ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – They descended upon Florida in droves, traveling more than 1,000 miles from Waukesha and Green Bay and Madison and Milwaukee and across the state of Wisconsin to witness what no Brewers team before had ever accomplished.
They did it because they believed.
They believed after seeing these Brewers win a franchise-record 103 games. They believed after watching comeback victory after comeback victory — 42 in the regular season, another seven in a postseason that affirmed Milwaukee’s place as the undisputed best team in the sport.
They believed because, after 57 years without a World Series title, they knew they were watching something different with this relentless bunch, a group of overlooked overachievers who cared little about their payroll or their market size or their lack of home-run hitters and instead came together, greater than the sum of their parts, to form an inevitable, incredible, inescapable force of nature.
They believed, mostly because the players did, too.
Brewers fans packed Tropicana Field during the World Series. (Photo by Mary DeCicco/MLB Photos via Getty Images)
“If you take a single piece out of this team, it’s not the same,” said standout reliever Aaron Ashby, who threw a record 18 scoreless relief innings in the playoffs. “I don’t know that you can remove anyone from this team and we’re here.”
Here, by the way, was Tropicana Field, where the Brewers celebrated their first World Series championship in franchise history on Wednesday night with a 4-1 Game 5 victory and turned west-central Florida into Milwaukee South. As the victory stage was being set up, 21-year-old rookie Luis Lara, a champion in his first big-league season, began to sob. From the dais, William Contreras talked through tears as he accepted the World Series MVP trophy.
The Brewers catcher, a star throughout these playoffs both at the plate and behind it, began the year as a World Baseball Classic champion alongside Venezuelan teammates Jackson Chourio and Antonio Senzatela. Now, that trio of Brewers ended the year as World Series champions.
“When I go out here, I give everything,” Contreras said. “I put my body on the line. I do whatever it takes to win because I love it.”
That’s a mindset adored by Pat Murphy, a football mind in baseball manager’s garb, an enigma who could pull a pancake out of his pocket one moment and demand perfection the next. Fail to hustle for him, and risk getting benched. The Brewers were molded in his image, and he had the right ingredients for a championship concoction.
The man who constructed that perfect blend was asked to describe the Brewers’ identity.
“It’s undaunted. It’s relentless,” Brewers president of baseball operations Matt Arnold said. “It starts with Pat Murphy. He’s not going to give an inch. That’s who he is. The team takes on his personality.”
Part of Murphy’s method was invoking the spirit of the late Bob Uecker into his squad, believing the broadcast legend was watching down from above. Murphy would write letters in Uecker’s voice that he would deliver to the team. During the playoffs, Brewers legends Robin Yount and Paul Molitor saluted Uecker before their celebratory first pitches. Yount wore a Uecker jacket with a Uecker uniform underneath.
The spirit of Bob Uecker was never far away.(Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)
On the field at “The Trop,” I asked Arnold who he was thinking about most after accomplishing what no Brewers team before ever had.
There were a lot of thoughts running through his head. He considered the fans and all the Milwaukee luminaries who meant so much to the franchise.
He then pointed down toward his feet: “I’m wearing the Bob Uecker shoes.”
THE BREWERS PLAYED all year with controlled chaos, wearing teams out by working long at-bats, putting the ball in play and persistently pressuring on the basepaths. They led the majors in batting average and on-base percentage in the regular season, then did it again in the postseason en route to winning their first World Series title.
With that mindset spread throughout the entire roster, there seemed to be a different hero every night.
Ashby led one of the most dominant bullpens in postseason history, a group that went 8-2 with a 1.38 ERA and eight saves. Contreras slashed .373/.448/.588 with three home runs and a playoff franchise-record 19 hits while catching six runners stealing and winning 22 ABS challenges in October. Chourio became the franchise’s leader in playoff home runs and RBI at 22 years old and joined Babe Ruth as the second player all-time to have 10 hits in the first four games of a World Series.
Rookie Cooper Pratt hadn’t played in a big-league game when the team signed him to an eight-year extension in April. Six months later, the Brewers’ starting shortstop was making an argument for World Series MVP, becoming the first rookie to record three straight multi-RBI games in the World Series and the first rookie to record a hit in six straight at-bats in the World Series.
“I thought they were going to send me down after my second week against the Cubs, go back down to Triple-A,” Pratt told me. “But I battled, stayed with it. I worked hard, man. There’s a lot that goes unnoticed. But, no, if you would have asked me this in March if I would have been here, I would have said, ‘Kick rocks, buddy.’ But we’re world champions.”
Cooper Pratt became a breakout star. (Photo by Carmen Mandato/Getty Images)
There will be a parade Friday in Milwaukee to celebrate the occasion. The Brewers’ fans in attendance Wednesday at Tropicana Field — about half of the crowd of 40,489 — didn’t have to wait that long. They hugged and smiled and cried and FaceTimed their friends and family back home after Trevor Megill got Richie Palacios to ground out to seal the deal and set the party in motion. The game ended at 11:13 p.m. More than an hour and a half later, “Let’s Go Brewers” chants were still being sung at 12:45 a.m.
