Brewers rally past Rays in Game 2, take 2-0 World Series lead

The Milwaukee Brewers overcame an early four-run deficit to beat the Tampa Bay Rays 5-4 in Game 2 of the World Series on Saturday night at American Family Field, taking a 2-0 lead in the best-of-seven series. Sal Frelick's game-tying home run and Cooper Pratt's go-ahead single in the seventh inning anchored the comeback, and reliever Aaron Ashby closed it out by getting Yandy Diaz on a checked-swing strikeout with the tying run at third base.

Milwaukee claws back from a four-run hole

Tampa Bay built the early lead on three straight hits off Brewers rookie starter Logan Henderson. Chandler Simpson's grounder scored Diaz to open the game, Junior Caminero followed with an RBI single, and catcher Liam Hicks drove a 411-foot home run to right-center for a 4-0 lead before Milwaukee had come to bat, according to MLB.com's recap of the game. It was the first home run of the series.

The Brewers answered immediately. Jackson Chourio and Jake Bauers singled in the bottom of the first, William Contreras drove in a run on a hit-and-run single, and Garrett Mitchell's two-out single trimmed the margin to 4-2. Milwaukee got within one run in the fourth when a grounder by David Hamilton skipped past Rays first baseman Jonathan Aranda for an error, scoring Pratt.

Frelick tied the game in the sixth inning with a solo home run to center field off Rays left-hander Ian Seymour, a pitch he fought off during a nine-pitch at-bat before connecting, as detailed in a separate MLB.com account of the at-bat. It was only his second home run off a left-handed pitcher in parts of two big league seasons. An inning later, Brice Turang doubled, advanced to third on a Mitchell flyout, and scored on Pratt's single off Rays reliever Kevin Kelly for what proved to be the winning run. Milwaukee threatened to add to the lead in the eighth, but Chourio was ruled out at the plate on a close play that Tampa Bay successfully left in the umpires' hands.

Frelick's homer drew an emotional response in the Milwaukee dugout. Teammate Jake Bauers said afterward that he had never seen Frelick hit a ball out to dead center even in batting practice, and that he "almost cried" watching it land. Pratt, a rookie who has been in and out of the lineup for parts of the season, called his go-ahead single in the seventh "pretty electric." Aranda, whose error opened the door to Milwaukee's first comeback run, said through an interpreter afterward that he had misread the spin off Hamilton's bat.

A franchise still chasing its first title since 1982

The win put the Brewers two victories from the first World Series championship in franchise history. Milwaukee's only prior appearance in the Fall Classic came in 1982, when the club lost to the St. Louis Cardinals; members of that team, including Robin Yount, have been visible at this year's games, a connection MLB.com explored after Saturday's comeback, noting that the 1982 Brewers also erased a four-run deficit, in Game 4 of that World Series against the Cardinals. Yount said watching this postseason has been harder on his nerves than playing ever was, adding that he had "waited 44 years for this." Brewers owner Mark Attanasio said the surviving members of the 1982 team remain closely tied to the current roster and are "really intense about wanting to see us win."

Tampa Bay, for its part, is also still seeking its first championship. The Rays have reached the World Series twice before, losing to the Philadelphia Phillies in 2008 and the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2020, and they now trail 0-2 in a series for the first time in either appearance.

"They believe, and they don't give up," Brewers manager Pat Murphy said of his team's response to the early deficit.

Saturday's rally was also the second time this postseason that Milwaukee has erased a four-run deficit, after doing so in the National League Championship Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers. Brewers pitcher Brandon Woodruff, watching Ashby's ninth-inning escape from the dugout, offered a blunter assessment of his teammate's October: "He's a stud."

Ashby's scoreless streak extends into the ninth

The bullpen performance drew as much attention as the late-inning hitting. Ashby worked the final five outs for the save, stranding a leadoff double in the ninth before freezing Diaz on a 3-2 curveball for the final out, with the potential tying run standing at third base. The outing extended his scoreless streak to open this postseason to 15 2/3 innings, passing marks set by Goose Gossage in 1981 and Andy Hawkins in 1984 and leaving him second only to Andrew Miller's 16-inning streak to begin the 2016 postseason, according to MLB.com's reporting on the reliever's run. Diaz, speaking through an interpreter, said simply of the final call: "The umpire said it was a swing."

Tampa Bay starter Drew Rasmussen, who had pitched well in the early rounds of the postseason, did not get out of the fourth inning, departing after allowing the four first-inning runs in what was described as his shortest start in months. Henderson, making his first World Series start for Milwaukee, worked around the early damage without being charged with a decision.

A Milwaukee-area recap from WSAW-TV independently confirmed the final score and the sequence of the late-inning rally, including Frelick's homer, Pratt's go-ahead single, and the Chourio out at the plate in the eighth.

Series moves to Tampa for Game 3

The World Series now shifts to Florida, where Game 3 is scheduled for Monday night at 8 p.m. ET at Tropicana Field, Tampa Bay's home park, broadcast on FOX. The Rays are expected to turn to right-hander Freddy Peralta, the American League Championship Series MVP, while the Brewers plan to start left-hander Robert Gasser, according to the pitching matchup preview published by MLB.com.

For Milwaukee, which posted the best regular-season record in the majors this year, the view entering Monday is straightforward: two more wins, on the road, stand between the franchise and a title it has waited 44 years to chase again. For Tampa Bay, the task is to find a way to slow down a lineup that has now rallied from a four-run deficit twice in the same postseason, and to do it in front of its own fans for the first time in this World Series.