Brewers: World Series Champs

A week ago I was a bit stressed out, the Brewers, the team I follow during baseball season, were up 3 games to 1 in the World Series. Would they clinch it or would the series continue to a sixth game? The month of October was spent organizing my life around baseball, even more so than the regular season. It also represented the culmination in a shift to how I've been watching baseball. This year I watched, really watched, the game—especially during the playoffs.

I get it, many of you reading this don't care about baseball and that's fine, you can move along to the next post in your feed, but I really didn't want to let this moment pass without saying anything. I spend 7 months of the year watching baseball. It relaxes me, it's fun, and it keeps me away from news and the horrors of the current world we live in. This year the Brewers were the best team in baseball and a super fun team to watch. They play small ball: getting hits, batting in the people on base, and the occasional home run. They're a small market team in MLB and they don't spend a lot of money on players, unlike other teams such as the Dodgers, Mets, and Yankees. This means they're often perceived as an underdog, yet they win a lot.

This year, the Brewers finally did it, they won it all one week ago. They won playing their way (#winourway, #wonourway). They dominated the playoffs going 11-2, which included a sweep of the Dodgers, the very team that swept them out of the playoffs last year. The playoffs were tense at times as they kept coming back from behind to win, often by one or two runs. I could list out what I think were the pivotal moments in each of the playoff series, but I won't do that here (feel free to email me if you want my opinion). During the playoffs I started to understand some of the underlying aspects of the game, particularly the duel between pitcher and batter. That's the heart of the game to me and as I watched some of the best pitchers in baseball do their thing I saw the Brewers rise to the occasion and have some of the best at bats I've ever seen.

I'm still reading stories about this team and I'm reading a bit about the impending doom of the owners locking players out as they negotiate a new collective bargaining agreement (I'm on the side of labor here, the players). I'm looking forward to next year and hoping there is baseball. But right now, I'm gonna buy a patch to commemorate the win and stick it on something I sew soon, a token to remind me of what a great season 2026 was and how much fun I had watching this team of young players win it all.