Game 2 of the World Series started off with a bang, the Rays jumping out to a 4-0 lead and threatening to tie this thing back up with their ace Drew Rasmussen on the mound. The Brewers had other plans though, and did what they’ve done all postseason long — chip away at any deficit, flip it into a lead and shut down the opposition’s chances to get anything else going. Lo and behold, it worked again and Milwaukee is heading out of town with a 2-0 lead hoping that their next flight back home will be with a trophy in tow. The Rays have certainly threatened in this Fall Classic so it won’t be a cakewalk, especially going into Tropicana Field where they’ve had the best home record in baseball, but the Brew Crew have to like their odds.

It’ll be a busy day here as we close out the weekend, and Matt has contributed heavily to the cause today: he’ll lead off with an extended look at how Game 2 went down last night before covering his own exploits avenging the Yankees’ dismal results by wrecking havoc in some MLB The Show sims, and then rounding it all out with a look at Bobby Brown’s incredible career as a baseball player and a cardiologist. Estevao takes a look at which contract the Yankees would blip out of existence from their current roster if they could, and John ends the day with the weekly social media spotlight.

Today’s Playoff Matchup:

Off-day

Questions/Prompts:

1. Was stealing Game 2 back after falling behind 4-0 in the Rasmussen start a dagger for Milwaukee, or do you expect the Rays to claw their way back into this series?

2. How will Fastball Freddy fare in his World Series debut against his former team?

MLB Trade Rumors | Charlie Wright: As my colleague Madison covered in detail yesterday, the Yankees finalized a three-year extension for pitching coach Matt Blake, keeping probably the most important member of their coaching staff in the fold. The Yankees pitching staff boasted the best ERA in the league (3.23), and that has as much to do with Blake’s work with star and presumptive AL Cy Young Cam Schlittler as it has to do with his well-known talent for converting pitchers they acquire into impact relievers, Brent Headrick and Paul Blackburn the foremost examples this season. With Blake continuing in his role and last year’s reunion with assistant pitching coach Desi Druschel, the Yankees’ pitching development factory looks to be in good hands for the near future.

The Big Lead | J.P Hoornstra: The Yankees may have succeeded in retaining Blake, but they lost another influential voice in their pitching room. Spencer Medick, pitching coach for Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, has agreed to join the Astros as their new major league director of pitching. It’s a huge promotion for a minor league pitching coach and one that is well deserved given how well Yankees prospects at that level pitched in 2026. Medick helped implement the organization-wide pitching philosophy at the level closest to the majors, and it is no surprise that the Yankees minor league affiliates lapped the field when it came to K-BB%, one of the best publicly available predictive stats for future performance.

SNY | Phillip Martinez: The Yankees’ infield is in need of a major revamp this offseason, though it remains to be seen whether that renovation is forthcoming. We’ve spent the last few days wondering about second base and Jazz Chisholm Jr.‘s future, and today we shift our attention to third. The Yankees have been among the worst teams in the league at third base over the last decade, the platoon of Ryan McMahon and Amed Rosario the latest to disappoint at the hot corner. The most likely course in 2027 would be a platoon between McMahon and Caballero given they are both still under contract, though they could consider shifting Anthony Volpe after he took reps there leading into the postseason. Looking outside the organization, the author considers trade proposals for Eugenio Suárez and Isaac Paredes while also examining the free agent cases of Alec Bohm and Bo Bichette should he opt out of his deal with the Mets.

MLB.com | Sweeny Murti: Almost 70 years after attending the last World Series win in Milwaukee, Joe Torre is back in the city that gave him his shot in baseball watching another Fall Classic. Torre was just a teenager when the Milwaukee Braves defeated the Yankees in seven games in 1957, his older brother a backup first baseman on the winning team. Torre played the first six seasons of his career in Milwaukee for the Braves before the franchise moved to Atlanta, and you can bet the Hall of Fame player and manager is rooting for the home team.

MILWAUKEE – This World Series is set to move on from Dairyland, but not before a chicken-or-the-egg question is settled:

Are the Tampa Bay Raysblowing it on the big stage, or are the Milwaukee Brewers forcing them to act like imposters and not the 98-win American League champions?

