind of getting a jump on it. They like to be aggressive. They've got some guys who are good runners. It was just one of those days. I probably wasn't as fast to the plate as I should have been."
Marlins manager Don Mattingly said the running game will be looked at.
"They picked up something," Mattingly said. "We'll get on video [Wednesday] and see if we're seeing any changes and work through that. They, obviously, were better with him today than they were in Milwaukee, so you've got to give them credit for making that adjustment."
In previous starts, Conley has been effective working his fastball inside on right-handers. But that didn't work as well against the Brewers, so he turned more to his slider and changeup.
"My fastball on the extension side of the plate hasn't been as good the last couple of outings," Conley said. "Normally, that's a place I like to live with my fastball. I throw it a lot in there. So you just have to make adjustments if the strength of yours isn't [there]. If you're not able to do what you want to do out there, then you've got to throw the next best stuff."
"I don't think we did anything different. I think we had good at-bats," Brewers manager Craig Counsell said of his team's performance against Conley. "We put runners on base, and we put pressure on him. I thought that was the big thing."