At last, Milwaukee has its title.
The Brewers finished off the Rays 4-1 on Wednesday night at Tropicana Field to claim the first World Series championship in franchise history, doing it in their 58th season and closing out a series in which they were better almost everywhere you looked. After coming up just short of a sweep in Game 4, they took care of the final step in Game 5 and never let Tampa Bay fully settle in.
Jacob Misiorowski was at the center of it. He threw 5 2/3 scoreless innings for his second win of the series, allowing only one hit and two walks while striking out two before leaving with a leg injury. Even without his usual swing-and-miss stuff, he gave Milwaukee exactly what it needed on the biggest night of the season.
“Honestly, I couldn’t get a smile off my face as soon as I walked in that clubhouse [today,” Misiorowski said on the MLB on Fox postgame show. “I was just so happy to be there and in this moment, it’s unreal.
It’s nowhere near what I thought it was gonna be. Honestly I walked out for warm-ups, and my heart wouldn’t stop.
I couldn’t calm myself down. There was so many jitters, it was insane.”
The trophy that followed also came with a World Series MVP award for William Contreras, who was everywhere for Milwaukee behind the plate. He went 10-for-13 on ABS challenges, threw out four baserunners and hit .381 with an .863 OPS and four RBIs.
“I was playing every day for the fans,” Contreras told MLB on Fox. “It had to happen for the city. They were waiting a long time for that.”
Milwaukee struck first in the second inning against Drew Rasmussen. Brice Turang doubled on a hanging changeup, Sal Frelick was hit by a pitch, and Cooper Pratt then lined an RBI single to bring Turang home before getting caught in a rundown between first and second. The hit was Pratt’s fifth in his last five at-bats, and he kept rolling from there.
Pratt added another hit in the fifth inning and set a World Series record for a rookie with six consecutive hits. He had already delivered the go-ahead home run in extra innings in Game 4, and he kept showing up again when the Brewers needed it most.
Rasmussen, working on three days’ rest, was out after four innings and just 48 pitches. Once the Rays turned to the bullpen, Milwaukee kept pressuring. Kevin Kelly allowed back-to-back singles to Pratt and Garrett Mitchell, then David Hamilton chopped a grounder through the infield to score Pratt and make it 2-0.
The Brewers kept stretching the lead in the sixth. Garrett Cleavinger hit Christian Yelich to start the inning, then William Contreras ripped a double off the left-field wall to bring Yelich in.
Brice Turang followed with a bloop into shallow left to put runners on the corners, and after Tyler Wells took over, Pratt lifted a fly ball into foul territory in right that was deep enough for Contreras to tag and score. Just like that, it was 4-0.
Misiorowski’s night ended shortly after that, as he pulled up awkwardly after a pitch to Hicks with a cramp in his right leg. He limped off and was replaced by JoJo Romero, who got two outs without allowing a baserunner. Abner Uribe worked through two more outs, and Trevor Megill took the ball in the eighth.
Tampa Bay finally broke through in the ninth, but it was far too late. Hicks doubled off Megill on a ball that got a generous bounce off first base, then Chandler Simpson brought him home with a double to right. Richie Palacios followed with a groundout to second, and that was that.
Milwaukee poured onto the field, and the Rays were left watching from the dugout as the Brewers sealed their place in MLB history. Pat Murphy’s club ran through the postseason at 11-2 and outscored its opponents by 26 runs. The path included a four-game win over the Padres in the division series and a sweep of the reigning champion Dodgers in the NLCS, and it ended with the Commissioner’s Trophy in Tampa Bay in the franchise’s first World Series appearance since 1982.
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