Sunday night brings the National League Championship Series back to the doorstep both clubs have been walking toward for months: the 103-win Brewers, baseball’s top regular-season team, against the Dodgers, champions of the past two World Series and still chasing another October crown.
It is also a return engagement from last year’s NLCS, when Los Angeles swept Milwaukee in four games. The Brewers get home-field advantage again, a far deeper club than the one that ran into the Dodgers a year ago, and a chance to erase a postseason memory that has lingered through an outstanding season.
Game 1 is scheduled for Sunday at 8 p.m. ET, 7 p.m. CT and 5 p.m. PT, with FOX, FOX Deportes and FOX One carrying the broadcast.
A Game 1 built around power arms
The opening pitching assignment has the feel of an All-Star showcase. Tarik Skubal gets the ball for Los Angeles against Milwaukee’s Jacob Misiorowski, putting two of the sport’s most intimidating arms under the lights at the start of the series.
Skubal, the reigning two-time American League Cy Young Award winner, enters with a 1.97 ERA across seven career postseason starts. He was sharp in the Division Series against Atlanta, giving the Dodgers exactly the kind of October presence they expected when they handed him this Game 1 assignment.
Misiorowski has been even better during the regular season and is positioned as a leading National League Cy Young candidate. His velocity has become one of the game’s most remarkable sights, the sort of overpowering stuff that changes an at-bat before the hitter settles into the box.
Yoshinobu Yamamoto remains a major October piece for the Dodgers after his World Series MVP performance and past postseason work, but the Game 1 matchup belongs to Skubal and Misiorowski. Neither lineup will get much room to breathe if either starter establishes his fastball early.
Ohtani remains the Dodgers’ central question
The Dodgers have arrived at this round in far better health than they were for much of the second half, but Shohei Ohtani remains the concern. Injuries disrupted his stretch run, and the club eventually stopped using him as a pitcher while attempting to give him as much rest as possible.
His bat has not yet looked like itself in October. Ohtani went 2-for-13 against the Braves in the NLDS, without an extra-base hit, and struck out four times. Manager Dave Roberts moved him down to fifth in the batting order, his first time in that slot since joining the Dodgers.
That makes his October track record against Milwaukee all the more notable. Last postseason, Ohtani produced three home runs against the Brewers and struck out 10 hitters on the mound, becoming the first player in Major League history to reach both marks in the same postseason series.
Los Angeles has won without a fully healthy Ohtani before, and its roster is built to withstand difficult stretches. Still, a third straight championship run becomes far more manageable if the player at the center of the lineup starts driving the baseball again.
Milwaukee has a different chance this time
Last year’s series was a hard landing for a Milwaukee club that had won 95 games and opened the postseason with momentum and home field. The Dodgers beat the Brewers 15-4 on the scoreboard over the four-game sweep, while Milwaukee managed a .384 OPS.
This Brewers group has more answers. Misiorowski now leads a rotation with a legitimate frontline force. The lineup and bench carry more depth, the defense is sturdy, and the club has shown flexibility in close games. Jackson Chourio has continued to make himself a dangerous October presence, and Milwaukee is coming off a string of wins that demanded late-game nerve.
The franchise has not reached the World Series since 1982, when the club was still in the American League and lost a seven-game matchup with the Cardinals. It has never won the title it has spent decades chasing.
The Dodgers remain the obstacle Milwaukee knows too well. Los Angeles has eliminated the Brewers three times over the last eight seasons, including last year’s sweep, and arrives as a club accustomed to playing deep into October. But Milwaukee’s 103-win season has earned it this stage, and Game 1 offers an immediate chance to show that this version of the Brewers is ready to turn old frustration into a different ending.
