After nearly a week of rest, the Milwaukee Brewers enter the playoffs as the team that finished the season with the best record in baseball.
With a franchise record of 97 wins in the regular season, including a 14-game winning streak, the blue and gold have an edge when facing the Chicago Cubs, who on Thursday won the National League Wild Card Series against the San Diego Padres.
The Brew Crew kicks off the National League Division Series on Saturday.
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But Chicago has challenged Milwaukee. During the regular season, the Brewers finished 6-7 against the Cubs.
“They’re two teams that are very evenly matched,” said Brewers beat reporter Todd Rosiak of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “Both teams have their distinct strengths and weaknesses.”
The following has been edited for clarity and brevity.
Alex Crowe: What can we expect in this NLDS matchup against the Chicago Cubs?
Todd Rosiak: I think you can expect lots of boos for (Cubs manager and former Brewers manager) Craig Counsell. That’s become pretty standard operating procedure anytime the Cubs travel to American Family Field, and it certainly adds a lot of spice to what already was a really spirited rivalry.
As far as the Cubs go, they’re probably one of the most balanced teams in the playoff field. They’ve got a good mix of pitching, good offense, and they’re also a very strong defensive team. Whereas the Brewers are probably less prone to hit home runs, but a scrappier offensive team. They’re terrific defensively, terrific on the bases, and their pitching has been very good as well. It’s a very competitive matchup.
AC: How many pitchers versus position players are the Brewers planning on putting on the postseason roster?
TR: Last we discussed with (Brewers manager) Pat Murphy, he seemed to indicate they would go with a mix of 14 position players and 12 pitchers. In the position player group, a player that’s not going to be included is going to be Rhys Hoskins. At the start of the season, if you would have said that, you definitely would have been surprised. But through no fault of his own, he was injured in Miami in early July and missed a good portion of the second half of the season.
By the time he came back, Andrew Vaughn had already inserted himself and done well at first base. Now the Brewers are going to go ahead with a twosome of Andrew Vaughn and Jake Bauers at first base, leaving Rhys Hoskins out of the mix for this round.
On the pitching side, I think everybody wants to know what’s going on with Jacob Misiorowski, “The Miz.” While he did fall out of contention to be part of the starting rotation and the playoffs, his arm is just too good to not at least have him on the roster in the bullpen.
It’s a spot that he’s not really comfortable with yet, as he’s only had one major league outing out of the bullpen. But again, when he’s on, he’s on. It should be interesting to see how he fares.
AC: On the pitching side of things, you wrote that Freddy Peralta really had to have a great season for the Brewers. Can you tell us why you think that?
TR: He is basically the straw that stirs the drink for the Brewers. On the pitching side, this is a guy who really has kind of come into his own. He’s in the physical prime of his career. But the previous few starts that he’s made in the postseason in 2023 and ’24 have not gone according to plan.
I would assume, even though he may not admit it publicly, that he is anxious to go out there and turn in a five- or six-inning strong start with the Brewers in the lead. If he can do that, it certainly will give the Brewers momentum moving ahead in the series, because without Freddy Peralta pitching it’s going to be an uphill battle for the Brewers.
AC: How has the Brewers offense been looking so far this season?
TR: It’s been kind of an up and down season, to be quite honest. Offensively, it started off pretty rough. Once the Brewers hit their stride in early June through the 14-game winning streak (in August), the offense was tremendous.
It was a unit that did not necessarily hit home runs, but still was able to generate enough runs coming across the plate to finish third in the Major Leagues in that category. It was by being scrappy, getting deep in counts, working pitchers and fouling balls off. They’re basically a bunch of pests, to put it crudely, but when they’re going well, they are making pitchers work.
They’re getting guys on base, they’re stealing bases, they’re advancing on wild pitches, that sort of thing. But there is a counterargument that teams that don’t hit home runs in the playoffs don’t typically advance.
The big key this year for the Brewers was getting Christian Yelich back healthy with his back healed up from surgery. He responded with his best season since 2019, which is when he finished runner-up in the National League for Most Valuable Player.
If Pat Murphy can get him off to a good start, that certainly would be gigantic for the Brewers as well.
AC: How has this core group of young guys been able to hold it together? Is that going to be the same thing heading into the postseason?
I’m interested to see how the Brewers’ youngsters react to the bright lights of the postseason. Guys like Brice Turang have been through it before, but he’s still a young player. Caleb Durbin, this will be his first time through. Isaac Collins is another guy who will be coming off the bench who hasn’t experienced this yet.
Those are two guys who, over the course of the season, played well enough to now be in the running for National League Rookie of the Year honors, which is certainly big.
Another guy who has not been mentioned yet but should be is Quinn Priester. He’s a starting pitcher who will start game two for the Brewers in the NLDS, who’s been an absolute godsend for this organization.
A lot of people questioned why the Brewers traded so much for him in terms of prospect capital early in the season, considering he didn’t really have an established track record as a major leaguer up until that point. But the Brewers, as they quite often do, were able to sprinkle some of that magic dust on him once he got into the organization. Pitching coaches Chris Hook and Jim Henderson worked with him very closely and kind of refined his repertoire. Ever since that he has been just on this incredible roll. The Brewers had won 19 straight games that Priester pitched in prior to that streak coming to an end.
Those are three guys who had big roles in how the Brewers finished up this year in the regular season. I think they’ll have big roles again moving forward in the playoffs.
