Jacob Misiorowski and the Brewers Get Their Dodgers Rematch, and Los Angeles Is Still the NLCS Favorite

The National League Championship Series is a rematch. The Los Angeles Dodgers closed out the Atlanta Braves 4-1 at Truist Park on Wednesday night to win their Division Series 3-1, and a few hours later the Milwaukee Brewers beat the San Diego Padres 3-1 at Petco Park to finish their own series in four games. Game 1 is Sunday, Oct. 11, at American Family Field, where the top-seeded Brewers own home-field advantage.

It is the same pairing as last October, when the Dodgers swept Milwaukee in the NLCS and the Brewers scored four runs in four games. Los Angeles has now reached a third straight NLCS and is chasing a third straight World Series title. Milwaukee, which led the majors with a 103-59 record, is still looking for its first pennant since 1982.

How both clubs got here

The Dodgers won Game 4 without much offense. Tyler Glasnow walked five but allowed just one hit and one run over 4 2/3 innings, with Atlanta's lone run scoring on a wild pitch after Michael Harris II singled and stole second in the first. Los Angeles tied it in the second when Shohei Ohtani walked, stole second and came around on two Braves errors. The game stayed 1-1 until the seventh, when Andy Pages, hitless in his first seven at-bats of the series, lined a two-out, bases-loaded single off Robert Suarez on a full count to score two. It was the Dodgers' first hit with runners in scoring position in 20 such plate appearances in the series, per MLB.com. Max Muncy added a solo homer off Raisel Iglesias in the ninth, the 19th postseason home run of his career.

The bullpen, the biggest question about this roster entering October, did its job. Alex Vesia, Edgardo Henriquez, Tanner Scott and Edwin Diaz combined for 4 1/3 scoreless innings, with Diaz recording the final three outs. The Dodgers have now won five straight road postseason games, tying a franchise record.

Milwaukee's clincher was a pitching-and-defense game. Robert Gasser threw four innings of three-hit ball, Aaron Ashby followed with three hitless innings, and Trevor Megill closed it. Garrett Mitchell tripled and scored the go-ahead run in the fifth, then robbed Manny Machado of a potential game-tying homer at the wall in the eighth. Jackson Chourio drove in a run that moved him past Ryan Braun for the franchise record in postseason RBI. The win snapped a 12-game road playoff losing streak for the Brewers, whose last road playoff win had come in Game 3 of the 2018 NLCS.

Chourio is the name to know. He won Game 2 with a two-out, bases-loaded, two-run single off Mason Miller in the ninth inning, a 109.5 mph line drive up the middle on a 101 mph fastball, per multiple game reports.

The schedule and the pitching

Every game airs on FOX or FS1, per MLB.com. Start times had not been set as of Thursday.

Jacob Misiorowski is expected to start Game 1 for Milwaukee, per MLB.com. He led the majors in ERA (1.80), strikeouts (252) and WHIP (0.80) across 174 2/3 innings and went 16-5, setting a franchise record for ERA by a starter, and he is the overwhelming favorite for the NL Cy Young Award. Logan Henderson, who went 11-3 with a 2.47 ERA, is lined up behind him according to Brewers coverage, though Milwaukee's rotation questions start after those two.

The Dodgers had not named a Game 1 starter as of Thursday. MLB.com lists Tarik Skubal as the likely choice. The two-time Cy Young winner, acquired from Detroit at the deadline, went 12-7 with a 2.72 ERA across both clubs and started Game 1 of the NLDS, a 5-3 Los Angeles win. Yoshinobu Yamamoto struck out a postseason career-high 10 over seven innings in Game 3, and some reporting has floated the possibility that Skubal and Yamamoto swap spots. With four days off before Sunday, Dave Roberts has his full rotation available.

The matchup that matters

The regular season went Milwaukee's way. The Brewers took the season series 4-3, and three of those wins came in a four-game set at Dodger Stadium in mid-August, per MLB.com. October has gone the other way: the Dodgers have won all three previous postseason meetings, in the 2018 NLCS, the 2020 Wild Card Series and the 2025 NLCS.

The biggest variable on the Los Angeles side is Ohtani. He struggled through the Division Series, Roberts dropped him to fifth in the order for Game 3 against Chris Sale, the lowest he has ever hit in a Dodgers lineup, and moved him back to cleanup for Game 4. Ohtani has not homered since Aug. 18, according to multiple reports. The Dodgers won the series anyway, and Roberts said after Game 3 that it was good to know the team could win without Ohtani doing much. Against Misiorowski in Game 1, Los Angeles may need more.

The biggest variable for Milwaukee is length. Misiorowski and Henderson can match any pair of starters in the sport. After them, the plan gets thinner: Game 4 against San Diego needed four innings from Gasser and three from Ashby, and a seven-game series against this lineup will test that kind of patchwork more than San Diego did.

Betting angle

The market sides with the Dodgers despite Milwaukee's home field and better record. DraftKings had Los Angeles at -160 to win the series and Milwaukee at +130 as of Thursday, per FOX Sports, and SI's betting coverage also listed the Dodgers at -160. Game 1 is close to a pick'em: FOX Sports had the Brewers at -113 and the Dodgers at -106 behind Misiorowski.

The gap between the series price and the Game 1 price is the story. The market is paying for Milwaukee's ace at home and then charging for the Dodgers' depth over seven games. Bettors who like Milwaukee get a better number on the series than on any single Misiorowski start, while Dodgers backers are effectively laying the price for their rotation in Games 3 through 5 at Dodger Stadium. Verdexed's game-by-game call will be on the MLB predictions page (/mlb/predictions) once probables are confirmed.

What to do with it

For postseason DFS and playoff fantasy formats, Sunday's Game 1 is the only baseball on the schedule, so ownership will be concentrated. Misiorowski is the strongest pitching play on the board, and the Dodgers hitters who have produced this October (Muncy, Teoscar Hernandez and Pages in big spots) carry more risk against him than their salaries suggest. Chourio is the Milwaukee bat to build around given his October run.

If Skubal is confirmed, the Brewers' right-handed bats, Chourio first among them, get the platoon edge. Ohtani is the classic contrarian call: his ceiling remains the highest of any hitter in the series, and his recent form will keep ownership lower than usual.

What's next

Watch for two announcements before Sunday. The Dodgers will name their Game 1 and Game 2 starters, likely Saturday, and the clubs will set their NLCS rosters, which will show how much relief depth each side trusts. If Roberts flips Skubal and Yamamoto, Yamamoto gets the Misiorowski matchup and Skubal moves to Game 2, which would change the shape of the DFS slates on both Sunday and Monday.

The question from last year still frames this one. Milwaukee has the better regular-season record and the best pitcher in the National League. Los Angeles has won every October meeting between these teams. Game 1 starts the answer on Sunday night.