MILWAUKEE -- Jackson Chourio and William Contreras provided the power, and Brewers manager Pat Murphy couldn’t help but wonder whether a higher power made sure the Padres didn’t answer in kind in Game 1 of the National League Division Series.
“I’m telling you,” Murphy said after the Brewers survived a scare in their 3-2 win at American Family Field, “‘Ueck’ reached up there and knocked that ball down.”
But, no, it wasn’t the late, legendary Bob Uecker who knocked down Padres first baseman Ty France’s towering fly ball in the ninth inning. It was one of the roof trusses high above American Family Field that redirected the baseball into Chourio’s glove for one of the most memorable outs in Milwaukee’s franchise history, and put the Brewers in the driver’s seat in this best-of-five series.
Nothing came easily for a team that won 103 games during the regular season and was fully rested after a bye week. The Brewers’ 24-year-old ace, Jacob Misiorowski, lasted only 12 hard-fought outs, and it took five relievers to get the other 15.
But a team that hit the fewest home runs of any NL team during the regular season showed that the start of the postseason means a clean slate. Chourio hit a game-tying, two-run home run in the third inning to become, at all of 22 years old, Milwaukee’s franchise leader with five postseason homers, and Contreras connected for a go-ahead solo shot in the seventh.
He didn’t have to sprint down the line on this one. The All-Star catcher, who was benched for failing to hustle during the final week of the regular season, could simply trot.
“These are the types of games that I like -- the games that are close, the games where fans are able to bring more adrenaline,” Contreras said through Brewers interpreter Daniel de Mondesert. “These decisive games where it comes down to the wire and it’s close there at the end, I feel like it gives me more energy.”
Down to the wire?
No pun intended, there.
Anyway, Contreras connected off the Padres’ ace setup man, Adrian Morejon, a left-hander who yielded four home runs in 86 innings during the regular season, and took a satisfying trip around the bases. Contreras means so much to the Brewers’ vaunted run prevention unit as Major League Baseball’s leader in innings behind the plate during the regular season, and he led the Majors and set a Brewers record this season with 89 RBIs while playing catcher.
He is not the type of man who likes to have his commitment questioned, but that’s what occurred during the Brewers’ final road series of the regular season in Philadelphia, on the night the Brewers secured the first 100-win season in club history. After Contreras didn’t hustle to first base on a bouncer that Phillies shortstop Trea Turner bobbled, Murphy pulled Contreras in favor of a pinch-hitter. It was meant to send a message to the team that the high standards required to contend every season on a tight budget apply to everyone, even three-time All-Stars.
Contreras got the message. When he grounded out in his first at-bat the following night, he dived headfirst into first base. Murphy smiled in the dugout. He later called it "beautiful."
Not as beautiful, perhaps, as the fly ball that left the game in the hands of the Brewers’ well-rested bullpen.
“I think William’s a very, very special player,” said Chourio. “I think he’s very special on both sides of the ball, what he does for us defensively and offensively.”
The defense came into play in the fifth inning of Game 1, when Antonio Senzatela and Aaron Ashby were combining to cover the first inning of relief for Misiorowski. Three straight hitters reached safely against Senzatela, but Contreras threw out one of them, Dustin Harris, trying to steal second base, for a critical out in what became a messy inning.
“I love the way he plays the game,” Chourio said of Contreras. “For me, I think he’s definitely someone to follow his lead and to look up to. He’s someone that’s extremely important to us, extremely important to this clubhouse.”
Said Murphy: “He was magnificent.”
After Senzatela and Ashby, Contreras helped usher Abner Uribe, DL Hall and Trevor Megill through the remainder of the game. Hall, who rose to a high-leverage role late in the regular season, escaped a bases-loaded jam in the seventh inning and secured the first two outs of the eighth before turning it over, with the tying runner on third base, to Megill, who struck out Fernando Tatis Jr. to preserve the lead and then worked around the wacky France flyout in the ninth to give the Brewers a 1-0 lead in the series.
In all best-of-five postseason series, teams taking a 1-0 lead have gone on to win the series 116 of 160 times (73%). In Division Series with the current 2-2-1 format, teams taking a 1-0 lead at home have gone on to win 42 of 56 times (75%).
And the Brewers won with home runs.
“I like that we won that way,” Contreras said. “Obviously, there’s a lot of people in the public opinion that think we’re not able to connect with the big hits, with the homers. I like that today, that’s how the game shook out. We were able to show that we are able to play that game as well.”
“I feel like we earned it,” Murphy said. “We weren’t perfect, but we swung the bat pretty darn good.”