Two Deadline Arms Helped Milwaukee Silence the Dodgers

Four Milwaukee relievers retired 15 Los Angeles hitters in a row on Monday, the longest fully perfect bullpen outing in postseason history, and the Brewers beat the Dodgers 7-4 to take a 2-0 NLCS lead.

Dustin May, JoJo Romero, Abner Uribe and Aaron Ashby allowed no baserunners over five innings at American Family Field. William Contreras went 3-for-4 with a 436-foot homer and three RBI as Milwaukee answered three separate Dodgers leads.

Four Relievers Retired 15 Dodgers in Order

Logan Henderson lasted four innings and was charged with four runs, two of them earned, after two throwing errors. The second error came in the fifth, when he fielded a Tommy Edman bunt and threw wildly, letting Kyle Tucker score. Edman later came home on Freddie Freeman’s sacrifice fly, and Los Angeles led 4-3.

Pat Murphy, the Brewers’ manager, called on May with that inherited mess. May let the runner score, then retired three hitters without putting anyone on. Romero, Uribe and Ashby followed, and the next 15 Dodgers made outs. MLB researcher Sarah Langs said five perfect innings is the most any team’s bullpen has thrown, all perfect, in a single postseason game, a mark that now sits in the postseason pitching record books.

The Brewers bullpen threw 5 perfect innings

That’s the most innings by a team’s bullpen, all perfect, in a game in postseason history https://t.co/KKLIXfDt2l

— Sarah Langs (@SlangsOnSports) October 13, 2026

The four arms struck out seven and walked none. Milwaukee relievers have now allowed 1 earned run in 28 2/3 innings this postseason, a 0.31 ERA through six games. In the five games they have won, the bullpen has not allowed a run.

GAME 2 RELIEVERS VS. LOS ANGELES

Ashby recorded the last five outs. Trevor Megill, the usual ninth-inning arm, never left the bullpen, so he arrives in Los Angeles unused.

Milwaukee Took May and Romero After Losing Skubal

May is not a random October extra. He pitched for the Dodgers from 2019 through 2025, missed 2024 after a second Tommy John surgery and an esophageal tear, then moved through Boston and St. Louis. On Aug. 3 the Brewers acquired May and Romero from St. Louis for outfielders Alexander Frías and Josiah Ragsdale, Milwaukee’s No. 11 and No. 13 prospects on MLB Pipeline at the time.

That deal was Plan B. Milwaukee had came up short on Tarik Skubal, the two-time AL Cy Young winner who went from Detroit to Los Angeles, and then turned to two Cardinals rentals. May is on a $12.5 million 2026 deal with a $20 million mutual option for 2027 and a $500,000 buyout. Romero is earning $4.26 million and hits free agency after the season. He had a 3.35 ERA in 44 games with St. Louis, stranded 20 of 28 inherited runners, and missed time after an appendectomy in July.

The guys that we got are pretty battle-tested, experienced guys. They’ve pitched in some big games and they’re tough. I think they’re going to fit in very well.

Matt Arnold, Brewers president of baseball operations, on the Aug. 3 deadline

Arnold also said the club had to pick itself up after coming up short on other names. May’s first job in this series was to face the franchise that drafted him. He did it in relief, on a night Yoshinobu Yamamoto lasted only 2 2/3 innings in his shortest postseason start. Yamamoto had entered 8-1 with a 2.14 ERA in 11 playoff appearances.

Dave Roberts, the Dodgers’ manager, did not dress it up. “Just wasn’t sharp today,” Roberts said. “He just didn’t have it tonight, which is very rare.”

Every October Game Has Gone Through Uribe

The deadline pair started the shutdown. The two arms Murphy already trusted finished it. Uribe has now pitched in all six of Milwaukee’s postseason games. Ashby has pitched in five, and the Brewers are 5-0 when the left-hander takes the mound. Uribe got four outs with two strikeouts. Ashby got five outs with two strikeouts and the save.

