Another Milwaukee Brewers regular season is in the books and if this season’s narrative feels familiar, it’s because it is was: For the third time in a decade, a Brewers team largely projected to finish around or even below .500 set a franchise record for wins in a regular season and will head to postseason play as one of the National League’s top teams.
— Kyle Lobner (@bykylelobner.bsky.social) September 16, 2026 at 2:55 PM
Despite its familiar theme, the 2026 season had plenty of unique, historic, and weird moments. In lieu of a season recap, what follows is a brief look at the first 27 items—the good, the bad, and the weird—added to that calendar during the 2026 season. The second part of this feature, containing the notable events from late July through October, will run following the conclusion of the Brewers’ postseason.
March 26 – No Miztake
The MLB season is six months long and usually features a variety of twists and turns and new narratives, but every now and then the first game of the season sets a storyline that will last through September. That was the case this year as Jacob Misiorowski, a first-time member of an Opening Day roster, took the ball and dominated in the season’s first game. He allowed a solo home run in the first inning and nearly nothing else, holding the White Sox to that single run and setting a Brewers franchise record with 11 Opening Day strikeouts. The previous record had been eight.
March 29 – A Debut to Forget
Not every history-making debut is a positive performance, and Brandon Sproat’s Brewers tenure started with an outing that couldn’t have gone much worse. In the top of the first inning of the series finale against the White Sox, he walked the first two batters, then gave up a single and a grand slam to Colson Montgomery, putting the Brewers in a 4-0 hole four batters into the game. Montgomery was only the 58th batter in known MLB history to hit a grand slam as the fourth batter in a game.
The day’s story didn’t end there, however: The Brewers trailed 7-2 in the third inning, but scored six in the bottom of the eighth to take the lead and eventually win 9-7. Christian Yelich’s pinch hit, three-run, go-ahead home run was the difference and, by Win Probability Added, was the single biggest hit by a Brewer all season. The victory completed a sweep of the White Sox and moved the Brewers into sole possession of first place in the NL Central for the first of over 120 days this season.
April 11 – William on the Wall
It had been a relatively quiet few seasons for the Brewers’ Wall of Honor, which did not see a single new inductee in 2023 and 2024 and just a single one in 2025 (John Axford). All of that changed in 2026, however, as two new plaques were added to the wall (more on those later) and two more players reserved a space once their careers are over.
The first to do it was William Contreras, who collected his 2,000th Brewers plate appearance in this game against the Nationals. He made history in style, hitting a home run in the game, but the rest of his teammates struggled to follow suit and the Brewers lost 3-1. He’s the 81st person to qualify for induction, which will happen following his MLB retirement.
April 14 – A Blown Save and a Bottoming Out
For most of the night on a Tuesday at American Family Field the Brewers appeared poised to snap a five-game losing streak, but fans who left early missed a wild finish. The Brewers took a 4-3 lead into the top of the ninth but the first three batters to face Trevor Megill all reached and Megill was in line for the loss after a three-run inning gave the Blue Jays a 6-4 lead. The Brewers responded with two of their own to hang a blown save on Jays closer Jeff Hoffman, but Toronto scored three more in the top of the tenth and held on for a 9-7 win.
The loss was the Brewers’ sixth in a row, their longest losing streak of the season, and it dropped their record to 8-8 on the season. This would be the last day all year with the Brewers at or below .500.
April 22 – Tough Crowd
After the aforementioned loss to Toronto, the Brewers won five of their next six games, righting the ship with back-to-back series wins over the Blue Jays and Marlins. It took a while for the results to show up in the standings, however, because the rest of the NL Central teams were all off to hot starts. In fact, the Brewers lost to the Tigers on this day to fall to 13-10 and, despite being three games over .500, found themselves in last place in the division. It was the first time the Brewers had been in last place at least 10 games into a season since 2016.
April 24 – Skenes’d Alive
Nearly a month into the season, the Brewers were in the upper half of the sport in terms of scoring runs, but the right pitcher can slow down even the best offense. On this particular day, that pitcher was reigning Cy Young Award winner Paul Skenes, who took a perfect game into the seventh inning of a 6-0 Pirates win in which the Brewers managed just two baserunners.
The loss dropped the Brewers to 13-12 on the season and seemed to put a dent in their hopes of returning to the postseason: Following that day’s action FanGraphs gave them just a 31% chance of reaching the playoffs, the lowest their odds would be all season.
