The Brewers’ formula this postseason has followed a similar recipe in many of their wins: hope your starter makes it two turns through the lineup, rely on your middle-inning groundball specialists, and then hand the ball off to Aaron Ashby and Trevor Megill for the final three innings. The tale of the tape in Game 1 followed this script almost to a T, Milwaukee jumping out to an early lead, Jacob Misiorowski going two turns, Abner Uribe recording a dominant four outs, and Ashby and Megill locking
down the final 2.2 innings to secure the opening game of this edition of the Fall Classic in front of a packed and frenetic Miller Park crowd, 3-2.
World Series Game 1
Milwaukee Brewers 3, Tampa Bay Rays 2
(Milwaukee leads, 1-0)
As untouchable as Misiorowski pitched during the regular season — leading MLB in ERA (1.80), FIP (2.17), strikeouts (252), and pitcher fWAR (6.6) while throwing more pitches over 100 mph (1,115) than every other starter combined to virtually guarantee NL Cy Young honors — he has looked mortal in the playoffs. During the regular season, his four-seamer induced a 40.2-percent whiff rate and held batters to a .174 average, but in the postseason the whiff rate plummets to 16.1-percent while the batting average against skyrockets to .364. The velocity is holding steady, but he’s lost life on the pitch while throwing a much higher percentage down in the zone. Fastballs that hitters had been whiffing beneath are now a fair bit easier to foul off, leading to inlfated pitch counts early and a dearth of strikeouts.
The Miz made a partial adjustment in Game 1, commanding his four-seamer belt high or above with better consistency than his starts against the Padres and Dodgers, and it allowed the Brewers’ ace to complete five innings for the first time this postseason. The strikeouts didn’t return, Misiorowski punching out just three of the 19 batters he faced, but for the most part he was able to stay out of trouble thanks to some brilliant defensive plays by his teammates.]
The traffic started early, Misiorowski giving up consecutive one-out singles in the first to Jonathan Aranda and Chandler Simpson, but he got Junior Caminero to roll over a cutter for the inning-ending double play. One of the many marks of a good team is the ability to immediately punish your opponents for failing to capitalize on a scoring opportunity, and that’s just what happened in the bottom of the first. Jackson Chourio led off with a single, and after a Jake Bauers pop out, Christian Yelich lined an 0-2 Nick Martinez cutter into the gap in right-center. Center fielder Jonny DeLuca covered a ton of ground and went fully horizontal on the diving attempt, but the ball clanged off his glove for an RBI triple.
William Contreras then ambushed the next pitch Martinez threw, another cutter that the All-Star catcher rocketed to the left side of the infield. Taylor Walls couldn’t get his glove up quite in time, and the liner ricocheted off the webbing into left field to easily plate Yelich and spot Misiorowski an early 2-0 lead. For all that has been made of the elite defense from the Rays outfielders and Walls this postseason, you just had this feeling that both those tough liners would have been caught had they been hit by Yankees batters.
Misiorowski settled down to retire the side in order in the second and third, but encountered his toughest test in the fourth. A leadoff walk from Aranda followed by a Caminero double put runners on second and third with one out. Liam Hicks then topped a weak grounder to the right side to get the run in from third and cut the deficit in half. Misiorowski refocused to get DeLuca to fly out and strand Caminero at third.
In the Miz’s final inning of work, he allowed a leadoff single to Victor Mesa Jr., who then advanced to second on a Ben Williamson grounder. The Rays right fielder bailed the Brewers out though, committing a cardinal sin by making the final out at third base on an ill-advised steal attempt that drew a pinpoint throw from Contreras.
Martinez posted the lowest strikeout rate and walk rate of any qualified starter during the regular season, but it was he instead of Misiorowski who won in the strikeout department in Game 1 with five in five innings. Martinez stranded Sal Frelick at second in the second following a single and sac bunt by striking out Chourio on a backdoor sinker. He then faced the minimum across his final three innings of work, aided by a sparkling defensive play from Mesa to atone for his blunder. Speedster David Hamilton laced a grounder down the right field line and was thinking triple immediately out of the box. However, a stumble around second paired with a perfect throw and relay from Mesa and Williamson beat Hamilton to third by half a step.
With both starters out of the game after five, Uribe was the first man out of the Brewers bullpen. Normally more of a groundball specialist than a strikeout artist, Uribe rung up three of the four batters he faced. The most important one was to finish the sixth. After Aranda reached on a one out single, the Brewers executed a textbook strike-‘em-out, throw-‘em-out double play to end the inning, Simpson going down swinging on a back-foot slider and Contreras gunning down Aranda at second for his second caught stealing of the contest.
Kevin Cash selected Steven Matz as his first reliever out of the ‘pen, and the veteran southpaw was wayward with his command, issuing three walks while recording five outs between the sixth and seventh. The final of those free passes came back to haunt him, Cooper Pratt drawing the walk to lead off the seventh and advancing to second on a Hamilton grounder. That brought sidewinding righty Kevin Kelly out of the Rays bullpen to neutralize Chourio with a runner in scoring position with two outs, but the Brewers’ young star inside-outed a first-pitch sinker just inside the bag at first and beyond Aranda’s diving attempt to plate Pratt. The score was 3-1, Milwaukee.
With this extra insurance run, you felt that the Brewers’ lead was unassailable with Ashby and Megill primed for their lanes. Ashby entered the Fall Classic with the most innings (12.1) of any postseason reliever yet had not surrendered a single run, and it was more of the same in the seventh and eighth innings. He retired all five batters he faced, three via the strikeout thanks to his deadly sinker-changeup duo.
That left it up to Megill to secure his fifth save of these playoffs, but this game had one more dose of high drama in store. Aranda and Simpson reached on a pair of one-out singles and Caminero worked a six-pitch walk after falling behind, 1-2, to load the bases with one out. Hicks appeared to ground into the game-ending double play, but replay review revealed that Pratt prematurely took his foot off the bag at second before the ball had contacted the inside of his glove. The call on the field was overturned, Caminero ruled safe at second while pinch-runner Jorge Mateo scored on the play and Simpson advanced to third.
Megill had to do it all over again, this time facing DeLuca with runners on second and third with two outs. However, Brewers fans could exhale and celebrate for a second time as he made quick work of the Rays center fielder, striking him out on a filthy knuckle curve below the zone to secure the Brewers’ first win in a World Series in 16,077 days (Game 5 in 1982) by a score of 3-2.
The Brewers will look to maintain the momentum of this narrow victory into Game 2 tonight. Rays ace Drew Rasmussen is set to face off against Logan Henderson with first pitch scheduled for 8:00 pm ET.
Box Score
