2026 NLCS Preview: The Brewers Get Their Rematch

When the Los Angeles Dodgers completed off the Atlanta Braves in Recreation 4 of the NLDS, they arrange a rematch of final yr’s NLCS in opposition to the Milwaukee Brewers. Final time round, the Brewers, coming off an especially profitable 97-65 season, bumped into the Dodger buzzsaw and had been swept out of the postseason. Whereas Milwaukee principally saved Los Angeles’ offense in examine, the Brew Crew may solely muster one run in every of their 4 video games, and when that’s all you handle to attain, you must pitch shutouts to prevail. As famous in lots of a e-book and film, revenge ceaselessly comes with a great deal of satisfaction, no matter Herman Melville might have thought. And the Brewers now have the possibility to show the tables on the Dodgers and stymie their quest for baseball’s first three-peat (please don’t sue me, Pat Riley) of the twenty first century.

Going again to the beginning of the fashionable World Collection in 1903, there have been 45 consecutive-year postseason rematches in main league historical past (right here we’re together with a rematch in any playoff sequence the next yr). In 17 of these 45 rematches, the earlier yr’s loser received their revenge, however no crew has instantly avenged a playoff sweep. Granted, prior to now, there have solely been 5 possibilities for a crew to get vengeance the yr after being swept within the playoffs — Orioles-Twins in 1970, Yankees-Rangers in 1999, Cardinals-Padres in 2006, Pink Sox-Angels in 2008, and Yankees-Twins in 2010 — nevertheless it nonetheless offers the Brewers the chance to do one thing that’s by no means been performed earlier than.

ZiPS favors the Dodgers by a major, however not overwhelming, margin within the NLCS. However with the fourth-most wins within the majors during the last decade, together with probably the most wins in every of the final two seasons, the Brewers aren’t your typical scrappy underdog combating for desk scraps. But, in one other sense, they’re: Yearly, they crush the expectations of followers, the Vegas oddsmakers, and projection methods. Because the developer of a type of projection methods, I’ve spent numerous time scratching my head over how the Brewers so routinely defy the expectations of my mannequin in a method no different crew has, and whereas I feel I’ve recognized the mechanism of my humiliation, I’m nonetheless making an attempt to determine mannequin it.