May 1 – Rotational Stress
Ten different pitchers started at least one of the Brewers’ first 30 games (and none of them were Quinn Priester, who was also expected to contribute, but missed the season). Over a span of two days at the end of April, things looked like they might get much worse. On April 30, Brandon Woodruff, the Brewers’ leader in starts, left the game in the second inning after experiencing a significant drop in velocity. The next night, Misiorowski carried a no-hitter into the sixth inning before he also left with the trainer, this time due to hamstring cramping.
This was the beginning of the end of Woodruff’s season: He wouldn’t pitch in the majors again for nearly two months and would start just three more games across the rest of the season. Fortunately, Misiorowski’s cramping issue did not linger and he was back on the mound six days later.
May 4 – Chourio Makes Up For Lost Time
The Brewers were 18-15 through their first 33 games despite starting the season without one of their franchise cornerstones: Jackson Chourio suffered a broken bone in his left hand while preparing for the World Baseball Classic, opened the season on the injured list, and wasn’t back with the Brewers until this day—when he immediately made an offensive impact. Chourio went four for four and reached base five times in a 6-3 loss to the Cardinals. It was the first of six games where Chourio had four hits, which is the second most in a season in franchise history (Paul Molitor had seven in 1991).
May 8 – Honoring History, Making History
Even if the Brewers hadn’t played a game that day, May 8 would have been a notable moment in franchise history because CC Sabathia and Dave Parker, former Brewers and 2025 inductees into the Baseball Hall of Fame, were inducted into the Brewers’ Wall of Honor. Both players had relatively brief Milwaukee tenures, but qualified for the honor by being enshrined in Cooperstown.
Later, the Brewers also made history on the field when Jacob Misiorowski, just days removed from the hamstring cramping that abruptly ended his no-hit bid, set an MLB record by becoming the first starting pitcher ever recorded throwing 103 mph in a game. Misiorowski reached 103.3 mph four times in the first inning and hit 103.6 twice in the second. This record, however, would not last long: Misiorowski would go on to throw 103.7 or faster in six more games this season, topping out at 104.5 against the Rockies on July 26.
May 16 – Patrick Closes the Door
In a year where Jacob Misiorowski dominated the headlines, it was a long reliever who might have had the Brewers’ most impactful outing. The Brewers had just taken a 2-1 lead in the top of the sixth inning against the Twins at Target Field when Chad Patrick entered the game and took over: He retired 12 of the 13 batters he faced to record a four-inning save, becoming the first Brewer ever to do that while protecting a one-run lead in every inning.
May 19 – Taking Over
On May 4, the Brewers were 18-16 and in last place in the NL Central, but they were back on top just 15 days later. They won 10 of 12 games over that span and this night’s victory, a 5-2 win over the Cubs at Wrigley Field, moved them into sole possession of first place. They never looked back. The Brewers have nine first place finishes in franchise history (including 1981, when they won the AL East in half of a split season), but this is the second earliest they’ve ever taken first place for good: The 2024 team did it on May 9.
May 20 – Hamilton Turns on the Jets
David Hamilton’s speed produced plenty of memorable moments in his first season in the majors as a Brewer, but one of the first ones came at Wrigley Field. With two on and one out in the second inning, he hit a line drive up the middle that got past Cubs center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong and he came all the way around to score on a “Little League Home Run,” officially scored as a single and a fielding error. Hamilton also had a triple in the game and scored on a wild pitch.
May 30 – 1,000 for Yelich
The list of longest tenured players in Brewers franchise history has remained relatively untouched for quite some time. In the 1980s, eight different players appeared in their 1,000th game for Milwaukee, but few have stuck around that long since then. B.J. Surhoff reached 1,000 in the 1990s, Geoff Jenkins in the 2000s, and Ryan Braun and Rickie Weeks in the 2010s. As such, when Christian Yelich appeared in his 1,000th game as a Brewer on this day, he was the first to clear that threshold in 12 years. He reached base twice in the game, but it was not enough to prevent the Astros from beating the Brewers 9-3.
June 4 – All Five above .500
As noted above, the NL Central was one of baseball’s toughest divisions for most of the season. After this day’s action (including the Brewers’ 12-9 loss to the Giants) the Central was a combined 167-140 and all five teams were above .500, with the Reds bringing up the rear at 31-30. At this point, all five Central teams would have had a record good enough to qualify for the postseason in the American League.
June 5 – Four-ever
The Brewers had an uncharacteristically quiet night at the plate for the first eight innings of a Friday night game with the Rockies in Denver, but things changed rather suddenly with the game on the line. Trailing 3-1 in the top of the ninth, they strung together four hits and scored four runs off (future Brewer) Antonio Senzatela to take a 5-3 lead, but couldn’t hold the advantage in the bottom of the ninth as the Rockies plated two to force extras. Undeterred, however, the Brewers had five consecutive batters reach in the top of the tenth, as they scored four runs for the second consecutive inning to take a 9-5 lead, then held on to win 9-7.
