Two Sweeps in Two Weeks: What we can learn from Dodgers/Brewers in 2025

LOS ANGELES — As we await the start of the NLCS, there will be one stat that we’re going to be hearing ad infinitum before first pitch: “The Dodgers are 0-6 against the Brewers this season.” Sure enough, a quick perusal of the schedule shows exactly that. But what can we learn from those rough days in July, and in what way will it color the next ten days? Let’s dig into this season’s version of Brewers/Dodgers and see if there are any takeaways that might come in handy.

Game 1, July 7: Dodgers 1, Brewers 9

Reeling from being swept at home by the hated Astros, the Dodgers got little relief as they started their roadtrip in Milwaukee. Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s night unraveled in a brutal first inning as Milwaukee stacked a leadoff double, a walk, and then Andrew Vaughn’s two-run debut homer after a string of sliders, opening the floodgates to five runs before Dave Roberts lifted him at 41 pitches with two outs; a spiked throw from Mookie Betts that skipped past first and a bloop RBI only deepened the hole, and a shorthanded Dodger lineup missing Teoscar Hernández, Tommy Edman, Kiké Hernández, and Max Muncy could not answer against All-Star Freddy Peralta’s six shutout frames, settling for a 9–1 loss and a fourth straight defeat.

Game 2, July 8: Dodgers 1, Brewers 3

Shohei Ohtani ambushed Jacob Misiorowski with a leadoff homer, but the rookie flamethrower settled in and steamrolled the Dodgers the rest of the night, striking out 12 (all in the first five innings) over six frames in a 3–1 loss that extended L.A.’s skid to five. Clayton Kershaw was crafty for six innings (two runs, mostly soft contact), yet Milwaukee nicked him with a string of seeing-eye hits in the fourth, and Sal Frelick tacked on insurance off Kirby Yates in the eighth. The Dodgers’ best shot came in the sixth—Ohtani walked, Mookie Betts singled, but Ohtani was thrown out at the plate on Andy Pages’ chopper and the rally died. Shorthanded again without Teoscar Hernández, Tommy Edman, Max Muncy, and with Will Smith resting, the lineup couldn’t cash chances as the Brewers’ bullpen retired all nine it faced. The pregame plan to “stress” Misiorowski flipped on its head; he made the Dodgers do the stressing.

Game 3, July 9: Dodgers 2, Brewers 3 (walkoff)

The skid hit six as the Dodgers fell 3–2 in 10, wasting Tyler Glasnow’s encouraging return and a pair of scratch-and-claw runs. Glasnow went five innings with two hits, three walks, and five strikeouts, escaping a second-inning jam and looking more aggressive than tentative. Offensively, a shorthanded lineup finally showed some fight against José Quintana after four no-hit frames, manufacturing a fifth-inning run on a bases-loaded walk and nudging ahead in the seventh on Mookie Betts’ sacrifice fly. The missed chance was leaving the bases full in that same inning, then stranding more traffic in the eighth and ninth. Tanner Scott could not close it, yielding three ninth-inning singles capped by Andrew Vaughn’s broken-bat game-tying knock, and after Trevor Megill struck out the side in the top of the 10th, Kirby Yates gave up Jackson Chourio’s walk-off single to finish the sweep in Milwaukee.

Game 4, July 18: Dodgers 0, Brewers 2

Back home, the Dodgers dropped a 2–0 pitcher’s duel despite Tyler Glasnow’s best outing since April: six innings, one run, six strikeouts, with the fastball back to 98–99 and a useful sinker/curve mix that kept Milwaukee quiet except for Caleb Durbin’s RBI double in the fifth. The bigger problem was on the other side, where Quinn Priester carved through six scoreless with 10 strikeouts and the Dodgers’ bats mustered little against him or the bullpen. Kirby Yates surrendered a solo shot to Durbin in the seventh to cap the scoring, and an offense that had seen only four runs across the last four meetings with the Brewers never threatened. The silver lining was Glasnow’s health and simplified “be athletic and compete” approach, which gives the rotation something solid to build on even as the season series slipped away.

Game 5: July 19: Dodgers 7, Brewers 8

The bats finally woke up but the Dodgers still fell 8–7 to Milwaukee at Dodger Stadium, wasting a four-run third and late thunder. Shohei Ohtani drove in three, including a 448-foot opposite-field shot, and the offense posted ten hits with back-to-back eighth-inning homers from Tommy Edman and Miguel Rojas to slice a three-run gap to one. The missed pivot came right after that four-run third when, with the go-ahead run at third and no outs, the next three hitters went quietly. Emmet Sheehan lasted only three-plus innings for five runs, the tie broke on Isaac Collins’ leadoff homer in the fourth, and the bullpen leaked three more. Defense cost bases in the gaps, Ohtani’s potential tying drive in the eighth died at the track, and even with Mookie Betts getting a mental reset day, a much livelier lineup could not mask a pitching and run-prevention night that fell short.

Game 6, July 20: Dodgers 5, Brewers 6

On Family Day, the vibes were anything but, as the Dodgers blew two leads, committed three errors, lost 6–5, and were swept by Milwaukee again while also watching Freddie Freeman exit with a left-wrist contusion after being hit by a pitch. Shohei Ohtani launched his 34th to cap a three-run third, and Esteury Ruiz’s first Dodger homer briefly put L.A. back in front, but a sloppy fourth inning and a three-run sixth against Alex Vesia and Lou Trivino flipped it for good. Clayton Kershaw’s line unraveled amid the miscues and a 29-pitch fourth; the bullpen continued a rough July and hadn’t posted a clean sheet since July 3. The last shot came with the bases loaded in the ninth, when Mookie Betts lined out to center to end it. The result made it six straight losses to the Brewers and 10 defeats in 12 overall, with the run differential in that span an ugly 71–36. Frustration was high, and until the defense tightened and the relief corps steadied, even good swings weren’t enough.

Conclusion

So what can we learn from this rather disheartening trip down memory lane? First, context matters. It’s important to keep in mind that all these games came during the mid-summer malaise that gripped the club in July. The Brewers didn’t just catch the Dodgers at a bad moment; they caught them in the midst of their worst stretch of baseball in the last five years. So, in one way, we can throw out these results pretty quickly. Second, it’s important to remember that the revitalized Dodgers rotation will be different than the pitching the Brewers saw in summer. Both Glasnow and Yamamoto pitched against them, but the Crew has yet to face Ohtani and Snell, two pitchers against whom you wouldn’t exactly want your first ABs to come in the postseason. In addition, keep in mind this was in the middle of the worst of the Mookie Betts slump. It would be another couple of weeks before he’d start to get it going again.

And, it’s also important to note that this was in the hottest section of the Brewers season. They were in the middle of an insane patch in which they went 29-4 and wrested control of the NL Central away from the Chicago Cubs. At first pitch on July 7, the Crew was 3.5 games out of first place. When their second double-digit winning streak of the season ended on August, they were eight games clear of the Cubbies and never looked back.

So, while it’s important not to underestimate a good, fundamentally sound team like Milwaukee, there will be no handwringing on our part about facing the Number One seed with the World Series on the line. The Dodgers are a better team. They have better hitters. They have better starters. They have an October pedigree made for winning.

And when they punch their ticket for the World Series, these six games in July will be a distant memory, like a bad hot dog bought at a street vendor long, long ago in a galaxy far, far away.

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