Caleb Durbin had two different RBI singles, Quinn Priester was perfect through four, and Christian Yelich recorded his 100th RBI of the season as Milwaukee completed their sweep of the Los Angeles Angels. The Crew have now won 19 straight games when Priester starts.
Both pitchers brought their “A” game early. Milwaukee broke a 0-0 tie in the bottom of the fourth off of Angels starter Yusei Kikuchi thanks to an Andrew Vaughn double and a Durbin RBI single. Blake Perkins, the next batter, tried to keep the inning alive by beating out a bunt, but was thrown out at first to end the inning with the Brewers ahead, 1-0.
Priester was as dominant as he’s ever been in a Brewers uniform — at least through the first four innings. Priester started tonight’s game by striking out the first six Angels he faced. He also struck out the eighth and ninth hitters to give him eight strikeouts through the first three frames. His sinker was touching 97 at times. Second baseman Christian Moore was the only Angel to make contact against Priester the first time through the order. Absolutely dominant.
A 1-0 lead almost felt like it would be enough, especially because the Brewers haven’t lost a game started by Priester since May. He still had a perfect game going into the fifth but began to show signs of fatigue after walking Jo Adell on five straight pitches out of the zone. The next batter, Luis Rengifo, turned on a 2-1 slider and hit it into the visitors’ bullpen. Priester was able to avoid any further damage after Rengifo’s home run, working around a walk to retire the side with the score still 2-1, Angels.
After the Brewers went down in order in the bottom of the fifth, the Angels threatened to score again in the sixth. Chris Taylor struck out looking for Priester’s 10th strikeout of the game, but things unraveled from there. Mike Trout and Taylor Ward singled to put runners on first and second with one out. Aaron Ashby was warming in the the bullpen by this point, but manager Pat Murphy left Priester in to face Adell. With Priester at 87 pitches and seemingly fading fast, I was curious about Murphy’s decision, so I did some quick research: Adell has a 91 tOPS+ against righties (like Priester) and a 141 tOPS+ against lefties (like Ashby).
Murphy got the matchup he wanted, and Priester got the result he wanted — a fly ball out to right field that settled harmlessly into the glove of Jackson Chourio in right for the second out. Neither Trout nor Ward were able to advance on the play, bringing up Rengifo with another opportunity to play hero. Fortunately for the Brewers, Ashby struck him out on three pitches for the third out, keeping the score 2-1.
The Brewers then countered to tie the game up in the bottom of the sixth. After William Contreras grounded out for the first out, Yelich ripped a single into left field. Vaughn then finished a great at-bat with a walk, bringing up Isaac Collins with a chance to tie the game. Collins popped out to first. but luckily the next hitter up was Caleb Clutch:
Durbin’s second RBI single of the day tied things back up at 2-2. Los Angeles quickly threatened to pull back ahead in the top of the seventh, putting runners on second and third with two outs. Taylor hit a deep drive to center field over the head of Blake Perkins, who made a difficult sliding grab look routine:
Milwaukee finally pulled ahead in the bottom of the seventh. Chourio led off with a ground-rule double, and Turang quickly knocked him in. Contreras walked, then Yelich smoked a double out of reach of a diving Ward and off of the left-field wall. Vaughn made the first out of the inning, which was still a productive one: a sacrifice fly scoring Contreras. After the dust settled, Milwaukee was ahead 5-2, the same score by which they would win.
Murphy had Abner Uribe pitch the eighth and Jared Koenig pitch the ninth in a save opportunity, presumably because the Angels had the heart of their lineup due up in the eighth (Trout, Ward, Adell). Los Angeles did briefly threaten against Uribe after an error by Vaughn at first allowed Trout to reach third, but Uribe struck out Rengifo and Yoan Moncada back-to-back to end the inning.
Milwaukee now heads down to St. Louis to face off with the Cardinals, who they haven’t played since … Sunday. The Brewers’ magic number is now four, meaning they have to go at least 4-5 from here on out to win the division. They have a six-game lead over the Cubs in NL Central and a three-game lead over the Phillies for the NL’s No. 1 seed. 6-3 would put the Brewers at exactly 100 wins on the season. It’s almost October.
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