How to watch this weekend's Brewers at Dodgers series: NL playoff hopefuls meet in Los Angeles

New York Times

2 days ago

The Milwaukee Brewers emerge from this week's All-Star break as the National League's hottest outfit, having won seven straight games and grooving atop the mound. Pat Murphy's surging Brew Crew now gets a test in Chavez Ravine, where the NL West-leading Los Angeles Dodgers roll out their big-name bats. Despite a mammoth payroll and defending champion status, Dave Roberts finds his Dodgers at just 5-7 through July's first dozen games.
Who had the Brewers with a better run differential than the Dodgers at this point in the summer? Milwaukee has thrown out a largely competitive group throughout the last decade, but it hasn't advanced past the NLDS since 2018. This year's insurgent installment might have the juice to push for it, entering the weekend series only one game behind the dominant Chicago Cubs for a division lead. The Brewers are an excellent 25-12 since the start of June, though they're still an average team away from Wisconsin (23-23, despite outscoring their hosts by 46 runs).
Advertisement
In the outfield, dogged vet Christian Yelich is on pace for a 30-homer, 20-steal effort in his age-33 season, while 21-year-old Jackson Chourio is projected for a 27-and-27 line. Milwaukee is aggressive on the base paths, coming in at No. 2 in stolen bases across MLB.
The Brewers play a fun and swaggering style of baseball, but the Dodgers tend to devour upstart visitors in their own park. L.A. opens this series 33-17 at home. The reigning World Series trophy lifters are sputtering out to a midsummer lull, though, and they were just blown out by Milwaukee in a three-game sweep July 7-9. Shohei Ohtani had a .300/.462/.600 slash line in those losses, but Freddie Freeman slugged a paltry .091, and Mookie Betts fell further to .083.
Slump or not, underestimating the offense is deeply unwise. The Dodgers are still second in MLB in home runs, RBIs and OBP, and they've crossed home plate more than anyone in the league.
Friday's opening game pits solid RHP Quinn Priester (7-2, 3.55 ERA) against recovering right-hander Tyler Glasnow. The 31-year-old Californian returned from the 60-day IL, where he was shelved with shoulder inflammation, to hurl five innings (one unearned run, three walks and five strikeouts) in that previous Brewers series. The Saturday draw is elite pitch placer and righty ace Freddy Peralta (11-4, 2.66 ERA) versus Emmet Sheehan (1-0, 2.03 ERA), who returned last month from Tommy John surgery.
Sunday's conclusion offers a pair of ultra-experienced lefties in José Quintana (6-3, 3.28) and Clayton Kershaw (4-1, 3.38 ERA). Together, these two have put together 32 Major League campaigns. Quintana's done so with eight different teams; Kershaw is, of course, a Dodger lifer.
Most home runs in both jerseys:
Ticketing and streaming links in this article are provided by partners of The Athletic. Restrictions may apply. The Athletic maintains full editorial independence. Partners have no control over or input into the reporting or editing process and do not review stories before publication.
(Photo of Shohei Ohtani and William Contreras: Patrick McDermott / Getty Images)