ST. PETERSBURG, FL — If it were a prize fight, they would have stopped it in the fifth round.
If it was a World Baseball Classic game, they would have stopped it after seven innings.
If it wasn’t a nationally-televised game, they may have begun showing re-runs of Gilligan’s Island.
The Milwaukee Brewers put on an old-fashioned whooping on the Tampa Bay Rays in Game 3 of the World Series Monday night, winning 10-1, and all but mathematically ending this mismatch of a World Series.
The Brewers are up 3 games to 0, and don’t be surprised if the entire state of Wisconsin jumps on flights Tuesday, turning Tropicana Field into their own personal playground to watch them win their first World Series championship history.
The Brewers, who tied a postseason record with eight consecutive victories, now have a chance to go where only the 1976 Cincinnati Reds “Big Red Machine,"1 has ever gone, sweeping a League Championship Series and a World Series.
In a series that was expected to be riveting with these two small-market teams, has turned into a massacre.
The Brewers nearly came within one out of joining Don Larsen as the only pitcher to throw a perfect game in the World Series. It just so happened to be the first hitter of the game with Yandy Diaz’s single.
It was the Rays’ last baserunner until the ninth inning.
It was so ugly this night that by the sixth inning, the Brewers had 18 baserunners. The Rays had one.
Brewers left fielder Jackson Chourio had four hits by the fifth inning, becoming the youngest player to produce four hits in a World Series game since Joe Garagiola in 1946. The Rays, of all ages, had one.
It was so comical that the Rays made Brewers starter Robert Gasser look like Sandy Koufax, not producing a single hit after Victor Diaz’s leadoff single. Gaasser not only became the first Brewer to complete six innings this entire postseason, but tying a postseason record by winning all four of his games on the road.
By the time the game ended, the joint was half-empty, with the only ones remaining from the sellout crowd of 40,388 being Brewers’ fans who turned Tropicana Field into their own brewery.
“Our fans are a huge part of this whole thing," Brewers manager Pat Murphy said. “The whole city of Milwaukee, the whole state of Wisconsin, they're a big part of this. Our guys are aware of that responsibility and how much that state, that city, loves the Brewers and supports the Brewers.
“So I'm not surprised."
The game actually was close until the fifth innings, with the Brewers clinging to a 2-and-0 lead, and having former Brewers ace Freddy Peralta on the ropes.
Then, came the play that turned the game completely upside down.
Brewers catcher William Contreras, with runners on first and second, hit a sharp bouncer to third baseman Junior Caminero that spun him around. He could have easily thrown out Contreras at first base, but opted instead to make the short throw to second base.
He underestimated the fact that veteran Christian Yelich was hustling on the play, and although second baseman Dan Bellino called him out, the replay showed he slid in safely. The inning was still alive. The bases were loaded. And Rays manager Kevin Cash called on left-hander Cam Booser to face Brice Turang.
Turang, with two strikes, hit a 106-mph fastball that shortstop Taylor Wells smothered, but the ball caromed off his glove into shallow center field, allowing two runs to score for a 4-0 lead.
Garrett Mitchell followed with a run-scoring single to left field. 5-0.
Cooper Pratt, on the first pitch, lined a double that deflected off Caminero’s glove into the left-field corner. Two more runs. 7-0.
Sal Frelick, who homered in Game 2, followed with another double to left field. 8-0.
Just like that, Booser, who had given up only two hits with runners in scoring position the entire season, while yielding a .100 batting average with men on base, gave up three consecutive run-scoring hits.
Out went Booser, in came Cole Sluser, and it made no difference.
David Hamilton greeted him with a run-scoring single. 9-0.
Chourio, producing his second hit of the inning, hit a double into right field for another run. 10-0.
Jake Bauers, the only Brewers’ player who didn’t have at least one hit, one RBI and one run by the fifth inning, flied out for the final out.
The Brewers’ faithful wildly cheered. The Rays’ fans gave them the Bronx cheer.
The game was over, with Freddy Peralta becoming the latest ace to be knocked around by the Brewers, giving up more runs in 4 ⅔ innings this night than he had in his previous seven starts at Tropicana Field.
The remainder of the game looked like a spring-training game with everyone freely substituting and getting their work in.
The Brewers, who clinched the NL Division Series on the road in San Diego, the NLCS on the road in Los Angeles, will now clinch the World Series on the road in St. Petersburg, Fla.
No World Series team in history has ever blown a 3-games-to-0 lead.
And there’s zero chance that the Brewers being the first.
It’s over, and after 113 victories, the Brewers need just one more to get ready for that downtown parade in Milwaukee.
Just what has made this team so special, so powerful, so utterly ridiculous?
“I think the buy-in from top to bottom on what we're trying to do,’’ Bauers said, “which is ultimately win a World Series. And I don't just mean the players. I mean the coaching staff, the scouts, down to the ushers working the aisles at the stadium.
“I think the entire city wants a World Series. The organization knows that, and everybody within the organization is working towards a common goal.’’
It soon will be spectacularly fulfilled with a celebration that will be forever remembered in Wisconsin.
Follow Nightengale on X: @Bnightengale
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Stop the fight! Brewers humiliate Rays and are about to win World Series
