The Brewers didn’t just take Game 1 of the 2026 National League Championship Series. They took it with Brice Turang in the middle of everything, turning a tight, tense opener into a Milwaukee win that finally gave the crowd room to breathe.
From the start, this had the feel of two heavyweights leaning into each other. The Dodgers came out swinging, and the Brewers answered punch for punch.
Mookie Betts opened with a sharp grounder that forced Turang to race across the bag and throw on the move to first, his body only half-turned. Out.
Freddie Freeman followed with a line-drive single to left. Then Will Smith smoked a ball on the ground, and Cooper Pratt handled it cleanly before feeding Turang, whose turn completed a twin killing to get Jacob Misiorowski out of the first inning.
Los Angeles kept pressing in the second and managed to push across a run. The inning could have gotten uglier for Milwaukee when Enrique Hernándeza hit a ball into the hole at short with the bases loaded. Pratt made the play and fired to Turang to get the lead runner, and then Turang immediately snapped a perfect sidearm relay to retire Hernández and end the inning before the Dodgers could do more damage.
The Brewers were still trailing 1-0 when Turang came up to lead off the bottom of the fourth, and by then Tarik Skubal had the sharper night. He was commanding four or five pitches, while Misiorowski was missing even with his fastball. Milwaukee wasn’t making life any easier on itself, either, and Turang was the first Brewer to adjust when Skubal saw him a second time.
He took two four-seamers away, the spot Skubal had been living in all night. On 2-0, Skubal tried a sinker back toward the arm side, and Turang was ready for it.
He turned on the pitch and sent a slicing drive just over the wall in left-center for his trademark home run. It was a clean, exact answer to a pitcher who had been in control up to that point.
That swing flipped the mood in the building, and the Brewers rode it the rest of the night. Misiorowski’s outing was not a clean one, and Pat Murphy leaned on only four relievers, but those arms held up. Milwaukee spent more time threatening to add on than Los Angeles did trying to wrestle the lead back.
The late innings brought the kind of emotion that can stick with a team. Abner Uribe’s strikeout celebration to end the sixth inning stood out, as did Garrett Mitchell’s fist pump after catching the final out. The Brewers had plenty to feel in that moment: they had spent a year waiting for a chance to show last season’s finish was not some unavoidable fate, and they were making it clear they could stand toe to toe with the Dodgers.
Turang was quieter than some of the others, but he was the difference-maker all over the field. He gave Milwaukee the defensive play it needed when the game was hanging in the balance, then later showed Skubal could be beaten.
He also added a late sacrifice bunt. After three straight poor playoff series, he looked like a player shaking off the doubts some fans had started to attach to him.
Instead, he looked essential. And with Turang at the center of it, the Brewers left Game 1 one step closer to the NLCS breakthrough they haven’t had since 2018.
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The most interesting wrinkle now is how Milwaukee lines up its pitching after the initial wave of the series. The Brewers have already mapped out their starting plan for the first three games, but the way they use the rest of the staff could shape the tone of the matchup just as much as the names on the lineup card. Against a Dodgers club that can force managers to make decisions early, every lever matters, and the Brewers still have at least one high-stakes pitching choice hanging over the series. [Read more 🡒]
Brandon Woodruff Just Created A Brewers Roster Dilemma For October
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The next stretch will help determine how realistic that path is, with more mound work ahead and a possible live batting practice session if his arm responds well. It has been a good October for Brewers storylines off the field too, with Pratt even getting rewarded by Coca-Cola after his NL Division Series celebration with Fanta, but Woodruff's recovery is the one that could actually reshape the roster if the Brewers need another arm in the months ahead. [Read more 🡒]