Why the Bye Means the Most for the Brewers

Against all odds, the Milwaukee Brewers are NL Central champions for the third consecutive season and the fourth time in the last five years.

Not only did they capture the division in dominating fashion, but nobody could have anticipated that these Brewers would be in play for the No. 1 overall seed heading into Opening Day.

But here we are with less than a week until the start of the postseason, and the Brewers hold a 2.5 game lead over the Philadelphia Phillies for the best record in MLB with four games left to play.

While getting the top overall seed in the National League would certainly be valuable, securing the bye was the top priority for the Brewers this time around. For a team with such a gloomy history of postseason performance, especially as of late, securing that first-round bye may just be the key for this team to get over the hump in October.

The Importance of the Bye

As many are aware, the Brewers have not struggled to get to the postseason in recent years. This year marks the seventh time in the last eight seasons where the Brewers made it to the playoffs. That’s truly a remarkable feat for a team of Milwaukee’s market size.

But despite winning the division in each of the last two seasons, they failed to secure that coveted first-round bye and have paid the price.

The Brewers have been bounced in the wild-card round in each of the last two seasons on their home turf, losing in three games to the Mets in 2024 and getting swept by the Diamondbacks in 2023.

The postseason woes go beyond just the past two seasons for Milwaukee, though.

Since the beginning of 2019, the Brewers are 2-10 in playoff games, and they have yet to win a postseason series since 2018.

After losing Game 7 of the NLCS to the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2018, the Brewers lost the NL Wild Card Game to the Nationals in 2019, got swept in two games by the Dodgers in the first round of the expanded playoff format in 2020, and lost in four games to the Braves in the NLDS in 2021.

First-round exits have become an unfortunate trend for this organization, and the gravity of the team’s performance in the coming weeks is not lost on the members in the clubhouse.

Christian Yelich, for example, arrived in Milwaukee back in 2018. He’s been here through all of this team’s highs and lows, and he has often spoke about how this team has higher goals than simply making it to October this time around.

Take a moment to listen to his comments after clinching the division over the weekend, it’s well worth your time:

On the pitching side of things, the team’s ace, Freddy Peralta, has been with the big-league staff also since 2018. His role has certainly changed throughout the years, as he is now the leader of this pitching staff, and having that experience from their anchor is truly valuable.

He is aware of how special this season has been for him, the entire organization, and the Brewers faithful, but he knows that the job is not finished. He too is looking for better postseason success this time around.

Both Yelich and Peralta have gone through the ups of regular season success and the downs of postseason heartbreak together throughout the years. Everybody in that clubhouse is aware of how important this postseason will be for this franchise, and it starts with those two names leading the way for this tight-knight group of players.

Added Time to Get Healthy

On top of eluding that dreadful wild-card round in which the Brewers have floundered in recent years, perhaps the biggest reason why the bye matters most for the Brewers is that it gives them time to heal up.

When fully healthy, there aren’t a lot of holes to pick apart on this roster. However, the pitching staff is far from fully healthy right now, and this is where the extra rest isn’t just helpful — it’s borderline essential for this team to make a legitimate run.

The Brewers hold the best starter ERA in the National League at 3.57, a testament to how dangerous this rotation is when firing on all cylinders. But injuries have really clouded what this rotation could look like come October.

Brandon Woodruff

The Brewers announced over the weekend that Brandon Woodruff was heading to the 15-day IL with a lat strain that he suffered in a bullpen session. Woodruff, who carries a 3.20 ERA on the year, was really starting to settle in at the right time. In his two most recent outings before hitting the shelf, Woodruff allowed just one run across 11 innings while striking out 17 and walking zero batters.

Woodruff was the clear No. 2 starter behind Peralta in a postseason series, and his presence in the rotation is twofold: on top of getting his steady production and veteran experience in a postseason game, it also allows Quinn Priester to function as the Game 3 starter and round out a formidable three-headed monster.

Without Woodruff, Priester is likely the Game 2 starter behind Peralta, and it opens up a world of uncertainty for who may get the ball in a Game 3.

It’s important to note that Woodruff’s injury was retroactive to September 18, meaning, if healthy, he would be eligible to pitch in the NLDS. That’s assuming he would be fully healthy upon his return and recovers well over the next couple of weeks, and that is all but guaranteed for an arm with his injury history.