The answer is relatively immaterial, since only one thing matters: The Brewers are up 2-0 in this World Series after a 5-4 Game 2 victory, their second one-run conquest and a most unlikely one given that the club trailed 4-0 after a half-inning.

Or maybe it was totally predictable.

The Brewers are now 9-1 in this postseason and, stunningly, have won seven of eight games in which they have trailed. Relentless. Demoralizing.

Two wins from a World Series championship.

Let’s break down the winners and losers of Game 2 from American Family Field as the Series shifts to the Gulf Coast:

MILWAUKEE — The Milwaukee Brewers were doing everything in their power Saturday night, no matter how much they were asked by the horde of media in their clubhouse, not to think about it.

They were certainly not saying anything about it.

But, my God, after their latest miraculous comeback, winning 5-4 over the Tampa Bay Rays at frenzied American Family Field, how can they not start dreaming?

They are up 2 games to 0 over the Rays, halfway to their first World Series championship in franchise history.

“Your brain really wants to go there, but you can’t let it," said Brewers pitcher Brandon Woodruff, their longest-tenured player, who has been with the organization since 2014. “You know what I mean? It’s like Kobe Bryant used to say, 'The job is not finished.’ We still got a lot of baseball lot to play.

“But come on, we’re human, how can you not think about it?"

Box Score

The 2026 Milwaukee Brewers might have to borrow a 40-year-old slogan from the Goonies: “Never Say Die.“

Tonight, the Brewers were facing Drew Rasmussen, the Tampa Bay ace and the best starting pitcher of the postseason so far. Logan Henderson, who hasn’t been at his best this postseason, suffered through a disastrous first inning. But if there was one thing that the Brewers proved against the Dodgers in the National League Championship Series, it was that no lead is safe, and this remarkable team will not ever give up. In the parlance of one of the Brewer standouts this evening, the Brewers dragged Rasmussen. The ground out at-bats. They chipped away. Peck, peck, peck. And before it was over, Milwaukee had a couple of new offensive heroes, another huge comeback win, and a 2-0 series lead.

But before all that, it was a nightmare start for the Brewers.

The first batter of the game, Yandy Díaz, worked for seven pitches. The last one, a changeup way below the zone, was hit weakly to shortstop. Cooper Pratt fielded it but rushed the throw, which got by Jake Bauers and into the dugout, putting Díaz at second base. An ominous omen.

Henderson recovered momentarily and struck out Jonathan Aranda for the first out. But Chandler Simpson did Chandler Simpson things, knocking an RBI single into center field, after which he stole second and then scored when Junior Caminero followed with another RBI single. The Rays weren’t finished, though: Liam Hicks got an 0-1 cutter right down the middle and hit it out to right center, the first homer of the series, which made it 4-0 Rays with only one out on the board.

Henderson did retire the next two, but the Brewers would have to dig themselves out of a deep hole on this night. Fortunately, they’re a team that has proved time and time again that they’re a team that brought their shovels to the postseason. They got to work on Rasmussen immediately in the bottom of the first: Jackson Chourio singled, moved to third on a single by Bauers, and then scored when, after a Christian Yelich strikeout, William Contreras came through as he has so many times over the past month with an RBI single through the right side of the infield.

Brice Turang hit into a hard-luck second out when he hit a 109 mph line drive right at Richie Palacios. But Garrett Mitchell kept the pressure on the Rays, and hit a 112 mph single into right that scored Bauers. Pratt struck out to end the inning, but Milwaukee had immediately halved the Rays lead.

A leadoff walk to Victor Mesa Jr. in the second had Henderson on the precipice, but he showed some fight; Taylor Walls bunted, Mesa Jr. over to second but made the first out, and Henderson struck out Díaz and Aranda to get through the inning unscathed. Rasmussen was on his way to a quick inning in the bottom of the second, but Chourio took a hammer to his pitch count when, with two outs, he battled for 11 pitches before hitting a 105 mph groundout. It was a 1-2-3 inning for the Tampa Bay ace, but he had to work hard for it.

