The Morning Horsehide Herald — the Fifth of October, Two Thousand and Twenty-Six

Is it spring training yet? No — the pennants are being decided, and spring must wait its turn.

The Game of the Day

A SEASON'S PHILOSOPHY, REDEEMED ON THE FORTIETH PITCH — MILWAUKEE PLAYS EIGHT UNTIDY INNINGS, THEN WALKS THE NINTH ALIVE ONE BASE AT A TIME UNTIL CHOURIO, DOWN TO HIS FINAL STRIKE, LINES THE CLOSER MILLER INTO HEARTBREAK: BREWERS 4, PADRES 3

Asked for the evening's last six outs, San Diego's splendid closer retires the eighth in order and then unravels in the ninth — Yelich, the newly anointed captain, walking and stealing second, Frelick climbing out of a one-and-two count, the pinch-hitter Sánchez declining a hundred-and-three-mile fastball a hair beneath the zone to fill the bases — whereupon Chourio, who had failed with these same bases loaded in the seventh, fouls off a hundred and three and a half, spits on the signature slider, and lines a two-run single to center for the first trailing-into-the-last-inning resurrection in the franchise's October annals; King outpitches the debutant Henderson, France drives in two against the yard whose roof robbed him Saturday, five errors litter the ledger, and the Brew Crew flies west two games to none with history offering San Diego ten chances in three-and-ninety

A week ago, asked why this Milwaukee club should fancy itself different from the seven other October entries the Cream City has sent forth in the past eight autumns — every one of them stopped short of the World Series — the center fielder Garrett Mitchell gave the scribes a plain man's answer: "We're in it until the 27th out. This year, even down to the last out, we still have a chance. That feels different." Sunday his club spent eight innings making the prophecy look foolish and one inning making it scripture. The Brewers resembled nothing less than a nine that had won a hundred and three games: the postseason debutant Henderson loosed a costly wild pitch in the first that opened the scoring's door, the gloves committed three errors to tie the season's high, and the order managed but five hits all afternoon. They entered the ninth trailing 3-2 against Mason Miller, who had breezed through the eighth on three batters and returned for a second inning of work — a closer who posted a 1.67 figure this summer with 129 strikeouts, the most any San Diego reliever has ever collected, and who had twice this season been asked for six outs and twice delivered them without blemish.

The ninth began obediently, Mitchell himself grounding out. Then Christian Yelich, Milwaukee's newly anointed captain, worked a walk and stole second for his trouble; Sal Frelick climbed out of a one-and-two count to walk behind him; and after the pinch-hitter Vaughn flied to center — the seven-and-twentieth out of Mitchell's sermon now standing one swing away — Gary Sánchez came cold off the bench and performed an at-bat of the quiet heroic kind, declining a 103.3-mile fastball a hair beneath the zone and then a slider boring in at his hands, and the bases were full. Up stepped Jackson Chourio, two-and-twenty years old, one day removed from becoming the franchise's October home-run king, as this paper recorded yesterday, and two innings removed from grounding out with these same bases loaded in the seventh. Miller came at him with pure fire: three triple-digit fastballs, and the young man stood at his final strike. He fouled off a hundred and three and a half. He let the signature slider dart for the dirt. And on the fortieth pitch of the closer's evening — a fastball at a hundred and one, in a hittable spot — Chourio lined it to center. Cronenworth laid out at second and missed by inches; Merrill came up throwing and was late by half a second; Yelich and Frelick crossed, 41,683 shook the yard, and Milwaukee had a 4-3 verdict in a game it began the ninth losing — the first such last-inning resurrection in all the franchise's postseason history, and its third October walk-off, joining Moustakas's in 2018 and Morgan's in 2011. The fates, ever fond of a flourish, had arranged for Nyjer Morgan himself to throw one of the evening's ceremonial first pitches. "We're a team that never backs down," said Chourio. "I knew that he was going to come at me with the fastball at some point, so mentally I was just making sure that I was prepared for that."

