The Dodgers were supposed to be the sport’s juggernaut again, the team everyone else was chasing after those offseason headline moves for Kyle Tucker and Edwin Díaz and back-to-back titles already in the bag. Instead, they’re staring at the edge of elimination.
Milwaukee pushed Los Angeles there Wednesday night with a 6-2 win, moving out to a 3-0 lead in the NLCS and putting the Dodgers in a hole only one team in MLB history has ever climbed out of. That was the 2004 Red Sox, who came back on the Yankees in four straight before going on to win their first World Series since 1918.
The Brewers have looked like the better team throughout the series, and Game 3 was powered by two names few would have circled as October headliners before the season: Jake Bauers and Robert Gasser.
Bauers, a first baseman who has spent most of his career bouncing around the league, delivered the biggest swing of the night. He’s been everywhere - Rays, Guardians, Mariners, Yankees, then Milwaukee in 2024 - and nearly walked away from the game after his first season with the Brewers.
He had already decided he was ready to quit when his wife found out she was pregnant, and that changed everything. As Bauers put it, “We needed health insurance.”
He came back in 2025 in more of a supporting role, but this season turned into a real breakout. Bauers reworked his approach, became a difficult out and posted 94 walks with a .393 on-base percentage, third-best in MLB. He also launched a career-high 26 home runs, blowing past his previous best of 12.
That patience showed up again in Game 3. Bauers battled Blake Snell for 11 pitches in the seventh inning before crushing a go-ahead two-run homer.
Garrett Mitchell followed with a solo blast, and suddenly Milwaukee had all the breathing room it needed. It was the first time Snell had ever given up consecutive homers to left-handed hitters, and only the second time he’d allowed two homers to lefties in the same game.
Los Angeles never answered that punch, managing only a Shohei Ohtani single over the final three innings.
For a player who entered the 2026 season with a career bWAR of -1.3, Bauers has become an unlikely postseason force for Milwaukee.
Robert Gasser was just as important, if not more so, on the mound. In only the second postseason start of his career, the rookie left-hander blanked the Dodgers for five innings, making him the first rookie in MLB history to throw a scoreless postseason start against the defending champions. He struck out three, allowed three hits and walked one before Abner Uribe briefly gave the lead away after Gasser exited.
Gasser wasn’t even a sure thing when the season began. He opened the year buried in a crowded Brewers rotation and had a rough first half, posting a 4.79 ERA and giving up 13 home runs over his first 15 starts.
But he pitched his way into the playoff mix over his final six outings, working 32 1/3 innings with a 1.67 ERA, 31 strikeouts and just two homers allowed. That form has carried straight into October, where he has thrown nine innings and allowed only one earned run.
The Brewers have been leaning on production from places few expected. Bauers, the journeyman who finally found his footing, and Gasser, the 27-year-old rookie acquired in the Josh Hader trade in 2022, have become central figures in a series that now has Los Angeles on the brink.
A year ago, it was the Dodgers sweeping Milwaukee in the NLCS before winning their ninth World Series title. This time, the roles are flipped. The Brewers are one win from their first World Series trip since 1982, and they’re suddenly on the verge of chasing the first championship in franchise history.
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