Brewers erase four-run deficit, take 2-0 World Series lead

The 2026 Milwaukee Brewers might have to borrow a 40-year-old slogan from the Goonies: “Never Say Die.“

Tonight, the Brewers were facing Drew Rasmussen, the Tampa Bay ace and the best starting pitcher of the postseason so far. Logan Henderson, who hasn’t been at his best this postseason, suffered through a disastrous first inning. But if there was one thing that the Brewers proved against the Dodgers in the National League Championship Series, it was that no lead is safe, and this remarkable team will not ever give up. In the parlance of one of the Brewer standouts this evening, the Brewers dragged Rasmussen. The ground out at-bats. They chipped away. Peck, peck, peck. And before it was over, Milwaukee had a couple of new offensive heroes, another huge comeback win, and a 2-0 series lead.

But before all that, it was a nightmare start for the Brewers.

The first batter of the game, Yandy Díaz, worked for seven pitches. The last one, a changeup way below the zone, was hit weakly to shortstop. Cooper Pratt fielded it but rushed the throw, which got by Jake Bauers and into the dugout, putting Díaz at second base. An ominous omen.

Henderson recovered momentarily and struck out Jonathan Aranda for the first out. But Chandler Simpson did Chandler Simpson things, knocking an RBI single into center field, after which he stole second and then scored when Junior Caminero followed with another RBI single. The Rays weren’t finished, though: Liam Hicks got an 0-1 cutter right down the middle and hit it out to right center, the first homer of the series, which made it 4-0 Rays with only one out on the board.

Henderson did retire the next two, but the Brewers would have to dig themselves out of a deep hole on this night. Fortunately, they’re a team that has proved time and time again that they’re a team that brought their shovels to the postseason. They got to work on Rasmussen immediately in the bottom of the first: Jackson Chourio singled, moved to third on a single by Bauers, and then scored when, after a Christian Yelich strikeout, William Contreras came through as he has so many times over the past month with an RBI single through the right side of the infield.

Brice Turang hit into a hard-luck second out when he hit a 109 mph line drive right at Richie Palacios. But Garrett Mitchell kept the pressure on the Rays, and hit a 112 mph single into right that scored Bauers. Pratt struck out to end the inning, but Milwaukee had immediately halved the Rays lead.

A leadoff walk to Victor Mesa Jr. in the second had Henderson on the precipice, but he showed some fight; Taylor Walls bunted, Mesa Jr. over to second but made the first out, and Henderson struck out Díaz and Aranda to get through the inning unscathed. Rasmussen was on his way to a quick inning in the bottom of the second, but Chourio took a hammer to his pitch count when, with two outs, he battled for 11 pitches before hitting a 105 mph groundout. It was a 1-2-3 inning for the Tampa Bay ace, but he had to work hard for it.

Henderson got one more inning and made the most of it, retiring Simpson, Caminero, and Hicks in order. The Brewers were unable to score in the bottom of the inning despite Contreras’s second hit of the game (which pushed his batting average in the postseason over .400). In the top of the fourth, JoJo Romero replaced Henderson and worked around a one-out single to put up another zero.

The Brewers were back on Rasmussen in the bottom of the fourth. With one out, Pratt drew a walk, and two pitches later, Sal Frelick lined a solid single into right, putting runners on the corners. David Hamilton, in a possible squeeze situation, eschewed the bunt and swung away, ultimately hitting what should’ve been a routine grounder to first. But Aranda, possibly with an eye on trying to get Pratt at home, booted it, and everyone was safe. The lead was down to one.

The Rays worked out of the inning, but after a Chourio groundout, Rasmussen walked Bauers, which ended his evening. He was replaced by the Rays’ best lefty, Cam Booser, who faced Yelich; another manager may have gone to Andrew Vaughn as a pinch-hitter with the bases full and two out, but Pat Murphy rode with Yelich, who anticlimactically grounded out to second.

