Jake Bauers and Garrett Mitchell hit back-to-back home runs off Blake Snell to regain the lead in the seventh inning as the Milwaukee Brewers beat the Los Angeles Dodgers 6-2 Wednesday night to take a 3-0 lead in the National League Championship Series.
The Dodgers had just taken a 2-1 lead in the bottom of the sixth before being stunned. The loss pushed the two-time defending World Series champions to the brink of elimination. They had only been up 3-0 in a best-of-seven playoff series once before in franchise history, when they were swept by the Baltimore Orioles in the 1966 World Series.
Game 4 is Thursday at Dodger Stadium.
Snell had retired 14 straight batters before the seventh. The two-time Cy Young Award winner’s first pitch of the game was knocked out of the park by Jackson Chourio, and his last was Mitchell’s solo shot.
Andrew Vaughn drew a seven-pitch walk to open the seventh and was replaced by pinch runner Christian Yelich. Bauers followed with a 412-foot drive to right field on the 11th pitch at bat, giving Milwaukee a 3-2 lead as much of the Brewers dugout spilled onto the field to celebrate. Mitchell came next and launched a 428-foot shot to right center, chasing Snell.
Snell allowed four runs on four hits over six-plus innings, striking out nine and walking two.
The Brewers are poised to sweep the Dodgers in an upset of last year’s NLCS, when Los Angeles eliminated Milwaukee in four games. The Brewers have never beaten the Dodgers in the previous three postseasons.
Milwaukee extended its lead to 5-2 in the eighth on a wild pitch by Justin Wrobleski that scored Brice Turang, who had reached third on an infield single and advanced on William Contreras’ single. They added another run on Joey Ortiz’s two-strike RBI single in the ninth.
The offensively starved Dodgers took their first lead of the night, 2-1, on Will Smith’s two-run double off reliever Abner Uribe in the sixth.
Uribe, who replaced debutant Robert Gasser, loaded the bases with walks to Teoscar Hernández, Kyle Tucker and Shohei Ohtani. Smith, who entered the game hitting .043, doubled to left center for his first hit of the NLCS.
DL Hall replaced Uribe, allowing one hit and striking out two before handing the ball to Trevor Megill in the eighth.
The Dodgers had fallen behind almost immediately when Chourio hit Snell’s first pitch, with fans still heading to their seats.
Mitchell then walked and Cooper Pratt singled in the second before Snell retired 14 straight batters, six by strikeout, then collapsed in the seventh.
Los Angeles put runners on base in all but three innings, but struggled to bring them home. They have yet to hit a home run in the NLCS.
Ohtani went 1-for-2 with a walk while hitting sixth, his lowest spot in the lineup since joining the Dodgers three years ago.
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