Cubs vs Brewers: setting the table for the series

The Chicago Cubs were pushed to the limit of their Wild Card Series by the San Diego Padres, but managed to emerge victorious as the Bears' offense picked up a bit of steam.

The win gives them a bye into the Division Series against their sectional rivals, the Milwaukee Brewers, who finished first in all of MLB and were waiting comfortably this week.

This will be the first playoff meeting between the two teams.

The pitchers

The loss of Brandon Woodruff could hurt the Brewers in a best-of-five series.

Freddy Peralta will take the mound for the Brewers in Game 1 and should give them the upper hand in this first duel, after a regular season that saw him finish with a record of 17 wins against 6 losses and a career-best 2.70 earned-run average.

How Quinn Priester, Jose Quintana and Chad Patrick perform on the mound afterwards will probably dictate the pace of the series. Because it sure looks like Jacob Misiorowski could be used in the relief bullpen by manager Pat Murphy.

Milwaukee pitchers have allowed the third fewest runs and the fifth fewest home runs. They have the ninth-best WHIP in MLB and the fifth-most strikeouts.

For Chicago, Cade Horton was one of the best pitchers in baseball during the second half of the season, with an earned run average of 1.03 after the All-Star break. But he found himself on the injured list with a fractured rib just before the end of the season. There's a chance he could pitch late in the Division Series.

Cubs starters are posting a 4.41 ERA against the Brewers this season, although Jameson Taillon, Collin Rea and Shota Imanaga finished the last series between the two teams by allowing five earned runs in 18 and two-thirds innings of work with a 2.41 ERA.

Chicago's relief bullpen improved greatly in September, with the acquisition of Andrew Kittredge making a difference, and Brad Keller being very effective. The Cubs also have quality options in Drew Pomeranz and Caleb Thielbar.

Hitters

The Cubs ranked sixth in Major League Baseball with 223 home runs and third in runs batted in with 771.

Chicago has the eleventh-highest number of hits (1,371), the fourteenth-best team batting average (.249) and the tenth-best on-base percentage (.320) in MLB in 2025.

Flanked by Seiya Suzuki, Kyle Tucker and Pete Crow-Armstrong, to name but a few, the Windy City outfit is an aggressive team on the offensive side of the ball and likes to attack opposing pitchers, but it won't be easy against the Milwaukee pitchers.

For their part, with Christian Yelich and Jackson as leaders, the Brewers are a smart team that does all the little things the right way and avoids making the catastrophic mistakes that lose games.

However, at the fall dance, the Wisconsin representatives' lack of power could hurt them badly.

The managers

Prodigal son Craig Counsell returns to Milwaukee for the first time in the playoffs. The Whitefish Bay native, who is the winningest manager in Brewers history during his tenure from 2015 to 2023, shocked the baseball world when he left for the archrival before the 2024 season.

Brewers fans expressed their displeasure with him quite loudly at times when he returned to American Family Field, and will do so again in the coming days.

To understand what Pat Murphy means to Craig Counsell and what Counsell means to Murphy, you have to go back to a half-frozen field in South Bend in the fall of 1989.

As they meet in the NLDS, here are some favorite tales of a long baseball friendship. https://t.co/9tGq3GKYMw

– Adam McCalvy (@AdamMcCalvy) October 3, 2025

Pat Murphy, meanwhile, has worked miracles with his team in 2025, but will have to ward off fate in the playoffs, as the Brewers often collapse when it comes to October baseball.

It will be two great friends facing off for the manager's job in this series, Murphy having spent eight seasons as bench coach alongside Counsell before the latter quit.

The imponderables

Both teams are in the top-3 of MLB's best defenses, whatever statistics are analyzed. The Cubs, however, have much more power, but the Brewers are a team that runs the bases very well and can put pressure on the Bears' pitchers.

So it's a battle of two completely different styles that's likely to come down to the wire.

This content was created with the help of AI.