Henderson got one more inning and made the most of it, retiring Simpson, Caminero, and Hicks in order. The Brewers were unable to score in the bottom of the inning despite Contreras’s second hit of the game (which pushed his batting average in the postseason over .400). In the top of the fourth, JoJo Romero replaced Henderson and worked around a one-out single to put up another zero.

The Brewers were back on Rasmussen in the bottom of the fourth. With one out, Pratt drew a walk, and two pitches later, Sal Frelick lined a solid single into right, putting runners on the corners. David Hamilton, in a possible squeeze situation, eschewed the bunt and swung away, ultimately hitting what should’ve been a routine grounder to first. But Aranda, possibly with an eye on trying to get Pratt at home, booted it, and everyone was safe. The lead was down to one.

The Rays worked out of the inning, but after a Chourio groundout, Rasmussen walked Bauers, which ended his evening. He was replaced by the Rays’ best lefty, Cam Booser, who faced Yelich; another manager may have gone to Andrew Vaughn as a pinch-hitter with the bases full and two out, but Pat Murphy rode with Yelich, who anticlimactically grounded out to second.

The Brewer pitcher in the fifth was Dustin May. With one out, Aranda lined a double into the right-field corner, but May was able to work out of it—Aranda moved to third on a Simpson groundout, but a Pratt made an assured play on a slow Caminero chopper to end the inning and strand the Ray first baseman at third.

Booser worked through the middle of the Brewers’ order in the bottom of the fifth, allowing only a walk to Turang. DL Hall replaced May in the sixth and put himself in a hole when he hit the leadoff batter, Hicks, on the right forearm. He moved over on a sacrifice by Palacios, but Hall got the second out on a strikeout of Johnny DeLuca. Mesa Jr., though, came through with a two-out single to left, but Rays third base coach Brady Williams got extremely aggressive by sending his leadfooted catcher on a single to shallow left; Chourio’s throw was on target, and Hicks was toast at home plate.

The Brewers seized the momentum from getting the final out at home. With lefty Ian Seymor on to face the bottom of the Brewer order, Frelick, of all people, battled for nine pitches, and on the last one he took a 93 mph fastball right over the heart of the plate and hit it out to center field. Tie ballgame.

Milwaukee kept making Seymour work hard. Hamilton fell into a 1-2 count but hit seven foul balls before striking out. Chourio saw eight pitches before he struck out. With two outs, Bauers worked a walk. Yelich, against another lefty, hit a pop-up to shallow left, but it was sort of in no-man’s land between Walls, the shortstop, and Simpson, the left fielder. Some indecision about whose ball it was led to Simpson fielding it awkwardly; he had it in his glove, but he fell down while making the catch and when the glove hit the ground, the ball popped out. Bauers made it to third, while Yelich had a “single.”

With runners on the corners and two out, the Rays needed to pull Seymour, who had thrown 34 pitches and not recored an out. Kevin Cash went to righty Tyler Wells to face Contreras, who was definitely the batter the Brewers wanted up in this situation. The move to Wells worked, though; Contreras grounded out to third to end the inning. Still, for the second time in three games, the Brewers had erased an early 4-0 deficit by the end of the sixth inning.

With the game tied, the Brewers pivoted firmly toward their “A” bullpen, as Abner Uribe entered the game in place of Hall, facing Walls and then, for the second time in two days, the top of the Tampa Bay order. Troublingly, Uribe walked Walls, the worst hitter on the Rays’ roster, to set up the top of the order. Uribe got ahead of Díaz, and the Tampa Bay DH fouled off a bunch of pitches to stay alive, but Uribe finally got him with a slider for the first out. Aranda, who singled off of Uribe on Friday night, grounded out to second, but not until after Walls had stolen second base. With Walls at third and two out, Simpson was up, but he grounded out to first and Uribe’s bad leadoff walk didn’t come back on him.

