#tampa-bay-rays

The Milwaukee Brewers won the World Series on Wednesday night, Oct. 28, beating the Tampa Bay Rays 4-1 in Game 5 at Tropicana Field to take the series four games to one. Neither franchise had won a title before.

According to CBS Sports, presumptive NL Cy Young winner Jacob Misiorowski made his best start of the postseason and three relievers held Tampa Bay to one run the rest of the way. Rookie Cooper Pratt drove in two runs and, with hits in six straight at-bats going back to Game 4, set a World Series record for a rookie. CBS says the Brewers went 11-2 in the postseason after beating the two-time defending champion Dodgers in the NLCS.

The Rays had avoided a sweep the night before. NPR (via AP) reports that Pratt's 12th-inning home run put Milwaukee ahead in Game 4, but Tampa Bay rallied in the bottom half, with pinch-hitter Ben Williamson's chopper over first base winning it 4-3. The Rays were the fourth team in World Series history to avoid elimination with an extra-inning comeback.

Thousands of Milwaukee Brewers fans traveled to St. Petersburg, Florida, for the World Series games at Tropicana Field, the Associated Press reports. Before Game 4 on Tuesday, Oct. 27, a large group gathered in a parking lot more than four hours before first pitch, and by an hour before the game there appeared to be more Brewers fans than Rays fans in the stands.

According to ticket marketplace TickPick, cited by AP, 41.3% of all Game 4 purchases came from Wisconsin, against 30.5% from Florida; the cheapest ticket was $900. Back home, American Family Field in Milwaukee sold out a watch party for 31,000 fans.

Brewers outfielder Garrett Mitchell said the "Let's go Brewers" chants started during batting practice. The fans had to wait one more night: the Rays won Game 4 in 12 innings before Milwaukee clinched in Game 5.

The Milwaukee Brewers finished a four-game sweep of the Los Angeles Dodgers in the National League Championship Series, and the Tampa Bay Rays beat the Cleveland Guardians in six games for the American League pennant. The World Series opens Friday, Oct. 23, in Milwaukee.

According to the Associated Press, it is the first World Series between two teams that have never won a title since 1980, so the champion will be a first-timer. Both clubs are in the bottom half of MLB payrolls, and both play under roofs, so the AP says it will likely be baseball's first all-indoor championship.

The Brewers began as the 1969 Seattle Pilots and lost their only previous World Series, in 1982, to St. Louis. The Rays lost theirs in 2008 and 2020. Jake Bauers, a former Ray, was MVP of the NLCS; Freddy Peralta, a former Brewer, was ALCS MVP.