The lawful innings beforehand had belonged, narrowly, to the visitors. Michael King gave five innings of three-hit, one-run work with six strikeouts, out-pitching Henderson, who surrendered two runs across five frames in his October baptism; Ty France — the same man whose apparent home run the roof confiscated Saturday, as these columns told — singled home runs in the first and the seventh by way of answer, and San Diego led 3-1 in the seventh. The afternoon's untidiness kept the ledger close: five errors between the clubs, three of them Milwaukee's, and two charged to Cronenworth on a single seventh-inning play that let the hosts back within one. Thus was the stage dressed, and thus did a bullpen built precisely for this month hand back a game the Padres had all but banked.

In a clubhouse quiet as a reading room, the closer declined every extenuation. "I didn't do my job today," said Miller. "The cardinal rule is you don't beat yourself. I beat myself today. A base hit with nobody on doesn't win them the game. A base hit after you walked the bases loaded does." The ledger he leaves behind is stern: clubs down two games to none in a best-of-five have come through but ten times in three-and-ninety tryings, and none since the Yankees of 2017. San Diego's consolations are genuine — both games here were settled by a single run, the Friars won three-and-fifty of three-and-eighty at their own yard this year counting two October victories over the Cubs, and the manager Stammen vows the ground will be defended: "We like where we are when we play at home." But Milwaukee flies west with two victories and a two-and-twenty-year-old who slashed .291/.351/.487 this summer, authored the third straight twenty-and-twenty campaign to open a career — a feat previously belonging only to Julio Rodríguez and Bobby Witt Jr. — and now owns the two loudest hits of this October. Game Three goes Tuesday night at half past nine, Eastern time, at Petco Park. "The series isn't over," said Miller, and he is right; it merely leans.

The Postseason Card

THE PLAN WAS PATIENCE, AND PATIENCE THROWS A HUNDRED MILES THE HOUR — KERR OPENS WITHOUT BLEMISH A SECOND TIME, THE BOY FUENTES CLAIMS ELEVEN OF THE LAST TWELVE OUTS, AND HARRIS FINISHES A HOME RUN SHY OF OCTOBER'S SECOND CYCLE AS THE TOMAHAWK NINE SQUARE THE SERIES: BRAVES 3, DODGERS 2

Weiss holds Sale back for full strength and is vindicated twice over — Kerr giving two and two-thirds scoreless three days after a seven-and-forty-pitch night, and the one-and-twenty-year-old Fuentes pouring four-seamers at 99.4 miles the hour across three and two-thirds innings of one-run relief; Snell, rusted by a fortnight's idleness, walks five in three and two-thirds and is lifted at his ninetieth pitch, Dubón cashes the bases-full passes in the first, Harris triples on a sliced sweeper the instruments valued at .016 and scores the decider on Bubic's wild pitch, and Muncy's two-out thunder in the ninth arrives a run short; the aces come off the shelf Tuesday at six at Truist Park, Sale against Yamamoto, with the road split favoring Atlanta thirty times in nine-and-forty under the present format

The manager Weiss spent Saturday night explaining why a fatigued Chris Sale would not pitch Sunday — "We want full-strength Chris Sale. I know him at 80 percent is really good, but that's what it came down to" — and spent Sunday night being proven entirely right. His second consecutive bullpen game ran like a railroad timetable. Ray Kerr, opening for the second time in four days and three days removed from a seven-and-forty-pitch evening against Philadelphia, gave two and two-thirds scoreless innings with four strikeouts, at one point surrendering a leadoff double to Rojas and deliberately pitching around Betts to claim the left-on-left argument with Ohtani. Holmes lasted five batters and gave Freeman's leadoff homer in the fourth — the first baseman's first extra-base hit since the second of September — but Lee tidied the fourth for the victory, Suarez escaped a two-on, none-out crisis in the fifth in just his fourth appearance since the elbow began complaining in late June, and then came the revelation. Didier Fuentes, one-and-twenty years old, poured four-seamers averaging 99.4 miles the hour — two full ticks above his summer figure — across three and two-thirds innings of one-run relief, claiming eleven of the final twelve outs and touching 99 or better four times in the ninth. "I couldn't believe he came back out there for the ninth, but he did and he was still chucking 100," testified Olson. Muncy's two-out blast off the youngster was the only dent, and Iglesias retired De Paula on a popup for the save.