Back in Milwaukee, fans celebrated at American Family Field, where for three straight days 31,000 people packed the house. The first watch party sold out in 15 minutes, causing prices to skyrocket from $15 to hundreds of dollars more. It didn’t matter. They just wanted to feel this, to belt out “Roll Out The Barrel,” to be part of a moment they’ll tell their kids and grandkids about.
It was the Brewers’ first World Series appearance since 1982, 44 years after Yount and Molitor and all of Harvey’s Wallbangers fell just one win short against the St. Louis Cardinals. These small-balling Brewers, who needed just 13 home runs during their postseason run — the fewest of any World Series-winning club since the 2014 Giants — weren’t built the same way. Yet, as if Pratt were delivering an ode to that slugging squad of ‘82, he launched a 12th-inning home run in Game 4 that seemed destined to live forever on highlight reels throughout Wisconsin.
But it wouldn’t have felt right for this comeback crew to waltz through October without a little more adversity. The Rays stormed back in the bottom of the 12th to delay the inevitable.
“It’s part of it, right? said Christian Yelich, the Brewers’ longest-tenured position player. “It’s supposed to be hard. This stuff’s supposed to test you.”
Had the Brewers won that game, they would have joined the 1999 Yankees and 2005 White Sox as one of just three teams in the wild-card era to win the World Series with one loss on their postseason run. Instead, they’re now one of five to lose two or fewer.
And after waiting 57 years, their fans could stand to wait one more night.
“You say they’ve been waiting so long, that’s one thing, but it’s more about their undying commitment to this team,” Murphy said. “It started growing and growing throughout the year, grew last year, and then you see what it means to them.
“It’s not just the city of Milwaukee. It’s the whole state of Wisconsin. I hope they’re proud. I hope they’re proud of these guys.”
Brewers captain Christian Yelich celebrating a World Series title. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)
They stuck around because they believed.
“This is so special to so many people,” Arnold said.
They believed after watching Chourio walk off Padres shutdown closer Mason Miller as the Brewers cooled off the hottest team in baseball in the NLDS.
They believed after watching their crew take down the defending two-time champs in stunning fashion in the NLCS, besting American League Cy Young Award winner Tarik Skubal — the deadline prize that got away — defending World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto and two-time Cy Young Award winner Blake Snell in consecutive games before storming back from a 4-0 deficit against Tyler Glasnow to sweep the Dodgers.
The Brewers became the first team to sweep a best-of-seven postseason series after trailing in all four games and the first team to sweep a team that swept them in the playoffs the year prior. In total, seven of their 11 wins saw them come back from a deficit.
“It’s kind of a crazy thing,” Ashby said. “We never feel like we’re out of it.”
By late October, it was clear then that these Brewers were different, though their players will tell you they knew before that.
They’ve made the playoffs eight times in the last nine years and won the division six times over that stretch, only to always fall short in October. But before this playoff run began, pitching coach Chris Hook recalled the confidence he felt from his captain.
“Yeli was talking about, ‘We’re going to win the World Series,’” Hook told me. “There was a real belief we’re going to do this. I’ve been here; this is my eighth season, we’ve been to the playoffs seven times. This year felt different. I was like, ‘You know what? I’m just going to stay out of the way.’”
Ask the Brewers players when they knew this year was different, and the answer varies. Some said spring training. Second baseman Brice Turang thought the belief built throughout the year.
Ashby felt it on June 8 in Sacramento. The Brewers took a 14-10 lead in the top of the 10th, then he allowed the A’s to come back to tie it. No matter; his teammates won it in the 12th.
For Jacob Misiorowski, the soon-to-be Cy Young-winner who concluded one of the most unhittable seasons the game has ever seen from a starting pitcher by delivering his best start of the postseason in the World Series clincher, the turning point came in the middle of August when the Brewers got swept in San Diego. They responded by winning a series at Dodger Stadium and going 28-12 in their final 40 games.
A banner year for Brewers ace Jacob Misiorowski. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)
It was then that Contreras, known affectionately in the clubhouse as either “Wild Bill” or “Pitbull,” reached a new level. He had a .522 OPS over his last 29 games before the trip to Los Angeles. Then he posted a .941 OPS from Aug. 15 through season’s end and carried that momentum into October, putting his hands on every part of the Brewers’ run.
“William leads a little differently, I’ve got to be honest,” Murphy said. “It’s very effective, but like I said, he’s our pitbull. You don’t just walk up and pet him. There’s a chance you get nipped.”
The Brewers kept that edge throughout the past five-plus weeks. From Sept. 23 until winning the World Series on Oct. 28, they lost a total of two games.
“To be able to accomplish something like this, the season we had, the postseason these guys had, I can’t put it into words,” Ashby said. “It’s one of the most special things I’ve ever been a part of in my life.”
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