The Rays were staring at elimination, three outs from the end in Game 4 of the World Series, and then they kept finding answers.
Tampa Bay turned a wild 12th inning into a 4-3 walk-off win over the Brewers on Tuesday night at Tropicana Field, with Williamson delivering the final blow on a high chopper to right that brought home pinch-runner Nick Fortes. The ball didn’t leave anyone’s bat with much authority, but it got there just the same, and the Rays suddenly had life.
Jonny DeLuca started the rally by tying the game with a single after Shane Drohan was on the mound, and Chandler Simpson followed with another single to load the bases. That set the stage for Williamson, who came off the bench and sent the crowd into a frenzy as “Walking on Sunshine” played over the speakers.
It was the kind of ending that felt impossible a few innings earlier, especially after rookie shortstop Cooper Pratt had put Milwaukee ahead with a solo homer in the top of the 12th. For a moment, it looked as if the Brewers were about to close this thing out in style and make more history in the process.
Instead, the Rays delayed everything for at least one more day. They’ll play Wednesday, their final home game of 2026, with a chance to force the series back to Milwaukee.
The bigger picture had been brutal for Tampa Bay coming into Game 4. The first three games had stripped away the traits that carried the Rays to the top of the AL East and into the AL pennant race: sharp defense, disciplined at-bats and the kind of aggressive baserunning that usually makes them so hard to pin down. Too often in this series, they had helped the Brewers beat them.
President of baseball operations Erik Neander’s pregame message was simple: “Win an inning.”
The Rays did that early. In the second, Simpson doubled and DeLuca raced home from first for a 1-0 lead. That advantage didn’t last long, because the Brewers answered in the fourth when Pratt hit an RBI double to left and scored Sal Frelick to tie it at 1.
Tampa Bay grabbed the lead back in a messy, costly Brewers sequence in the bottom half. Junior Caminero advanced from second to third on a DeLuca grounder after third baseman David Hamilton missed the tag, then Hamilton threw wildly to first as Caminero scored. A replay challenge confirmed the double misplay and gave the Rays a 2-1 edge.
But Milwaukee answered again, and fast. Hamilton made up for it in the fifth by launching a solo homer to right to knot the game at 2.
From there, the game turned into a grind, with the Rays fighting for every out. Yandy Díaz opened the sixth with a single, but Brice Turang ruined that threat with a brilliant play on Jonathan Aranda’s 101.8-mph liner, then threw to first in time to double off Díaz.
Tampa Bay kept hanging around because it kept getting outs from everywhere. Nick Martinez gave them two scoreless innings out of the bullpen after starting the game, Bryan Baker added two more scoreless frames, and later Tyler Wells and Cam Booser helped push the game deeper. Simpson also saved a huge run by making a leaping catch at the left-field wall on a Garrett Mitchell drive, and a stolen base by Pratt in the ninth was erased by replay.
On the other side, Aaron Ashby kept dealing. He worked through the ninth, 10th and part of the 11th without allowing the Rays on base, extending his postseason streak to 18 straight scoreless relief innings and breaking Andrew Miller’s 2016 record of 16.
Even then, the Brewers had another surge left. Pratt’s 12th-inning homer off Ian Seymour looked like the knockout punch, and the Milwaukee contingent at the Trop made sure everyone knew it. The Brewers spilled out of the dugout as if the night was over.
But Seymour steadied himself and got NLCS MVP Jake Bauers to pop out after Jackson Chourio doubled, and that mattered. It left the door cracked just enough for the Rays to storm through in the bottom half.
They did, and now they get one more night to keep this thing alive.
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Brewers Let A Title-Clinching Chance Slip Away In Game 4
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Brewers Rookie Looked Ready To Clinch It Until Everything Unraveled
For a few tense minutes in Game 4 of the World Series, it looked like Cooper Pratt had delivered the kind of breakthrough swing Milwaukee could build around. The rookie came through in the 12th inning with a go-ahead homer that put the Brewers ahead 3-2, a moment that seemed to tilt a back-and-forth game firmly in their direction.
Instead, the finish turned into a collapse that sent the series to a fifth game. A defensive miscue cracked the door open, and the bullpen that had been so steady through the postseason could not close it, with left-hander Shane Drohan taking the loss after Tampa Bay strung together four straight hits. For Milwaukee, it was the kind of ending that lingers - one that left a rookie's big swing buried under a far messier final inning. [Read more 🡒]