The runs the relay protected were largely the work of one Georgian. Michael Harris II — whose first-inning thunderclap decided Thursday's Wild Card finale, as these columns told — went 3-for-5 and finished a home run shy of what would have been but the second cycle in all postseason history, Brock Holt's of 2018 standing alone. His fifth-inning triple was a thing of fortune honestly collected: an 86-mile sweeper off the plate, sliced away from Hernández, who broke sideways and lost it — the instruments valued the ball at .016 of expected average — and Harris legged it to third, whence Bubic's wild pitch brought him home with the lead. His double cashed Olson for insurance in the seventh, making him the fifth Brave ever to triple and double in a single postseason game, after Acuña, DeRosa, Lemke, and Gowdy of 1914. The boy who watched the 2021 champions from the Truist Park stands now carries their successors. "There seems to always be unsung heroes in the postseason," said Weiss. "Tonight it was Michael Harris."

Los Angeles, by contrast, beat itself with a thousand small cuts. Snell, who had thrown but five innings on six-and-ninety pitches in the fortnight and a half since his groin tightened in mid-September, walked five in three and two-thirds — two of them loading the first-inning bases for Dubón's two-out single — and was lifted at his ninetieth pitch. "He just was fighting himself with his delivery all game," said Roberts. The order went 0-for-8 with runners in scoring position, stranded seven, and has now scored all seven of its series runs by the home run. The champions' consolations were Díaz's electric sixth, entered in the columns above, and the knowledge that their rotation remains the deepest in the field. "So now it's a three-game series," said Roberts — one that resumes Tuesday at six o'clock at Truist Park with the aces unsheathed at last, Sale against Yamamoto, and Mahle to follow in Wednesday's fourth game. The counting-men give the side that splits on the road and goes home thirty series in nine-and-forty under the present arrangement; Weiss, for his part, keeps the accounting simpler: "Every starter on their staff is a Cy Young guy. It doesn't get any easier, but I like the fact that we go back home even and we have Chris Sale."

News Around the League

THE OCTOBER DESK: CLEVELAND'S OCTOBER NARROWS TO A SINGLE EVENING — WILLIAMS AND HIS TWO-HUNDRED-AND-FORTY-EIGHT STRIKEOUTS TAKE THE BALL AT FIVE O'CLOCK, AGAINST A SOUTH SIDE RELAY OF KAY AND BURKE, WITH THE HOSTS ONE DEFEAT FROM A TWO-GAMES HOLE

The particulars this paper left open yesterday are now filled in. For this evening's second chapter on Lake Erie's shore, the manager Venable confirms the South Siders will repeat the method that shut Cleveland out in the opener: the left-hander Anthony Kay opens against the top of the order — Kwan, Ramírez, DeLauter, two lefties and a switch-man — and Sean Burke, the staff's ace by every figure, follows in bulk. The assignment could scarcely suit him better: Burke went 2-0 against Cleveland this summer at a 1.04 figure, one-and-twenty strikeouts in seventeen innings and a third, and carries a lifetime 2.57 mark at Progressive Field; across the season he struck out 185 in 172 and a third. "I dreamed of the World Series when I dreamed of playoff starts," says he of the unglamorous role. "So whatever's going to get us to the World Series, I'm all in on doing that." The heroes of Saturday may even reappear, Venable declaring both Smith and Taylor candidates according to feel, aided by Sunday's idleness and another off day Tuesday.

