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Here's the on-field celebration
More to come in the visitor's clubhouse, no doubt.
The job isn't done. Not yet. The Milwaukee Brewers still sit four wins away from the pinnacle of Major League Baseball: the World Series title that has eluded the franchise for 57 seasons.
At present, though, there is no doubting that this, a four-game NLCS sweep of the two-time defending champion Los Angeles Dodgers, is the highest point in the history of Brewers baseball. They closed it down with a 6-4, come-from-behind victory Thursday night.
Until this, they had just one pennant, the 1982 American League title with Harvey's Wallbangers, led by future Hall of Famers Robin Yount, Ted Simmons, Rollie Fingers and Paul Molitor, as well as the likes of Ben Oglivie, Gorman Thomas, Cecil Cooper, Jim Gantner, Cy Young winner Pete Vukovich and late addition -- another Hall of Famer -- Don Sutton.
This is different. This is better. That Brewers squad was a memorable bunch and loaded with talent, sure, but it was a two-year window -- the first year was the strike-shortened 1981 season -- before the Brewers went back to missing the playoffs every single year. That's not an exaggeration. Entering 2008, the Brewers had existed for 39 years and reached the postseason just twice. They then made it in 2008 and 2011. Still, headed into 2018, those were the only playoff seasons in Brewers history: four in 49 years.
Since then, the Brewers have made the playoffs in eight of the last nine seasons. They set a franchise record for wins in 2025 with 97 and then broke that record in 2026 with 103. Prior to 2018, the Brewers had only won three division titles. In the last nine years, they've taken the NL Central six times, including each of the last four seasons.
This was already the Golden Era of Brewers baseball. Now, with their first National League pennant, this is the culmination of all these years of regular-season success.
Getting over the hump in the NLCS against the Big Bad Dodgers felt both fitting and necessary. We've seen it so many times in sports; there's an established team in the way, and the upstart ballclub needs to get past their long-time nemesis. The Dodgers bounced the Brewers in the 2018 NLCS, the 2020 Wild Card Series and then, most painfully, swept them in the 2025 NLCS. It was total destruction, as the Dodgers outscored the Brewers 15-4.
The talking point that MLB needs a salary cap picked up even more steam. Sure, the Brewers could end up with the best record in the regular season, but once the postseason hits, the high-salaried Dodgers would just flip the proverbial switch. A small-market team like Milwaukee could never, ever compete with them on this monstrous stage, or so the narrative went.
This time around, the Brewers were ready. They'd stared in the eyes of Goliath and slung the stone in those eyes.
Games 1, 2 and 3 perfectly illustrated how things are different in 2026. The Brewers scored just one run in each of their four losses last season as they were dominated by the Dodgers' stable of aces. This season, they trailed 1-0 in Game 1 with two-time Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal on the hill for Los Angeles. They got two runs off Skubal to grab a lead they wouldn't lose. In Game 2, they were up against last season's World Series MVP, Yoshinobu Yamamoto. He didn't last through the third inning. The Dodgers scored in three different innings and the Brewers immediately answered every single time to either tie or take the lead. In Game 3, the Brewers held a 1-0 lead for a long time before the Dodgers scored two in the sixth to take the lead. In the top of the seventh, the Brewers grabbed three runs and then left no doubt by tacking on in the eighth and ninth.
Game 4 was even better. The Brewers fell behind 4-0 in the second inning on the strength of a Shohei Ohtani home run. If anything was going to breathe new life into the Dodgers, this was exactly it. Dodgers starter Tyler Glasnow had a perfect game through three innings. Then the Brewers put up two runs in the fourth and two more in the fifth before Garrett Mitchell hit what would prove to be the pennant-clinching home run.
This was what the Brewers were built to do: climb and scrape and win. They've used more power in the 2026 postseason than usual, but this is their game.
It might be mostly the same personnel as 2025, but these 2026 Brewers are built differently.
How they got here
First off, the organization is the best in baseball at knowing itself. The Brewers get every single ounce of production out of their talent. They develop players internally, grab others off the scrap heap or trade for players they believe they can coach up. Just look at some of their more important players to see the ways in which the Brewers thrive:
- Brice Turang, a Brewers' first-round draft pick, is arguably the best second baseman in baseball;
- Jacob Misiorowski is all but guaranteed to win the NL Cy Young this season. He was a second-round pick for the Brewers in 2022 but didn't reach top prospect status until 2024;
- Jake Bauers was a seventh-round pick in 2013, bounced around in seven different organizations and nearly quit baseball before re-signing with the Brewers;
- William Contreras debuted with the Braves as "Willson's brother" in 2020 and was an also-ran in a three-team trade ("the Sean Murphy trade" at the time) that sent him to Milwaukee;
- Andrew Vaughn was a first-round bust when the White Sox traded him to the Brewers in June 2025;
- Logan Henderson was a fourth-round pick and had never been a top-100 prospect when he made his MLB debut;
- Abner Uribe spent parts of seven seasons in the minors before finally becoming an ace reliever;
- Jackson Chourio was a top-five prospect in all of MLB when he debuted. He's still only 22;
- Christian Yelich was an All-Star with the Marlins when the Brewers traded for him prior to the 2018 season. He was the face of the franchise's turnaround.
We could keep going, but you get it. It's all over the map. They find players in every which way. The only thing they all have in common is that the Brewers are getting the absolute best out of them.
There have been plenty of personnel losses along the way, whether players left for monster paychecks in free agency, the organization decided to trade them a year or two before free agency, or a manager or executive took a higher-paying big-market job. It just never stopped them.
Why it worked
The 2026 Crew is good at pretty much everything. They led the majors in batting average and on-base percentage while ranking second in runs scored. They were in the top five in sac bunts and stolen bases. They were near the bottom in errors. They had one of the best team defenses. They ranked second in ERA behind the likely Cy Young winner (Misiorowski), another emerging ace (Henderson) and a downright nasty bullpen. The one thing they didn't rank highly in was home runs (29th in the majors), but they have the ability to hit for power. Just look at the playoffs.
Sometimes in sports, you'll hear conversations about a team's "identity." The Brewers' identity, as it has been for the last nine seasons, is winning. They churn out winning baseball players like an efficient assembly line. More are coming, too, as the Brewers boast one of the best farm systems in baseball.
First things first, though. The job isn't yet done.
This is the high point in the history of Brewers baseball, the height of the Golden Era. The final apex must be a World Series title.