HOW MURPHY HAS USED THE LEVERAGE ARMS

• Uribe: Appeared in all six postseason games, including 1.1 perfect innings in Game 2.
• Ashby: Five games, a 5-0 Brewers record in his outings, and Monday’s 1.2-inning save.
• Romero: The left-handed half of the Cardinals trade, a perfect sixth with two strikeouts and the win.
• Megill: Sat out Game 2 after closing Game 1, so the closer is fresh for Dodger Stadium.

That usage is the quiet advantage Milwaukee carries west. The Brewers can still shorten a game from the fifth inning without emptying the same four names two nights in a row. Los Angeles has to score before that chain starts, because once it does, the Dodgers have not put a runner on.

Three Dodgers Leads Met Three Contreras Answers

The bullpen only had a lead to protect because Contreras kept answering. Teoscar Hernández’s sacrifice fly made it 1-0 in the first. Contreras singled home Brice Turang to tie it. Henderson’s pickoff error in the third let Edman score, and Christian Yelich answered with a two-run single after Jake Bauers’s 12-pitch walk, putting Milwaukee up 3-2.

Los Angeles scored twice in the fifth on the bunt error and Freeman’s fly. Contreras tied it again, jumping a 94.8 mph fastball from Kris Bubic and sending it 436 feet to center, his third homer of the postseason. In the sixth, Brock Stewart hit David Hamilton, Freeman missed a pickoff, and Roberts walked Turang to get to Contreras. Contreras lined the first pitch to left for a 5-4 lead.

HOW GAME 2 CHANGED HANDS

1. First inning: Hernández’s fly makes it 1-0; Contreras singles to tie it.
2. Third inning: Edman scores on Henderson’s pickoff error; Yelich singles in two for a 3-2 Brewers lead.
3. Fifth inning: Tucker and Edman score to make it 4-3; Contreras’s 436-foot homer ties it 4-4.
4. Sixth inning: Contreras singles home Hamilton for 5-4 after the intentional walk to Turang.
5. Eighth inning: Turang and Bauers add RBI singles, and Milwaukee leads 7-4.

Yelich, who drove in two, put the night in one line. “We just kept going,” he said. Milwaukee out-hit Los Angeles 12-3, left 11 on base, and still led by more than two runs for the first time this postseason. Attendance was 42,516. The game lasted 3 hours and 21 minutes.

Los Angeles Is 2 for 26 With Runners On

The Dodgers went 0-for-4 with runners in scoring position on Monday and are 2-for-26 in those spots this postseason. They finished with three hits. Shohei Ohtani flied out to open the ninth. Mookie Betts, Freeman, Tucker and the rest of a $339.32 million Spotrac payroll, second in the majors, did not push a runner across after the fifth.

Milwaukee’s Spotrac ledger is a $146.2 million adjusted payroll, 19th in the majors, about 43 percent of Los Angeles’s figure. Contreras is at $9.45 million. Ashby is at $5.7 million. Yelich, at $26 million, is the only Brewer in the same neighborhood as the middle of the Dodgers’ list. Ohtani counts $70 million against Los Angeles.

PAYROLL GAP IN THIS NLCS

Money did not buy a hit after May entered. The 103-win Brewers, 55-26 at home in the regular season, now hold a 2-0 NLCS lead, their first 2-0 lead in a League Championship Series. Los Angeles last climbed out of a 2-0 postseason hole in the 2020 NLCS against Atlanta. Last October the Dodgers swept Milwaukee in four games. This rematch is already a different series.

Robert Gasser Starts Wednesday at Dodger Stadium

The clubs fly west for Game 3 on Wednesday, Oct. 14, at 8 p.m. ET at Dodger Stadium. Murphy has pointed to left-hander Robert Gasser, who went 5-5 with a 3.87 ERA and 103 strikeouts in 109.1 regular-season innings and allowed one run in four innings in the NLDS clincher at San Diego. Los Angeles had not named a Game 3 starter by the end of Monday’s game.

Henderson’s night was messy, Yamamoto’s was short, and the game still turned on four relievers Milwaukee either developed or bought in August. May faced his old club and started a record. Romero, the other half of that Cardinals trade, took the win. Uribe and Ashby closed it without Megill. The Dodgers have three home games to solve a bullpen that has not allowed a baserunner since the fifth inning on Monday.