The Brewers carried a one-run lead into the seventh inning behind six dominant frames from Logan Henderson, but the Padres finally broke through against him the third time through the order. Jackson Merrill’s two-run homer put San Diego ahead, and Milwaukee couldn’t answer against the Padres’ bullpen in a 3-2 loss.
Neither team managed to score in the first, but Milwaukee opened the scoring in the second. William Contreras, hitting sixth tonight, worked a one-out walk off Padres starter Casey
Mize before Christian Yelich, hitting seventh, squared up a first-pitch fastball for a two-run homer.
Contreras and Yelich have been mainstays in the heart of the Brewers’ lineup for years, but both have struggled recently, leading manager Pat Murphy to move them down in the order before tonight’s game.
Neither player has quite lived up to his lofty standards this season — especially Yelich, who has started to look like years of injuries may finally be catching up with him — but both are still capable of catching fire at any time. There’s a reason they’re still in the lineup every day, and if nothing else, moving them down in the order takes some pressure off while giving other hitters a chance to carry more of the offensive load. At least for one at-bat tonight, the change worked exactly as intended.
Meanwhile, Brewers starter Logan Henderson was dominant for nearly the entirety of his outing. Other than a solo home run by Ty France in the bottom of the third, Henderson shut the Padres down, allowing just two additional hits while striking out seven through six innings.
With Henderson at only 76 pitches, Murphy sent him back out for the bottom of the seventh, a decision that eventually proved costly. Although he got Manny Machado to pop up for the first out, Henderson was clearly slowing down, with his fastball barely touching 90 mph. France followed with a ground-ball single into left field, bringing the tying run to the plate.
Henderson stayed in to face Jackson Merrill, who took a strike, then a ball, before turning on an 82 mph changeup and sending it 431 feet over the center-field fence to give the Padres a 3-2 lead. In the span of two batters, Henderson had gone from being in line for the win to being in line for the loss, and San Diego wasn’t done threatening. Murphy left him in for one more batter, Luis Rengifo, whom Henderson walked on five pitches.
With Gavin Sheets coming up and still only one out, Murphy finally made the call to the bullpen, bringing in the recently activated Lyon Richardson for his first appearance as a Milwaukee Brewer. Richardson walked Sheets to put another runner on base but recovered to strike out Freddy Fermín for the second out. Sung-Mun Song then hit a hard grounder down the first-base line, but Jake Bauers made a nice play to spear it and beat Song to the bag, preventing any further damage.
The decision to send Henderson back out wasn’t unreasonable considering his pitch count and how dominant he’d been through six, but the end result was particularly frustrating for Brewers fans. Henderson had given Milwaukee six excellent innings, and with one of the better bullpens in baseball available, the Brewers had options. Instead, a start in which Henderson had shut down the Padres turned on one pitch.
Milwaukee managed to keep the deficit at one, but against the Padres’ bullpen tandem of Adrian Morejon and Mason Miller, one run is often insurmountable. Morejon faced the minimum in the eighth, allowing a ground-ball single to Jackson Chourio before getting Jake Bauers to ground into an inning-ending double play. Miller walked Contreras with two outs in the ninth, bringing Yelich to the plate with a chance to bookend the game with another big hit, but he never got the opportunity. Brandon Lockridge, pinch-running for Contreras, was thrown out trying to steal second to end the game.
On the bright side, the Brew Crew will have a chance to bounce back tomorrow in San Diego. Kyle Harrison will get the ball for Milwaukee opposite Walker Buehler. First pitch is set for 8:40 p.m.