With Wells still pitching, Turang got a rare at-bat against a right-handed reliever, and smoked the second pitch to the warning track in the right-field gap for a double. Mitchell also hit a ball deep to right but Mesa Jr. made a leaping catch in front of the wall; Turang was able to move to third, though, so it was a productive out. Cash went back to his bullpen and replaced Wells with another righty, Kevin Kelly, with Pratt at the plate.

Pratt delivered with the biggest hit of his young career. A base hit into right scored Turang from third, and the Brewers had flipped a 4-0 deficit into a 5-4 lead.

With Frelick back at the plate, Pratt stole second base, and the Brewers had another runner in scoring position with less than two outs. Frelick very nearly went yard again—he got into one, and the whole ballpark (and your humble scribe) thought he’d gotten his second of the game. But it held up on the warning track and Mesa Jr. made the catch for the second out. Hamilton grounded out, and Pratt was stranded, but not before he’d given the Brewers a late lead.

The Brewers now had a path to the end of the game in which they could avoid facing the top of the Rays order again. With the right-handed Caminero at the plate, Uribe stayed in the game with Aaron Ashby ready in the bullpen. Uribe got Caminero to chase a couple sliders that were way out of the zone, and on the fifth of five straight sliders from the Brewer righty, Caminero rolled over it harmlessly to shortstop for the first out. Ashby then replaced Uribe, and Cash countered by pinch-hitting Ryan Vilade for Hicks, and Ashby struck him out on a 3-2 changeup. Palacios hit a harmless grounder to second, which Turang flipped over to Bauers for the third out. Ashby was up to 14 2/3 scoreless innings this postseason.

With Kelly still pitching, Chourio led off the eighth with a single to center. Bauers flew out to the fringe of the warning track in left, but with Yelich up Chourio stole second base. Yelich drew a walk, and Contreras came to the plate to face Kelly, who was certainly on his last hitter. With Contreras at the plate, the Brewers executed a double steal, putting runners at second and third with one out. Contreras chased a 3-2 pitch and hit a grounder to shortstop, and Chourio was thrown out at home. The Brewers challenged, and it was very, very close, but for the second straight night, a very close, late-inning review on a run-scoring play went the Rays’ way as the play stood. Kelly was replaced by lefty Steven Matz, and with two outs and runners on the corners, Turang battled and made decent contact but flew out down the left-field line to end the inning.

Ashby had only thrown nine pitches to get his two outs in the eighth, so the Brewers rolled him back out there with a one-run lead in the ninth, with the bottom of the order due up. But maybe the long bottom of the eighth was a detriment; DeLuca lined a double down the right-field line to start the inning, and the Rays let the Brewers know: it’s not going to be that easy.

Trevor Megill warmed in the bullpen as Ashby faced Mesa Jr., but Ashby got back into the inning by striking him out on four pitches. The Rays sent pinch-hitter Ben Williamson to the plate in place of Walls, and he rolled a ball out to Turang. DeLuca advanced to third, but there were two out. Here’s where Murphy had a choice to make: did he stick with Ashby, or did he bring on Megill to face the right-handed Yandy Díaz, who led the majors in batting average with runners in scoring position this year.

Murphy stuck with Ashby. Ashby fell behind 3-1. He worked it back full. On 3-2, Ashby put a curveball in the dirt. Díaz tried to check his swing, but first-base umpire James Hoye said he went around. It was close, but it was a just mirror of a non-call on Caminero’s check swing in the ninth inning on Friday night. The game was over, and Ashby, by working out of trouble, added to his postseason legend.

This team’s resiliency has been a trait all season, but now their ability to bounce back, their unwillingness to give in, their “never say die” attitude, has become their defining characteristic. Two games ago, the Brewers fell behind 4-0 to the Dodgers after Shohei Ohtani’s three-run homer. It took them three innings to erase the deficit and a fourth to take the lead. Tonight, they fell behind 4-0, and it took them a whole six innings to erase the Rays’ lead and seven to take the lead. How lazy of them.

