Milwaukee’s 103-win regular season has carried into October, and now the Brewers are back in the National League Championship Series with a chance to change a much bigger piece of franchise history. Their 3-1 Game 4 win over San Diego at Petco Park on Wednesday ended a long postseason road drought and set up another October meeting with the Dodgers.
The Brewers will open the NLCS on Sunday at American Family Field. Los Angeles wrapped up its Division Series against Atlanta in four games earlier Wednesday, putting the familiar clubs back together with a pennant at stake.
Quick facts
- Milwaukee beat the Padres, 3-1, in Game 4 to win the NLDS.
- The Brewers reached the NLCS for a second consecutive season and the fifth time in club history.
- Game 1 against the Dodgers is Sunday at American Family Field.
- Jacob Misiorowski is lined up to start the opener for Milwaukee.
- Garrett Mitchell had an RBI single and a key leadoff triple in San Diego.
- Jackson Chourio set the Brewers’ career postseason RBI record with his 17th.
This will be Milwaukee’s third straight League Championship Series matchup with Los Angeles. The Brewers had not won a postseason game away from home since Game 3 of the 2018 NLCS at Dodger Stadium, a 12-game skid that matched the longest road losing streak in postseason history.
There was a bit of symmetry in how that streak ended. Walker Buehler, the Dodgers starter whom Milwaukee beat in that 2018 road victory, was on the mound for San Diego on Wednesday night.
Milwaukee made Buehler’s outing the backdrop rather than the story. Robert Gasser, once a Padres prospect before arriving in the 2022 Josh Hader trade, gave the Brewers four strong innings and left with a 2-1 lead. Gasser had spent much of the previous two seasons recovering from Tommy John surgery and did not make Milwaukee’s Opening Day roster.
Mitchell supplied the early push after a difficult opening to the series. He entered the night 2-for-11 with six strikeouts, then drove in a run with a third-inning single. His triple to begin the fifth put the Brewers in position to take the lead for good.
Chourio followed with the decisive contact, shooting a one-out single through San Diego’s pulled-in infield. The RBI gave the 22-year-old 17 in his postseason career, moving him past Ryan Braun for the Milwaukee record.
It also tied Andruw Jones for the most postseason RBIs by a Major Leaguer before his 23rd birthday. Chourio accounted for six of Milwaukee’s first 12 runs in the Division Series.
Sal Frelick added breathing room in the sixth with a sacrifice fly, and the bullpen took it from there. Aaron Ashby worked three no-hit innings after Gasser, carrying a family connection into the outing: his uncle, Andy Ashby, spent eight seasons with the Padres and made two All-Star teams.
Abner Uribe then handled the heart of San Diego’s order while making his fourth appearance in five days. The right-hander escaped a dangerous eighth when Mitchell raced to the short wall in center field to take away what could have been a game-tying two-run homer from Manny Machado.
Brice Turang made a difficult catch in foul territory to finish that inning, leaving Trevor Megill to close it out. Megill earned his second save of the series while Misiorowski, the NL Cy Young Award favorite, prepared in the bullpen in case the Brewers needed one more arm.
They did not. Misiorowski can instead take the ball for Game 1 against the Dodgers, with Milwaukee again one series from the World Series.
The Brewers remain among five active franchises without a championship, alongside the Mariners, Padres, Rays and Rockies. They have cleared one October obstacle that had followed them for years; the next one arrives Sunday in Milwaukee.
