Brewers pour on late offence to beat Rays 10-1 in World Series Game 3, take 3-0 lead

By Vancouver Television Sports Desk

ST. PETERSBURG — The Milwaukee Brewers won World Series Game 3 on Monday night, defeating the Tampa Bay Rays 10-1 at Tropicana Field to extend their lead to three games to none, putting the franchise on the brink of its first World Series championship in the modern era.

In the contest, Milwaukee strung together seven consecutive hits in the World Series, an accomplishment not previously recorded in the Fall Classic. The Brewers also produced eight runs in the same inning with two outs, another World Series first, as the game shifted sharply in their favour during the fifth.

The decisive stretch came as Milwaukee “dragged” opposing pitching through extended at-bats and kept pressure on. “At its finest,” said Jason Lane, who heads Milwaukee’s hitting program and is described as the offense and strategy coordinator for the club.

Christian Yelich highlighted the team’s approach after the breather point of the game had passed, saying, “It’s guys staying within themselves, taking what the game gives them and passing it on to the next guy, and then it’s the next guy going out there and having the will to compete and find a way to help the boys. We’ve taken it to that level.”

Milwaukee’s momentum also reflected the way the Brewers were built to wear down pitchers over multiple turns through a lineup. Sal Frelick said, “Our offense is built to kind of chip away and wear on pitchers,” with the club again turning that philosophy into a multi-run inning when the Rays were no longer able to escape trouble.

One of the narrative drivers entering Game 3 was the Brewers’ ability to take advantage of the Rays’ workload. The source notes that Game 2 in Milwaukee included a comeback from a 4-0 deficit, with Tampa Bay forced into 184 pitches; that contest set up an expectation that the Rays’ pitching could be tested again if Milwaukee kept connecting.

Against Tampa Bay in Game 3, Milwaukee began building pressure early. The Rays faced a 22-pitch first inning before the Brewers ultimately broke through in the third inning with a pair of first-pitch RBI singles from Yelich and William Contreras.

The biggest swing arrived in the fifth, when the Brewers scored eight runs while sending 12 batters to the plate. The inning featured eight hits and one walk, with the sequence extended by hustle and a key defensive challenge by Milwaukee.

The source describes the critical run potential beginning with Yelich reaching second base on an infield single by Contreras that Junior Caminero attempted to convert into an out at second. The initial call was out, but Milwaukee challenged and won the challenge, keeping the inning alive with the bases loaded as the rally continued.

“That’s a 14-year vet — All-Stars, MVP, [Silver] Sluggers — and nobody takes more pride in running the bases than him. He sets the standard here,” Frelick said, tying the inning’s expansion to Yelich’s base-running decisions.

Yelich’s basepath lead was a central part of that ripple effect, with Frelick describing how Yelich recognized the angle from the stadium suite and anticipated contact. The source also includes comments from Brewers owner Mark Attanasio, who said he noticed Yelich’s walking lead and thought he might score on a double, adding, “I didn’t think he was going to beat the ball to second base.”

After the Rays responded in the fifth by bringing in left-hander Cam Booser, Milwaukee kept the scoring coming. Brice Turang hit a two-run single off Rays shortstop Taylor Walls, and the inning continued with additional run-scoring hits credited to Garrett Mitchell, Cooper Pratt and Frelick.

As the Brewers maintained the pressure, the Rays turned again to their bullpen and called on right-hander Cole Sulser. The source says Sulser surrendered run-scoring hits to David Hamilton and Jackson Chourio, with Chourio adding his second hit of the inning and fourth of the game.

The scoring surge left little room for Tampa Bay to recover. The source notes that Chourio finished one hit short of tying a World Series record shared by Paul Molitor (Game 1 in 1982) and Albert Pujols (Game 3 in 2011), because he did not produce a fifth hit in Game 3.

Milwaukee’s five-inning advantage also fit the broader pattern of the club’s 2024-25 postseason performance as presented in the source. The Brewers are described as having matched a record shared by the 2019 Nationals, the 2014 Royals, the 2005 White Sox and the 2004 Red Sox by winning eight consecutive postseason games, and the club would be the first to reach nine wins in the World Series if it captures Game 4.

Manager Pat Murphy framed the offensive grind as a deliberate result of the team’s game plan, saying, “That’s dragging them. It says a lot for our guys that they’ve adopted that.” The source further connects that “drag” approach to an internal hitting philosophy that Lane developed from discussion and film, including a reference to former player Lance Berkman’s description of an at-bat concept.

Berkman’s influence is described through Lane’s account from earlier in the season, in which Lane said Berkman talked about envisioning being “down in a pit” and trying to “drag the pitcher down with him.” The source also includes comments from Jake Bauers on the mental and tactical edge created by seeing how a pitcher responds to such at-bats.

With the Brewers now holding a 3-0 lead, the matchup moves into the small-sample territory where postseason history starts to matter. The source states that in all best-of-seven postseason series, teams with a 3-0 lead have gone on to win 42 of 43 times (98%), including 33 sweeps, and it notes that only two teams have forced a Game 7 after trailing 3-0.

In the World Series specifically, the source says no team has made it as far as Game 6 after being in a 3-0 hole. It also adds that no team has swept both the LCS and the World Series since the LCS expanded to seven games in 1985.

Game 3 gives Milwaukee a clear path forward: if the Brewers defeat the Rays again, they would become the first team to win the World Series after sweeping the LCS and advancing through the World Series with a clean finish, according to the postseason history cited in the source.

Attanasio concluded in remarks included in the report by connecting the moment to the reality of the run, saying, “Debbie [his wife] was just saying this: It’s just all very hard to take in. It’s beginning to be real now.”