The Brewers got offensive contributions up and down the roster; every batter in the lineup got at least one hit except for Hamilton, who reached on a run-scoring error and was credited with an RBI. In a postseason that keeps giving us new heroes, tonight it was Frelick, whose solo homer in the sixth tied the game, and Pratt, who atoned for his first-inning throwing error by knocking in the go-ahead, and ultimately winning, run in the seventh.

And then there was Ashby, this postseason’s Grim Reaper. Tonight he was cruel enough to make Tampa Bay think they were going to get him before he buckled down and got the last three outs of the game. He’s up to 15 2/3 scoreless innings in the postseason. No player has ever thrown that many innings and had a scoreless postseason; only Andrew Miller has a longer postseason streak, but if Ashby can get two more outs without allowing a run, he’ll break that record, too.

Milwaukee now takes a 2-0 lead to Tampa. They say that seven-game postseason series don’t really begin until someone wins a game on the road, but the Brewers have put themselves in excellent position by beating the Rays at what the Rays have done best all season: winning one-run games. After an off day tomorrow, we’ll be back at it on Monday night at 7pm central time.

MILWAUKEE — Sal Frelick tied the score with his first home run in three months, Cooper Pratt hit a go-ahead single in the seventh inning and the Milwaukee Brewers stunned the Tampa Bay Rays 5-4 on Saturday night for a 2-0 World Series lead by overcoming a four-run deficit for the second time this postseason.

Tampa Bay, which won the AL pennant in part by consistently forcing opponents into mistakes, committed one error, made two other misplays on defense and had a runner thrown out at the plate by Brewers left fielder Jackson Chourio.u

Down 4-0 in the first inning, Milwaukee rallied for its seventh comeback win of this postseason. The Brewers also rebounded from a 4-0 deficit to beat the Los Angeles Dodgers 6-4 in Game 4 of the NL Championship Series, completing a four-game sweep.

“As long as there’s game left, we have a chance. I think we’ve all bought into that. We’re never out of it,” Pratt said.

After losing Friday’s opener 3-2, the Rays burst ahead against rookie Logan Henderson but the Brewers started to claw back with two runs in the bottom half off Tampa Bay ace Drew Rasmussen.

David Hamilton cut the deficit to 4-3 with a run-scoring grounder in the fourth and Frelick capped a nine-pitch at-bat against Ian Seymour in the sixth by driving a fastball over the center-field fence.

Frelick had gone 103 plate appearances without a home run since his July 11 drive off Pittsburgh’s Braxton Ashcraft and had not gone deep against a lefty pitcher since opening day against Tyler Gilbert of the Chicago White Sox. Frelick sped around the bases in 18.72 seconds, half the time of some theatrical trots this postseason.

“I was just pumped to try to get back to the dugout,” the 5-foot-9 Frelick said. “I don’t hit a lot of home runs, especially to center, so I was happy it went out.”

Screaming fans at Milwaukee’s first World Series since 1982 were fired up during the seventh-inning stretch, dancing to the “Beer Barrel Polka” played by Mike Schneider, an accordionist from Clinton, Wisconsin.

“It’s mayhem, and I’ve never experienced anything like it before,” Frelick said. “It’s been motivating for all the players.”

Brice Turang doubled against losing pitcher Tyler Wells on the second pitch of the bottom half, advanced on Garrett Mitchell’s deep flyout to right and scored when Pratt, a 22-year-old shortstop who debuted in June, looped a sinker from Kevin Kelly into short right field.

“I feel like we’ve been down a lot early throughout the playoffs so far,” Frelick said. “Nine innings to play, and it doesn’t really change your offensive plan at all. We’re trying to go up, take a chunk of the pitcher each at-bat, pass it to the next guy and hopefully that leads to a few runs doing that.”

Abner Uribe pitched 1 1/3 hitless innings for the win.

Jonny DeLuca doubled off Aaron Ashby starting the ninth, then Victor Mesa Jr. struck out when he couldn’t check his swing. Pinch-hitter Ben Williamson’s groundout advanced the runner and Yandy Díaz struck out when he couldn’t check his swing on a full-count pitch.

Ashby has three saves in the postseason while not allowing a run.

