Dodgers vs. Brewers Game 2: Less craziness, please

The first game of the Dodgers Brewers series had things never seen before. What does Game 2 have in store?

Summarized by AI ⓘ

What is the story about?

Well, if all of the rest of the postseason games are going to be as stressful as Game 1 was, I might not survive.

The Dodgers deserved to win that game, but it still felt like the Brewers were going to take it at the end. But, they somehow retained the win from the grasp of defeat.

But a win it was, so now the teams move on to Game 2, while taking some positives from Game 1.

The Dodgers forced the Brewers to use six pitchers. They knew going in that they were facing at least two, with the opener and

bulk guy. But even though they only managed to score two runs, (thank you weirdo baseball play), they got to see four more pitchers including their set-up guy and closer. Trevor Megill faced four batters, and Abner Uribe faced seven, throwing 24 pitches. He had three walks, including allowing the go-ahead run. Uribe had also pitched two innings in the final clinching Game 5 against the Chicago Cubs on Saturday. One could wonder if he would be available for use in Game 2.

The Brewers will be sending Freddy Peralta to the mound Tuesday night. Peralta pitched twice in that Cubs series, allowing 5 earned runs in 9.2 innings of work. He also allowed three homers. This is notable because the Dodgers are a homerun hitting team, and another Freddie seems to be heating up at the right time.

Freddie Freeman hit his first homer of the postseason Monday night and followed that up with a ringing double. That ended the longest RBI drought in a single postseason in his career. That was also Freddie’s 10th postseason go-ahead homer, tying him with Jose Altuve, although all of Freddie’s were unassisted. This series is obviously just what Freddie needed, as he is 6-for-18 with four extra-base hits and a 1.232 OPS in five career postseason games against the Brew Crew.

Shohei Ohtani is the other big bat that has yet to get going this postseason. Part of it is the fact he has to focus on pitching, and part of it is he’s getting walked a bunch, and part of it is the Phillies lefties just pitched him perfectly. However, he looked better at the plate in Monday’s game. He didn’t have a hit, but he scalded a pitch that just happened to be where the first baseman was positioned. He worked a walk in his first at bat, not chasing pitches. The Brewers only have one lefty with a low arm angle, and Shohei should start rounding back into form in this series.

As a team, most of the at bats looked a lot better. Max Muncy almost had a grand slam, and the Dodgers as a team had plenty of guys on the bases. The bats will start breaking through soon.

Yoshinobu Yamamoto will head to the hill for the Dodgers, looking to turn his postseason around. Yamamoto is the only Dodger pitcher who has not recorded a quality start. He also did not fare well the last time he faced the Brewers earlier this season, allowing five runs, three unearned, in two-thirds of an inning, which was the shortest outing of his MLB career.

Hopefully he took lots of notes from Blake Snell, who just carved up the Brewers. Yamamoto will be just the second righty starter the Brewers have faced this postseason. And since they lit him up in their last outing against him, they will be confident going into this game.

This may be a game where the Dodgers need to out-slug the Brewers if they’re going to win. They need to get to Peralta and force more pitchers to be used as they did last night. As the first game was so crazy, I’m expecting that anything could happen tonight. RIP my nerves.