The Brewer pitcher in the fifth was Dustin May. With one out, Aranda lined a double into the right-field corner, but May was able to work out of it—Aranda moved to third on a Simpson groundout, but a Pratt made an assured play on a slow Caminero chopper to end the inning and strand the Ray first baseman at third.

Booser worked through the middle of the Brewers’ order in the bottom of the fifth, allowing only a walk to Turang. DL Hall replaced May in the sixth and put himself in a hole when he hit the leadoff batter, Hicks, on the right forearm. He moved over on a sacrifice by Palacios, but Hall got the second out on a strikeout of Johnny DeLuca. Mesa Jr., though, came through with a two-out single to left, but Rays third base coach Brady Williams got extremely aggressive by sending his leadfooted catcher on a single to shallow left; Chourio’s throw was on target, and Hicks was toast at home plate.

The Brewers seized the momentum from getting the final out at home. With lefty Ian Seymor on to face the bottom of the Brewer order, Frelick, of all people, battled for nine pitches, and on the last one he took a 93 mph fastball right over the heart of the plate and hit it out to center field. Tie ballgame.

Milwaukee kept making Seymour work hard. Hamilton fell into a 1-2 count but hit seven foul balls before striking out. Chourio saw eight pitches before he struck out. With two outs, Bauers worked a walk. Yelich, against another lefty, hit a pop-up to shallow left, but it was sort of in no-man’s land between Walls, the shortstop, and Simpson, the left fielder. Some indecision about whose ball it was led to Simpson fielding it awkwardly; he had it in his glove, but he fell down while making the catch and when the glove hit the ground, the ball popped out. Bauers made it to third, while Yelich had a “single.”

With runners on the corners and two out, the Rays needed to pull Seymour, who had thrown 34 pitches and not recored an out. Kevin Cash went to righty Tyler Wells to face Contreras, who was definitely the batter the Brewers wanted up in this situation. The move to Wells worked, though; Contreras grounded out to third to end the inning. Still, for the second time in three games, the Brewers had erased an early 4-0 deficit by the end of the sixth inning.

With the game tied, the Brewers pivoted firmly toward their “A” bullpen, as Abner Uribe entered the game in place of Hall, facing Walls and then, for the second time in two days, the top of the Tampa Bay order. Troublingly, Uribe walked Walls, the worst hitter on the Rays’ roster, to set up the top of the order. Uribe got ahead of Díaz, and the Tampa Bay DH fouled off a bunch of pitches to stay alive, but Uribe finally got him with a slider for the first out. Aranda, who singled off of Uribe on Friday night, grounded out to second, but not until after Walls had stolen second base. With Walls at third and two out, Simpson was up, but he grounded out to first and Uribe’s bad leadoff walk didn’t come back on him.

With Wells still pitching, Turang got a rare at-bat against a right-handed reliever, and smoked the second pitch to the warning track in the right-field gap for a double. Mitchell also hit a ball deep to right but Mesa Jr. made a leaping catch in front of the wall; Turang was able to move to third, though, so it was a productive out. Cash went back to his bullpen and replaced Wells with another righty, Kevin Kelly, with Pratt at the plate.

Pratt delivered with the biggest hit of his young career. A base hit into right scored Turang from third, and the Brewers had flipped a 4-0 deficit into a 5-4 lead.

With Frelick back at the plate, Pratt stole second base, and the Brewers had another runner in scoring position with less than two outs. Frelick very nearly went yard again—he got into one, and the whole ballpark (and your humble scribe) thought he’d gotten his second of the game. But it held up on the warning track and Mesa Jr. made the catch for the second out. Hamilton grounded out, and Pratt was stranded, but not before he’d given the Brewers a late lead.