June 7 – The Sixth Inning Cycle
The Sunday game of that series at Coors Field was significantly more typical for a game at that ballpark, as the Brewers had a seven- and a four-run inning on their way to a 12-4 win over the Rockies. The majority of their damage came in the sixth inning when the first four batters to come to the plate combined to hit for the cycle: William Contreras singled, Andrew Vaughn tripled, Gary Sanchez homered, and Garrett Mitchell doubled. The win completed a sweep and improved the Brewers to 40-23 on the season, their best record through 63 games in franchise history.
June 8 – A Wild Night in Vegas
Entering the season, the Brewers’ franchise history had taken them to 58 MLB ballparks across 17 states, two Canadian provinces, Washington DC, and Puerto Rico, but they hadn’t seen anything like the offensive environment at park #59. Las Vegas Ballpark is typically home to the AAA Las Vegas Aviators, but for six nights in June it was home to the (formerly Oakland) Athletics and the offense provided plenty of fireworks. In the first game of the series, the two teams combined for 11 home runs in a 15-14 Brewers 12-inning win.
Brice Turang batted seven times in that game and went one for six with a home run and an intentional walk, but his time at bat in the fifth inning (a 6-3 groundout) had ramifications back at home: It was the 2,000th plate appearance of his MLB career, making him the second player this season and the 82nd ever to qualify for the Brewers’ Wall of Honor outside American Family Field.
June 12 – The Mizterpiece
There have already been three iconic Jacob Misiorowski moments on this list and, spoiler alert, there are more to come, but it’s possible the most dominant performance of his MLB career will be this one on a Friday night against the Phillies. The Brewers staked him to a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first inning and they could have turned the offense off at that point. Misiorowski allowed just one hit, a ground ball single later erased by a double play, in a complete game shutout where he would face the minimum 27 batters. He struck out 15 and did not issue a walk in the game while being clocked as high as 104.5 mph with his fastball, again breaking his record for the fastest recorded pitch by a starting pitcher. The Brewers won the game 6-0 but Misiorowski stole the spotlight with arguably the best pitching performance in franchise history.
June 26 – Fastest to 50
The Brewers won at least 60% of their games in May, June, July and September this season, so “fastest to __ wins” became a regular occurrence through much of the calendar. On this day, that story reached another round number as the Brewers opened a home series with a 6-2 win over the Cubs to improve to 50-29 on the season and win 50 of their first 79 games for the first time. The win opened their lead in the NL Central up to 7.5 games, their widest margin of the season at that point.
July 4 – The End for Woodruff
Brandon Woodruff has pitched in 151 regular season games and five different postseason series across his decade with the Brewers, but his struggles to come back from the 2023 shoulder injury that ended his season are the unfortunate storyline that has followed him across the last few years and possibly the end of his Brewers tenure.
Woodruff returned from the injured list in late June and was outstanding, allowing just two hits across 11 ⅔ scoreless innings in his first two starts back, but struggled in a holiday start at Arizona and was removed in the fourth inning. Woodruff was eventually slated for another shoulder surgery that was later cancelled, but did not pitch again for the Brewers in 2026 and will be a free agent this offseason.
July 8 – Pawol Behind the Plate
The first 9,091 games in Brewers franchise history all had one thing in common: The umpire behind home plate was a man. That changed for the first time during this Wednesday night game in St. Louis when Jen Pawol got the assignment for a 5-1 Cardinals win. Pawol had been the first woman to umpire an MLB spring training game in almost 20 years when she did that in 2024 and was nearly a year removed from becoming the first woman ever to umpire a regular season game in August of 2025. However, this was the first time she had been behind the plate in a Brewers game.
July 14 – A Lone Standard Bearer
The Brewers entered the All-Star break on a down note after getting swept in Pittsburgh, but they still had baseball’s second best record at 59-37 and led the NL Central by five games. Their remarkable start, however, was not reflected in the Midsummer Classic. The Brewers sent just two representatives to the contest: Jacob Misiorowski, who did not pitch, and William Contreras, who flew out in his only at bat and was replaced defensively.
Despite his short outing, Contreras did make a bit of history. He was behind the plate when his brother and Red Sox first baseman Willson batted in the top of the sixth inning. The Contreras brothers were also NL All Stars in 2022 and are only the fifth pair of brothers to appear in the game together multiple times. They’re the only ones to do it this century and only the second pair to do it since 1950, according to Sarah Langs of MLB.