Brewers Notebook: Crew’s Usual Suspects Secure Thrilling Game 1 Win

Friday was the moment baseball fans had been waiting for. A long regular season was in the books and three postseason rounds were complete. The Tampa Bay Rays and Milwaukee Brewers, top seeds in their respective leagues, were ready to square off in Wisconsin’s largest city.

If you were hoping for an exciting start to the 2026 World Series, well, you got one.

After playing behind in many games this offseason, the Brewers took an early lead in this one. In the bottom of the first, Jackson Chourio singled on the first pitch he saw and was driven in two batters later on a triple by Christian Yelich, who scored himself on William Contreras‘s first-pitch single the very next at-bat.

Rays starter Nick Martinez settled down quickly after that, striking out the next two batters to get out of the inning. He would actually retire 13 of the final 15 batters he faced, striking out five over his five innings of work.

Tampa would cut the lead in half before Martinez left the game. Following a Jonathan Aranda leadoff walk, Junior Caminero would scorch a 112.7 mph double that just got over the head of Garrett Mitchell to move his teammate to third, and Liam Hicks would ground out to first to score Aranda, making it 2-1.

That’s where the score would stay until the seventh when Cooper Pratt led off the bottom of the seventh with a walk for Milwaukee’s first leadoff baserunner since Chourio’s aforementioned single. And it would be Chourio himself to drive Pratt in with a two-out single later in the inning, making it 3-1 Brewers.

Milwaukee would take that lead into the ninth as closer Trevor Megill took the mound to wrap the game up. The Rays would put up one final rally, though, loading the bases with two singles and a walk with one out to bring Hicks to the plate. That’s when things got interesting.

Hicks grounded the first pitch of the at-bat to second, and it appeared at first that he had grounded into a game-ending double play. However, upon replay review, it was confirmed that Pratt never touched second on the relay, giving Tampa their second run and extending the game.

It wouldn’t be extended for long, though. Megill would strike out Jonny DeLuca on five pitches in the very next at-bat, and the Brewers would secure the Game 1 win at home.

Jacob Misiorowski Gets Back on Track

Brewers ace Jacob Misiorowski is a superstar pitcher in the making with his high-velocity fastball and otherworldly extension on the mound. But, that doesn’t mean he has had an easy go of it in the playoffs.

In his first two playoff starts, Misiorowski had gone fewer than five innings in each outing and given up three runs over a combined 8.1 innings with 11 strikeouts. His two opponents had been aggressive with him, fouling off more pitches than normal and working pitch counts early.

The 24-year-old looked better against the Rays, though. He went five innings and gave up just the one run on four hits and a walk. Though his strikeout numbers were down, his bread-and-butter four-seamer was up a bit in velocity from his season average, including a 103.5 mph pitch to start the game that was the fastest pitch ever to be thrown in a World Series.

“I thought Miz was great tonight,” Brewers manager Pat Murphy said afterward. “For Miz to go five innings the way he did, give up only a few hard contacts, only walked one guy, I think didn’t give up any free bases.”

Misiorowski was pulled after throwing just 78 pitches, 56 for strikes, and with the top of the order coming up in the next inning. Whether it was a logical move or not, the Milwaukee starter would’ve gladly pitched longer.

“I wish I could go more,” Misiorowski said. “Obviously I’m going to be competitive, and I’m going to keep going. I’m going to want to throw 130. I’ll keep going, it’s the World Series. I’ve got more rest to come.”

“No, the situation we had looked better going to the pen and turning it over that way,” he continued. “You have to trust the staff and understand they’re making a decision for later in the game.”

That decision could affect the rest of the series as well. Having thrown just those 78 pitches, Misiorowski should be decently fresh for whenever his next start is, if it ends up being necessary.

Contreras Makes His Presence Known Behind the Plate

Plenty of baseball fans know Brewers catcher William Contreras for his bat, and rightly so. Coming into Game 1, he was hitting .367 with a 1.157 OPS in eight postseason games, with numerous hits in huge moments to his name.

But, the Brewers have long stressed how important Contreras also is to the team with what he does behind the plate, whether that be how he calls games, how he controls the run game, or how he challenges balls and strikes. The Rays got a taste of that firsthand on Friday.

Contreras was able to convert two balls to strikes on the night, one to turn a 1-1 count to 0-2 in the second and the other to go from 2-0 to 1-1 in the sixth. Both of those at-bats ultimately resulted in outs for Tampa.

“Going through a good moment right now,” Contreras said afterward of his recent success with ABS challenges. “And I think the ABS is kind of similar to hitting in a season. You might go through a slump. Right now I think I’m going through a good moment with it, and I’ve got to take advantage of that.”

The Brewer backstop also gunned down two attempted base stealers in the game. His pinpoint throw to third caught Victor Mesa Jr. for the final out in the fifth, and a throw down to second to nab Aranda also ended the sixth.

“This guy has been incredible,” Murphy said of his catcher. “And he does both sides of the ball. And the side that you can’t measure, I don’t know what his numbers are, but he does so much for the team. He’s incredible… We wouldn’t be in the position we’re in without Contreras.”

Added Rays manager Kevin Cash after the game, “He’s a very talented player on both sides of the ball. We knew that coming in. Not surprised by anything that he did.”

Ninth-Inning Review Adds Suspense to an Already Thrilling Game

Neither team in this year’s World Series is a stranger to odd moments taking place in postseason games. In fact, both teams encountered plays in their respective home stadiums where a ball in play deflected off a part of the roof.

So naturally, the two teams got to experience another moment that was slightly out of the ordinary during the ninth inning of Friday’s game. Not that a challenge on a double play turn at second base is rare; it just doesn’t often happen when the game is supposedly over.

After Pratt took the throw from Brice Turang and relayed it over to first for a supposed ninth-inning double play, nearly everyone thought the game was over. The crowd erupted, fireworks were set off, and equipment started getting rolled onto the field for postgame TV coverage.

“Right away we thought we got it,” Misiorowski said after the game. “We thought we won.”

Everyone had to hold that thought, though, as the turn at second was being reviewed. It soon became evident that there was more baseball to be played.

“My thought was it looked like a close play,” Cash said of the play at second. “Once I saw the replay a couple times, I felt like it was going to get overturned.”

That is indeed what happened, and once the field was cleared for play, the Rays had their deficit cut to one run and had the tying run 90 feet away. But just five pitches later, DeLuca would strike out, and the real celebration was able to begin in Milwaukee.

“We talk about it all the time, when there’s a challenge, do not walk off the mound,” Murphy said. “[Megill] kept his composure, and that was the biggest at-bat of the game.”