The Brewers now had a path to the end of the game in which they could avoid facing the top of the Rays order again. With the right-handed Caminero at the plate, Uribe stayed in the game with Aaron Ashby ready in the bullpen. Uribe got Caminero to chase a couple sliders that were way out of the zone, and on the fifth of five straight sliders from the Brewer righty, Caminero rolled over it harmlessly to shortstop for the first out. Ashby then replaced Uribe, and Cash countered by pinch-hitting Ryan Vilade for Hicks, and Ashby struck him out on a 3-2 changeup. Palacios hit a harmless grounder to second, which Turang flipped over to Bauers for the third out. Ashby was up to 14 2/3 scoreless innings this postseason.

With Kelly still pitching, Chourio led off the eighth with a single to center. Bauers flew out to the fringe of the warning track in left, but with Yelich up Chourio stole second base. Yelich drew a walk, and Contreras came to the plate to face Kelly, who was certainly on his last hitter. With Contreras at the plate, the Brewers executed a double steal, putting runners at second and third with one out. Contreras chased a 3-2 pitch and hit a grounder to shortstop, and Chourio was thrown out at home. The Brewers challenged, and it was very, very close, but for the second straight night, a very close, late-inning review on a run-scoring play went the Rays’ way as the play stood. Kelly was replaced by lefty Steven Matz, and with two outs and runners on the corners, Turang battled and made decent contact but flew out down the left-field line to end the inning.

Ashby had only thrown nine pitches to get his two outs in the eighth, so the Brewers rolled him back out there with a one-run lead in the ninth, with the bottom of the order due up. But maybe the long bottom of the eighth was a detriment; DeLuca lined a double down the right-field line to start the inning, and the Rays let the Brewers know: it’s not going to be that easy.

Trevor Megill warmed in the bullpen as Ashby faced Mesa Jr., but Ashby got back into the inning by striking him out on four pitches. The Rays sent pinch-hitter Ben Williamson to the plate in place of Walls, and he rolled a ball out to Turang. DeLuca advanced to third, but there were two out. Here’s where Murphy had a choice to make: did he stick with Ashby, or did he bring on Megill to face the right-handed Yandy Díaz, who led the majors in batting average with runners in scoring position this year.

Murphy stuck with Ashby. Ashby fell behind 3-1. He worked it back full. On 3-2, Ashby put a curveball in the dirt. Díaz tried to check his swing, but first-base umpire James Hoye said he went around. It was close, but it was a just mirror of a non-call on Caminero’s check swing in the ninth inning on Friday night. The game was over, and Ashby, by working out of trouble, added to his postseason legend.

This team’s resiliency has been a trait all season, but now their ability to bounce back, their unwillingness to give in, their “never say die” attitude, has become their defining characteristic. Two games ago, the Brewers fell behind 4-0 to the Dodgers after Shohei Ohtani’s three-run homer. It took them three innings to erase the deficit and a fourth to take the lead. Tonight, they fell behind 4-0, and it took them a whole six innings to erase the Rays’ lead and seven to take the lead. How lazy of them.

The Brewers got offensive contributions up and down the roster; every batter in the lineup got at least one hit except for Hamilton, who reached on a run-scoring error and was credited with an RBI. In a postseason that keeps giving us new heroes, tonight it was Frelick, whose solo homer in the sixth tied the game, and Pratt, who atoned for his first-inning throwing error by knocking in the go-ahead, and ultimately winning, run in the seventh.

And then there was Ashby, this postseason’s Grim Reaper. Tonight he was cruel enough to make Tampa Bay think they were going to get him before he buckled down and got the last three outs of the game. He’s up to 15 2/3 scoreless innings in the postseason. No player has ever thrown that many innings and had a scoreless postseason; only Andrew Miller has a longer postseason streak, but if Ashby can get two more outs without allowing a run, he’ll break that record, too.

Milwaukee now takes a 2-0 lead to Tampa. They say that seven-game postseason series don’t really begin until someone wins a game on the road, but the Brewers have put themselves in excellent position by beating the Rays at what the Rays have done best all season: winning one-run games. After an off day tomorrow, we’ll be back at it on Monday night at 7pm central time.