MILWAUKEE - The Tampa Bay Rays, who won 98 games in the regular season, open the World Series against the Milwaukee Brewers on Friday at 8 p.m. ET on FOX and FOX Deportes, with streaming available on FOX One, as both franchises chase their first championship in franchise history.
The Brewers won a franchise-record 103 games this season, the best record in the National League, while the Rays posted the best record in the American League. Both clubs are among five current franchises - along with the Mariners, Padres and Rockies - that have never won the World Series.
“The World Series is about to be between two exceptional baseball teams,” Rays president of baseball operations Erik Neander said in the Tropicana Field clubhouse after Tampa Bay clinched its pennant. “It’s going to be a blast to watch.”
Rays ace Drew Rasmussen will start Game 1 on four days’ rest, having also started Game 1 of the ALDS and Game 1 of the ALCS. Tampa Bay has won 14 of Rasmussen’s last 15 starts. ALCS MVP Freddy Peralta - himself a former Brewer - is expected to start Game 2 for the Rays, with Nick Martinez and Griffin Jax available on full rest.
Milwaukee will counter with right-hander Jacob Misiorowski, who threw the fastest pitch in the pitch-tracking era - 104.8 mph - on the first pitch of NLDS Game 1 against the Padres. That era dates to 2008. The Padres fouled off 30 pitches in the first four innings to knock Misiorowski out by the fifth at 88 pitches. Against the Dodgers in NLCS Game 1, he threw 94 pitches in 4 1/3 innings, allowing one run, with 21 of 42 opposing swings producing foul balls. Misiorowski will be fully rested, having gone 11 days without pitching in a game after the Brewers swept the Dodgers in four games.
“Miz, say what you want, you didn’t see 105 [mph], whatever, but whenever he got in a jam, he got better,” Brewers manager Pat Murphy said after Milwaukee’s NLCS win. “His innings are up to almost 190 this year. That’s way over, way over what he’s ever done. The kid’s bound to be a little bit tired, you know what I mean? You can’t expect him to understand what this is all about going this far and having to pitch this much this year with the pressure he’s had on him.”
The Brewers’ bullpen enters the Series as one of the most dominant in recent postseason memory, going 7-1 with a 1.33 ERA - six earned runs in 40 2/3 innings - this postseason. Trevor Megill, Aaron Ashby and DL Hall have combined for 23 1/3 scoreless innings with a .096 opponents’ average. Milwaukee’s relievers led MLB with 48 wins and posted a 3.40 ERA - best in the NL - during the regular season. Tampa Bay closer Bryan Baker has worked seven scoreless innings across the Rays’ seven postseason wins.
The biggest injury question for Milwaukee is right-hander Brandon Woodruff, who threw 31 pitches off a mound in the visitors’ bullpen at Dodger Stadium during a workout between NLCS Games 2 and 3 in a last-ditch bid to make the World Series roster. “I’m not really holding back,” Woodruff said at that workout. “I’m going as hard as my body will let me right now, because that’s where we’re at. I’m doing it in what I think is a good and safe way. I wouldn’t get on a mound if I didn’t think I could get on a mound. … I wouldn’t go do what I’m doing if I didn’t feel like I could do it.”
Game 1 is the first World Series game at American Family Field, though Milwaukee hosted World Series games at County Stadium in both 1957 and 1982. Game 2 is scheduled for Saturday in Milwaukee.