The Milwaukee Brewers are headed to the World Series for the first time since 1982 after sweeping the two-time defending champion Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League Championship Series, according to posts from the Associated Press, CNN, NBC News and The New York Times.
The @AP account wrote early Friday that the Brewers had swept Los Angeles to reach the Fall Classic for the first time in forty-four years. The @NBCNews account carried the same development, noting that Milwaukee had eliminated the defending champions. The @CNN account described the result as a dominating sweep of the reigning two-time champions, and the @nytimes account, citing reporting from The Athletic, said the Dodgers had been swept by a Milwaukee club that reached its first World Series since 1982.
According to NBC News reporting by Greg Rosenstein, the Brewers closed out the series with a 6-4 victory in Game 4 on Thursday. The result ended Los Angeles’s hopes of earning what the report called dynasty status. The Dodgers entered the postseason as two-time defending champions, and a third straight title would have placed them in rare company — the report noted that the New York Yankees and the Oakland Athletics are the only other teams to have accomplished such a feat.
NBC News reported that the Dodgers jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the second inning Thursday. Kyle Tucker scored on an Andy Pages RBI single before Shohei Ohtani hit a three-run home run 428 feet into the right-center field bleachers. But the Brewers would not go away. Jake Bauers hit a ground-rule double in the fourth inning, scoring William Contreras and Brice Turang to make it 4-2. In the fifth, David Hamilton singled to center, scoring Sal Frelick. Later in the inning, Dodgers reliever Alex Vesia walked in the tying run, which was credited to starter Tyler Glasnow for having initially loaded the bases.
The Brewers were the best team in baseball this season, leading Major League Baseball with 103 wins, according to the NBC News report. Milwaukee’s bullpen and timely hitting were key to the Brewers’ jumping to a 3-0 lead in the NLCS. In Game 1, star Jacob Misiorowski allowed one run over four and one-third innings, and four pitchers — DL Hall, Abner Uribe, Aaron Ashby and Trevor Megill — combined to give up two hits and no runs to preserve a 2-1 victory. Relievers once again helped Milwaukee in Game 2 after starter Logan Henderson struggled early. Dustin May, JoJo Romero, Uribe and Ashby combined to retire the last fifteen Dodgers batters in order in a 7-4 win. In Game 3, rookie starter Robert Gasser went to Dodger Stadium and pitched five innings of scoreless baseball. Back-to-back home runs by Jake Bauers and Garrett Mitchell in the seventh inning gave the Brewers a lead they would not relinquish.
Other coverage of the same subject described the scene in Los Angeles. One report said the Brewers completed a four-game sweep to win the NL pennant and reach the World Series for the first time since 1982. Another account, published about twenty-eight minutes after the final out, opened with the line “Milwaukee, you have a World Series!” and referenced the late, legendary Bob Uecker. That report said there had always been a misconception that it was Uecker who uttered what were, before Thursday night, the six sweetest words ever said about the Milwaukee Brewers — but that Uecker hustled down to the clubhouse amid the final innings of the game. The same coverage noted that Milwaukee will face either the Cleveland Guardians or the Tampa Bay Rays in the Fall Classic, and that the NLCS result ends Los Angeles’s bid to win three straight MLB championships.
Earlier coverage framed the series as a question of whether the Dodgers could recover from a 3-0 deficit. One headline asked, “Are Dodgers done? Debating L.A.’s chances to recover from 3-0 NLCS deficit,” and posed whether the Dodgers could make history or whether the Brewers were about to dethrone the two-time defending champs. A separate report, published one day before the sweep was completed, described the Brewers as keeping their October magic rolling and being on the cusp of their first World Series in forty-four years. That account set the scene at Dodger Stadium, noting that just when the ballpark started to believe again, and just when Will Smith’s two-run double had gotten Los Angeles off the mat, and just when the two-time defending champions were starting to look the part, there was Jake Bauers at the plate again, fouling off one pitch after another.
Next News Network could not independently verify the outcome of the National League Championship Series.
Our Take
The Brewers’ sweep of the Dodgers is being treated across the national media as a passing of the torch, and it is not hard to see why. Los Angeles was chasing a third straight title, a feat only the Yankees and the Athletics have ever managed, and Milwaukee — a team that has never won a World Series — ended that chase in four straight games. For a franchise that has waited forty-four years for another shot, the moment is earned, not gifted. The Brewers won 103 games, the most in baseball, and their bullpen shut the door again and again. If the national coverage wants to frame this as a dynasty denied, that is accurate. But the bigger story is a small-market club that built the best team in the sport and finished the job. Milwaukee did not back into the Fall Classic. It took it.