If he’s good to go, this rotation can go up against any in baseball. But the Brewers may have to prepare without Woodruff and hope for the best during his recovery.

Jose Quintana

If Woodruff cannot make a return for the NLDS, Jose Quintana is the top candidate to get the ball in a Game 3, assuming he too is back to full health.

Quintana has been sidelined by a strained calf since September 14, but reports are that the Brewers are optimistic for an early-October return. He was scheduled for a longer bullpen session on Tuesday, and assuming he recovers well from that, he appears on track to make a return at just the right time.

Quintana is a proven vet who carries a 3.55 postseason ERA across eight appearances (seven starts and 33 innings of work). Just last year, Quintana put together a masterclass of pitching against the Brewers in Game 3 of the NLWCS, going six shutout innings and allowing just four hits.

If healthy, he’s almost certainly getting the ball behind Peralta and Priester. But how he recovers in the coming week and over the off days during the bye will be very telling for his availability leading into the NLDS.

Should neither Quintana nor Woodruff be healthy, that is where things get awfully dicey for the Brewers.

Who’s Up Next?

Judging by Pat Murphy’s comments regarding his role moving forward, it appears unlikely that Jacob Misioworski would be the one to get the ball in a Game 3.

“I don’t think you can comfortably just say, ‘Go ahead, here’s the ball for Game 3,'” he told Adam McCalvy of MLB.com regarding how Woodruff’s injury impacts Misioworski’s role moving forward. It appears he’s destined for a bullpen role in October, and that’s probably where he’s best suited for now anyways.

In that case, perhaps rookie Chad Patrick would be the next man in line to get the ball in a Game 3. Patrick, who sports a 3.66 ERA on the year to go with the highest fWAR among rookie arms (2.4), recently made his return to the big leagues after spending some time in Triple-A in the heart of the summer to recalibrate.

Scheduled to start for Milwaukee on Wednesday afternoon against the San Diego Padres, Patrick has made a handful of starts along with a couple of bullpen appearances in recent weeks.

In an ideal world, Patrick is used as a bulk man out of the bullpen. But the Brewers may have no choice but to give the rookie the ball in Game 3 of the NLDS if the status of some of their veteran starters doesn’t improve in the coming weeks.

Trevor Megill

Pivoting from the starting rotation to the bullpen, Trevor Megill is the other key domino that should be heavily monitored moving forward. After what was initially expected to be a minimum stint on the injured list, Megill’s recovery hasn’t been quite what the Brewers were hoping for throughout his rehab process.

However, signs are pointing up for the Brewers’ closer.

Per Adam McCalvy, the Brewers believe he is still on track for a late-September return and could even pitch for the club on Sunday against Cincinnati.

Not only does the bye give him more time to recover, but it also gives him some buffer room to shake off any rust he might have from being sidelined for the past month.

Getting Megill back for the postseason is significant in more ways than one. Obviously, adding in one of the more dominant closers in the NL changes the ceiling of their bullpen. However, his return also lengthens Milwaukee’s bullpen and changes the dynamic of how they can attack high-leverage situations.

It allows Murphy to slide some of his “A” arms back into their late-inning roles that they were in throughout the majority of the season before Megill hit the shelf.

If Megill can return to the mound and look like his former self before the injury, this Brewers’ bullpen has proven this year that it can be as dominant as any. His health could play a key role in this team making a postseason run.

Final Thoughts

Fortunately for Milwaukee, these injuries hopefully have light at the end of the tunnel with the chance of each one of these arms being ready by the NLDS.

Had the Brewers not received the bye, who’s to say what the rotation or back of the bullpen would look in the wild-card round. As Brewers fans have seen in each of the past two seasons, the margin for error in a three-game series is so incredibly small, so avoiding that first series was the first step in exorcising their playoff demons.

To many, the Brewers feel like a team of density this season. While some fans may have said something similar about previous teams, the 2025 Brewers feel different. At full strength, it’s difficult to envision a team beating them in a five or seven-game series.

But whether or not this team will be full health is the major question. All eyes will be on the injury updates of some of Milwaukee’s biggest arms between now and when the NLDS kicks off on Saturday, October 4.