Cleveland answers with its heaviest remaining artillery: Gavin Williams, second in all the game with 248 strikeouts and author of eleven starts of ten strikeouts or better, the most in the majors. The hosts' predicament wants no embroidery — shut out on three hits in the opener, they stand one defeat from a two-games hole with the series then removing to Chicago. The manager Vogt declines the panic: "It was one game. We've lost a lot of games this year, and we've bounced back the next day... We still have a great opportunity ahead of us to even the series tomorrow and go to Chicago with a chance to win it." First pitch at five o'clock.

THE ARMS DESK: AT THE DOME AT EIGHT, THE ROAD WARRIOR AND HIS NEW CURVEBALL MEET SEPTEMBER'S ADOPTED KING — SCHLITTLER AGAINST PERALTA, WITH NEW YORK WANTING THE SPLIT AND ONE HIT TO ITS NAME

The young right-hander Schlittler, named in these columns yesterday for tonight's assignment, arrives at Tropicana Field as the finest road pitcher in the game — an 8-2 account and a 1.16 figure across seventeen travelling starts this season, both tops in the majors, with a .153 average against — and with a new weapon besides. The game's foremost fastball merchant, who threw his three fastball shapes nine-and-eighty times in every hundred pitches this summer, the highest such rate among all starters, unveiled a power curve in earnest against Boston last week: two-and-thirty of them, a career high, drawing eight empty swings and accounting for four of his ten strikeouts. The scribes already presume him the American's Cy Young choice; that ballot is counted in November, and this paper will enter the verdict when the official rolls do. His catcher Wells states tonight's business plainly: "Hopefully get to their guy."

Their guy is Freddy Peralta, got from the Mets in August and transformed by the crossing: the American's Pitcher of the Month for September on a 5-0, 0.79 run across his final six starts, with a 1.69 figure in four home turns beneath the dome. "Everything changed when I got traded," says the right-hander. "I've been treated here as a king." He inherits a crowd still roaring from Saturday's one-hitter and an order that held New York to a single safety in the opener — the fewest of the franchise's four hundred and forty-seven postseason games, as this paper recorded. First pitch at eight o'clock.

THE BULLPEN DESK: THE TRUMPETS SOUND IN THE SIXTH INNING, OF ALL PLACES — DÍAZ, IN HIS LOS ANGELES OCTOBER DEBUT, THROWS HIS HARDEST PITCH IN TWO YEARS, AND THE CHAMPIONS NAME IT THEIR SILVER LINING

When the trumpets of "Narco" rang through Dodger Stadium Sunday evening, they announced not the ninth inning but the sixth — and Edwin Díaz, the closer signed at $69 million over three winters to anchor the champions' late innings, delivered the finest frame of his disrupted season in a losing cause. Three up and three down: Riley frozen on consecutive sliders for a three-pitch strikeout, the pinch-hitter Yastrzemski blown away at 100.8 miles the hour — Díaz's hardest pitch since the fourth game of the 2024 Division Series — and Baldwin's fly ball to end a twelve-pitch performance that touched a hundred three times, his most in any outing since September of 2024. "Try to find some silver linings — that was a silver lining and certainly a positive," ruled the manager Roberts, whose club has now seen every Atlanta reliever save the rookie Ritchie. The pitcher himself was less circumspect: "That's why I came here — to help this team win and pitch in big spots. I want to keep getting the ball and doing my job." The Herald observes that a bullpen's repairs, like a batsman's, tend to be tested soonest in Georgia.

