Brewers Erase 3-Run Hole With Five-Run Sixth, Hold Off Miami

Milwaukee trailed 3-0 after two innings and scored five unanswered runs in the sixth to take a lead it never surrendered, beating Miami 8-6 on July 18. Griffin Conine's 404-foot, three-run homer in the ninth made it interesting, but the Brewers had already done the damage.

Miami came out swinging. Leo Jiménez singled to left to score Sanoja in the second, then Hicks came home on a fielder's choice, and a Lopez sacrifice fly plated Jiménez to make it 3-0. The Marlins had three runs on the board before Milwaukee could blink, and Max Meyer — who lasted just 3.0 innings, allowing 2 ER on 3 hits and 3 walks — looked like he might be the story of the night for the wrong reasons. The Brewers chipped back with a Shewmake sacrifice fly in the second and a Contreras RBI double in the third, but they still trailed heading into the middle innings.

Then the sixth inning happened, and it happened fast. Jackson Chourio singled to center, scoring Ortiz and Shewmake to flip the lead to 4-3 — a swing that pushed Milwaukee's win probability from 73% to 86%, a 14-point jump on a single swing. Garrett Mitchell followed immediately with a double to left, scoring Chourio and Yelich to make it 6-3. Just like that, a three-run deficit had become a three-run lead. The story of the night was Milwaukee's middle lineup refusing to let Shane Drohan's early wobbles go to waste. Drohan settled in and delivered 6.0 innings of 5 H, 3 ER ball with 9 strikeouts — a performance that looks like the backbone of this win. Abner Uribe then came on and struck out all three batters he faced in a clean 1.0-inning relief appearance.

Milwaukee extended to 8-3 in the seventh when Christian Yelich doubled to left, scoring Pratt and Shewmake. Conine's ninth-inning blast — a 404-foot shot to left center that scored Hicks and Jiménez — trimmed the deficit to 8-6 and gave the Marlins a pulse, but it was too little, too late. Conine finished 1-2 with 3 RBI, and Jiménez went 1-2 with 2 runs scored, so Miami's offense wasn't invisible — it just ran out of innings. Mitchell led all hitters going 3-5 with 2 RBI, and Chourio's 2-RBI, 2-run night appears to have been the decisive contribution. Milwaukee's offense spread the damage across multiple contributors, which looks like exactly the kind of balanced attack that's hard to recover from when you're already chasing.