BULLET DODGED
Milkwaukee holds off furious L.A rally to take 1-0 NCLS lead
MILWAUKEE — Brandon Woodruff struck out the side against the heart of the Dodgers’ batting order in the fourth inning Friday, but that wasn’t even close to the highlight of his night.
On the exponentially grander level, the Brewers reliever led off the bottom of the third inning with a towering blast that created a thunderous roar from a Miller Park sellout crowd of 43,615. That it came against an iconic pitcher like Clayton Kershaw only added to the moment.
The Brewers had their energy burst. Woodruff ’s homer started a two-inning flurry that propelled the Brewers to a 6-5 victory in Game 1 of the NLCS.
Woodruff became only the third reliever to hit a postseason homer. His home-run trot — more like a dance around the bases — included a look behind him toward the Brewers’ dugout.
“I was just trying to look at the whole bunch and trying to get them fired up,” Woodruff said. “I thought that was a big moment to kind of get the guys going, and I guess that is the reason I turned around and was just kind of going crazy a little bit.” Mission accomplished. “Got the team going, and that’s exactly what we needed,” Lorenzo Cain said.
Woodruff crushed a 2-2 fastball from Kershaw for the first leftyon-lefty homer by a pitcher in postseason history.
“To see the ball go out of the ballpark against Clayton, that was a surprise to all of us,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said.
The Brewers, who are trying to reach the World Series for the first time since 1982, have won 12 straight games, with a dominant bullpen leading the stampede.
Friday night, it was Woodruff, Josh Hader, Xavier Cedeno, Joakim Soria, Jeremy Jeffress and Corey Knebel that delivered, albeit barely. The Dodgers rallied for three runs in the eighth against Soria and Jeffress, but pinch-hitter Yasiel Puig struck out with the tying runs on base to keep the Brewers in control. In the ninth, Chris Taylor stroked a two-out RBI triple, but was left stranded as Knebel struck out Justin Turner. Kershaw added another postseason clunker to his résumé by lasting just three-plus innings in which he allowed five runs, one unearned, on six hits and two walks. The ace lefty has been the pitcher of his generation in the regular season, but in- credibly ordinary in the postseason. With his latest dud, Kershaw’s career postseason ERA jumped from 4.08 to 4.26.
Domingo Santana’s two-run single in the fourth buried Kershaw in a 4-1 hole after he had walked the inning’s leadoff hitter, Manny Pina, and allowed a single to Orlando Arcia. Ryan Braun’s RBI single later in the inning extended the Brewers’ lead to 5-1
Yasmani Grandal, a player in whom the Mets could show interest this offseason on the free-agent market, had a brutal third inning in which he committed two errors and was charged with a passed ball. The biggest of those miscues was a catcher’s interference on Jesus Aguilar’s swing that helped the Brewers score an unearned run on Hernan Perez’s sacrifice fly. Grandal finished the night with two errors and two passed balls.
“We didn’t play clean when [Kershaw] was in the game,” Roberts said. “The errors affected the game.”
Manny Machado’s homer leading off the second against Gio Gonzalez produced the game’s first run. It was the third homer this postseason for Machado, who could become a Yankees target in free agency as Didi Gregorius heads to Tommy John surgery that could sideline him for a good portion of 2019.
The veteran lefty Gonzalez. was removed after just two innings in which he allowed the one run. It continued the Brewers’ strategy of heavy bullpen reliance throughout the postseason.
“That was the plan we had talked about, and Gio knew what was going to happen,” Brewers manager Craig Counsell said.