THE ALMANAC DESK: BEFORE CHICAGO AND CLEVELAND QUARRELED FOR A PENNANT, THEY CONSPIRED TO INVENT THE LEAGUE THEY QUARREL IN — A REMINISCENCE OF BAN JOHNSON, THE SPIDERS' DREADFUL SUMMER, AND A BLUFF CALLED IN A MILWAUKEE HOTEL

As the Central rivals contest their Game Two this evening, the league's historians supply a pleasing symmetry: the American League itself was conjured largely out of these two cities. In the autumn of 1899, Ban Johnson — a former sporting editor running the minor Western League — renamed his circuit the American League and resolved to challenge the National's monopoly, exhorting his owners to "fight them with fire, gentlemen!" Cleveland lay open for the taking, the National's Spiders having just completed a season of 20 victories against 134 defeats, the worst ever entered in the books — a mark lately challenged, the Herald notes with a diplomatic cough, by the 121 losses of the 2024 White Sox — and Johnson moved the Grand Rapids franchise there under the purses of Somers and Kilfoyle. The league was formally incorporated at the Republican House Hotel in Milwaukee on the fifth of March, 1900; the National's threatened counter-invasion proved, in the end, nothing more than a bluff.

Chicago required delicacy of another kind: the National's man Hart permitted the upstart club his league's cast-off name "White Stockings" on the condition that the word "Chicago" form no official part of the title. The new league declared itself major by 1901, and its first big-league game, fittingly, matched these very antagonists — Chicago against Cleveland, the 24th of April, 1901, at South Side Park, the White Stockings prevailing 8-2 on their way to the new league's first pennant. The peace of 1903 brought the first World Series, and the rest is the national pastime as we know it. A century and a quarter on, the argument resumes at five o'clock.

Two contests only on the Monday tables, but each a chapter heading: Milwaukee stands two games to none over San Diego, its consecutive one-run escapes achieved by roof and by rally, while Atlanta and Los Angeles square at one apiece with the aces Sale and Yamamoto booked opposite for Tuesday at six. Today the American League takes the stage back — Chicago at Cleveland at five o'clock, New York at Tampa Bay at eight, the burgling South Siders and the top-seeded Rays each a victory from commanding their quarrels outright. Tuesday carries the National's third games besides, Los Angeles at Atlanta at six and Milwaukee at San Diego at half past nine; and the pennant rounds stand ready beyond, the National's Championship Series opening the eleventh of the month and the American's the twelfth, by the league's forward ledger. Until the next dispatch, keep your scorecards near and your enthusiasms nearer.

~ THE HERALD ~

The Herald Acknowledges Its Debts

MLB Box Scores — Monday, October 5, 2026 — Boxscore
Baseball-Reference.com — Upcoming Schedule and Upcoming Dates — Baseball-Reference
Adam McCalvy, Chourio, Milwaukee's Mr. October, bests Miller with walk-off to give Crew 2-0 NLDS lead — MLB.com
AJ Cassavell, Game 2 heartbreaker has Padres on the ropes in NLDS — MLB.com
Mark Bowman, Braves follow manager's pitch-perfect plan to even series with Dodgers — MLB.com
Mark Bowman, Kerr twirls scoreless outing as opener; Sale set for Game 3 start — MLB.com
Sonja Chen, Snell's rust shows, Dodgers' bats can't pick up 'pen as NLDS evens up — MLB.com
Jacob Gurvis, Harris flirts with cycle in October breakout for hometown Braves — MLB.com
Rhett Bollinger, After 8 K's in WC start, Burke set for bulk role behind Kay in ALDS Game 2 — MLB.com
Scott Merkin and Tim Stebbins, White Sox-Guardians ALDS Game 2 FAQ (5 ET, TBS/HBO Max) — MLB.com
Adam Berry and Bryan Hoch, Yankees-Rays ALDS Game 2 FAQ (8 p.m. ET, TBS/HBO Max) — MLB.com
Jared Greenspan, The new pitch making Cam Schlittler even nastier — MLB.com
Courtney Hollmon, Does Díaz's high-velocity perfect inning trumpet a return to form? — MLB.com
Anthony Castrovince, How these ALDS teams spawned the American League — MLB.com