This MLB postseason statistically lacked excitement. Nearly every series ended early, individual games lacked a compelling narrative, there weren’t too many wild and wacky plays or controversial calls, and the team with the better record won out every time. On paper, it ran exactly as expected in a ho-hum manner. Once the White Sox were eliminated, the most whimsical storyline of holy papal intervention was exorcised, leaving various perennial division winners to hash it out amongst themselves.
Many thousands of words have been written about the Brewers’ run, with most of what I’ve read coming from the excellent crew at FanGraphs. I’m not here to compete with their game recaps and series overviews. Those professional writers earned their keep and then some, and anyone who cares about mixing statistical fervor with narrative excellence should toss them a few bucks to read their work. But I can share why, despite a year of baseball that lacked in nearly every way to 2025, I found myself equally enraptured for all of October.
New captains at the helm of the Giants and Twins didn’t pause either franchise’s recent foundering, so I spent little time following either of my two top teams except through game recaps. It was disappointing. So, my attention started to swing to the Brewers as my tertiary team. My connection to them is born of two people: my dad, who has adopted Wisconsin sports a few years after moving to the state, and a good friend from San Francisco. As the Brewers picked up steam, as The Miz successfully continued to throw middle-middle and pray, as they piled up wins through sheer determination backed by having enough good guys to keep their confidence, it was impossible not to notice them.
When the season began to wrap and they threatened to win 100 games, then made it past that landmark with a few to spare, one had to consider whether this could be the year: the culmination of the past two seasons under Pat Murphy where it wasn’t just a small-town team making the best of a moderate division to have a great regular season, but one where they had enough oomph to be a menace in the playoffs?
Taking three of four games against the Dodgers, including a win against the recently acquired Skubal, who the Brewers had lost out on at the deadline, raised eyebrows. Maybe they had the firepower to take on these juggernauts were there to be a postseason rematch. But before that, they needed to navigate the obnoxious rust-versus-rest discourse as a team with a bye to the Division Series and go up against the Padres after a week off, those San Diego dads being one of three fun teams in the draw alongside the Brewers and White Sox.
The Brewers vs. Padres series was the first sign of them as a lightning rod. All those things I said about this postseason lacking in story and song and stats? Well, the issue was not that those elements weren’t there. They followed only the Brewers through October. There were intense pitching matchups, fire-breathing bullpen arms, balls hit off roofs, scrappy play, and big blasts. It all came up as the Brewers fought their way through to the NL Championship Series and a rematch against the Dodgers.
What a rematch it was. Pure catharsis for Brewers fans, and an embarrassing nightmare for Dodgers fans hoping for a three-peat from an aging veteran core anchored by a diminished superstar. There were promising fits of offense by the Dodgers that each time proved entirely insufficient, particularly when Aaron Ashby rapidly showed himself as a threat to break the record for shutout innings by a reliever in a single postseason. Each Dodgers starter began to crumble when Jake Bauers decided enough was enough because he wanted to see a two-digit number of pitches over the next few minutes.
The Brewers were bet against in that series, then outplayed the Dodgers in four straight games with tenacity. Again, they were inevitable. They were the fun team, the lightning rod for every ounce of available entertainment while the Rays and Guardians played shoddy, forgettable baseball that lacked tension or delight.
Then, the World Series. Would The Miz find it after the Dodgers made it work? Could the Brewers just keep doing this? What would the fanbase be like in Tampa Bay? Could they do a clean nine-game sweep through the postseason? Most of the questions for us optimists amounted to How bad, exactly, will they beat the Rays while still making every game compelling?
Turns out, they would beat them terribly, all five games were basically home games for the Brewers (or close enough to it), and every game was compelling. Even the blowout in game three was a thrill simply because it was so unexpected given the Brewers’ path to that point. Yet, it also felt inevitable: if they could always score one more run than their opponent, why not nine or ten more?
All it took was one slip-up on a potential inning-ending play at second and a quick trip through the order with two outs.
And when the dust settled after the teams finished bunting and sprinting and bashing their way to the Commissioner’s Trophy, the Brewers remained. Sal Frelick promised to drink 100,000 beers. Pat Murphy cracked a smile. And everyone had a good time watching it happen.
I’m only sad that the playoffs ended a few games early, because I wanted to watch the Brewers somehow pull off a victory in half a dozen more ways. But it was the most fun I’ve had following a team closely since the early-2010s Giants. Meanwhile, my friend was thrilled. She took a red-eye to Chicago and a car to Milwaukee to watch the parade. We all manage our excitement in different ways.