“Look, we didn’t play our cleanest baseball game by any stretch,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “We pride ourselves on doing everything we can to support the pitchers and making plays behind them. Today was probably not our best day.”

Milwaukee won its seventh straight game, becoming the fifth team to twice overcome four-run deficits for victories in a single postseason and the first since Philadelphia in 2022.

Game 3 of the matchup between teams seeking their first title is Monday night at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida, where the Brewers last played in 2023.

Of the 57 previous teams to take 2-0 World Series leads, 46 claimed the championship.

Tampa Bay took a 4-2 lead in the highest-scoring Series first inning since 1993’s Game 4 as the teams combined for seven hits, tying the most in an opening frame.

Henderson followed Jacob Misiorowski in the Brewers’ rotation, the first time teammates 24 or younger started the first two games of a World Series since Cincinnati’s Gary Nolan and Ross Grimsley in 1972.

Henderson started on 11 days’ rest and struggled as the Rays fouled off 13 of 35 pitches in the first. He gave up four runs — three earned — in three innings.

Given an extra day of rest, Rasmussen allowed three runs and six hits over 3 2/3 innings in his shortest start since July 9.

“Just felt like he wasn’t as sharp as he’s been for quite some time,” Cash said.

Pratt made his fourth error of the postseason, the Brewers’ ninth in 10 games, bouncing his throw past first baseman Jake Bauers on a leadoff grounder by Díaz. Chandler Simpson and Junior Caminero followed with RBI singles, and Liam Hicks hit a two-run homer.

Chourio and Bauers started the bottom half with singles and first baseman Jonathan Aranda allowed Contreras’ one-out foul pop to bounce out of his mitt near netting in front of the seats.

With Bauers running on a full-count pitch, Contreras bounced an RBI single to the left of second baseman Richie Palacios, who had taken a step toward the bag. Mitchell’s two-out single cut the deficit to 4-2.

Hamilton hit an RBI grounder in the fourth that bounced under Aranda’s legs for an error.

Chourio threw out Hicks for the final out of the sixth when third base coach Brady Williams waved the slow-footed catcher to try to score from second on Mesa’s single.

“I think we’ve made some mistakes on the bases for sure, going back to yesterday,” Cash said. “To their credit, they have responded with everything that we have thrown at them in these first two games.”

For the second night in a row, the final out of a World Series game involved some drama.

With a runner on third and two outs in the ninth inning on Saturday in Game 2, first base umpire James Hoye ruled that the Tampa Bay Rays' Yandy Diaz was unable to hold his swing on a third strike from Milwaukee Brewers lefty Aaron Ashby.

Home plate umpire Jim Wolf initially didn't think that Diaz had gone around, but Brewers catcher William Contreras won his appeal to first. The strikeout ended the Brewers' 5-4 win at American Family Field in Milwaukee, overcoming a four-run deficit against Tampa Bay.

Diaz's check-swing was one of the closer calls you'll see in baseball, as the rulebook lacks a rigid, black-and-white definition.

"In the moment, yeah, I disagreed. But the umpire said it was a swing and it is what it is," Diaz said after the game.

"Ultimately, we lost."

Do you think Yandy Díaz checked his swing here? pic.twitter.com/CxwDi4ixlk

— FOX Sports: MLB (@MLBONFOX) October 25, 2026

MILWAUKEE – They held a two-day celebration for the Milwaukee Brewers at American Family Field, Games 1 and 2 of the World Series turning into a pulsating polka for the home team, a resilient group that seemingly wins under any circumstance.

The Tampa Bay Rays? They, too, were invited to the party. But their play continues to suggest they’ll be a mere footnote to this Fall Classic.

The best team in the American League has looked like no match for the Brewers even as they lost Games 1 and 2 of this World Series by one run. Yet in their deflating 5-4 loss to Milwaukee on Saturday, Oct. 24, the gap between an opportunistic club two wins from a championship and a confused squad bumbling toward the winter grew wider.

That's crazy, right? After all, the Rays got the tying run into scoring position in the top of the ninth inning in both games, with Yandy Díaz striking out against Trevor Megill on a check swing to end Game 2.