MILWAUKEE – The Brewers have gone into postseasons as underdogs and as favorites. They have been hot and cold, home and away, with a multitude of stars or a collection of undersized hitters and unheralded out-getters. And yet no matter the circumstances, the venue or their talent on paper, the result of each of their last five forays into October since 2019 had been, maddeningly, the same: One and done.
This year, the Brewers are moving on.
William Contreras and Andrew Vaughn each hit go-ahead solo home runs and Brice Turang shrugged off a miserable series to mash a huge insurance shot while five Brewers pitchers cobbled their way to 27 outs and a 3-1 win over the Cubs in winner-take-all Game 5 of the National League Division Series at American Family Field on Saturday. It snapped Milwaukee’s streak of six consecutive postseason series losses and sent the Brewers onward to the NLCS against the star-studded Dodgers.
NLCS Game 1 is Monday at American Family Field.
“I’m really just happy for the guys. They’re just a great group,” manager Pat Murphy said. “A lot of people didn’t believe in them early on and they just continue to stay relentless. I’m very, very lucky to be around these people. …
“They stayed with it. They’re a bunch of guys that never quit and you can call them the average joes, but I say they’re the above average joes.”
First, the Brewers savored one of the sweetest victories in franchise history. It not only gave them bragging rights over Craig Counsell and the rival Cubs, not only snapped a postseason hex that began with a loss to the Dodgers in Game 7 of the 2018 NLCS when Counsell was Milwaukee’s hometown manager, but it provided a satisfying end to a best-of-five series that had grown exceedingly tense.
The Brewers had taken control of the first postseason matchup between these Interstate 94 rivals with early-inning scoring barrages in Games 1 and 2 in Milwaukee, lost control of the series while dropping Games 3 and 4 at Wrigley Field, then returned home to settle things in front of a charged-up crowd of 42,743 fans.
“This place is awesome,” Vaughn said. “Crowd’s been electric. Just listen to this. Unbelievable. We did it for these guys, we did it for the boys. It was special.”
They are in the midst of the greatest stretch of regular-season success in franchise history, but what was it worth without success in October? That was the narrative, at least — no matter how hard Murphy pushed against it.
Now, they have a taste of October success. They want more.
“It’s been a while. We had to get over that hurdle,” Christian Yelich said. “We’ve had some great teams. We just weren’t able to get over that hump in the DS or the Wild Card. So I’m really proud of these guys for staying tough, persevering. We’re going up against a great Dodgers team, so we have to do more of the same.”
Once again, the first inning set the tone. Trevor Megill, the Brewers’ All-Star closer who missed a month down the stretch but returned in time to fill whatever role was asked of him, made the start as an opener and became the first Milwaukee pitcher to keep Cubs hitters in the ballpark in the first inning.
Contreras homered with two outs in the bottom half of the first, making this the first series of at least five games in postseason history to feature a first-inning home run in each game, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. And while Seiya Suzuki answered for the Cubs as the very first batter to face Brewers rookie Jacob Misiorowski, the 23-year-old flamethrower settled in and sent the Brewers toward a victory the same way they won so many games during the regular season: With run-prevention.
Misiorowski delivered 12 outs on 54 pitches, followed by hard-worked left-hander Aaron Ashby for one out, rookie righty Chad Patrick for five and Abner Uribe for the first multi-inning save of his career.
