Bauers on Brewers’ 3–0 lead: ‘The difference is belief’

“The difference is belief,” Jake Bauers said when Alex Rodriguez asked what had changed for the Brewers since their NLCS loss to the Dodgers a year earlier.

Milwaukee had just beaten Los Angeles 6–2 at Dodger Stadium on Wednesday, October 14, taking a 3–0 lead in the best-of-seven series. Bauers joined Kevin Burkhardt, Derek Jeter, David Ortiz and Rodriguez on FOX’s postgame show after his two-run homer put the Brewers ahead in the seventh inning.

“I think last year we got to this point and we were just kind of happy to be there. We were happy to be there. Happy for the opportunity,” Bauers said. Of the trip to Los Angeles last October, he added: “We were kind of realizing we were flying to a funeral.”

This time, he said, “We know we can play with anybody.”

Waiting for the fastball

Rodriguez also asked Bauers about the approach behind his long at-bats against Yoshinobu Yamamoto in Game 2 and Blake Snell in Game 3. Wednesday’s confrontation lasted 11 pitches. Bauers fouled off five pitches with two strikes before hitting Snell’s 97.8 mph four-seamer for a two-run homer, turning a 2–1 deficit into a 3–2 lead. Garrett Mitchell followed with another homer.

“Tonight that third at-bat he had been stuffing me in with fastballs and so I went up for the third one,” Bauers said. “I was looking for a fastball in the inner lane the whole time.”

Before that rally, Will Smith’s two-run double had put Los Angeles ahead in the sixth. DL Hall entered with two runners on and one out, then struck out Enrique Hernández and Tommy Edman to keep Milwaukee within a run. The complete account of Hall’s outing follows those strikeouts and his work into the eighth.

Asked about the team’s confidence after losing the lead, Bauers said, “We’ve won a lot of different ways this year.”

“We play for each other, and we take pride in that.”

Roberts on the elimination game

FOX also included an excerpt of Dave Roberts’ postgame comments about recovering from the 3–0 deficit. The Dodgers manager was part of Boston’s 2004 comeback against the Yankees, a series Ortiz, Jeter and Rodriguez also played in.

“It’s certainly possible,” Roberts said. “I’ve lived it.”

Jeter told the FOX panel that Los Angeles had to begin with a single win: “If you’re the Los Angeles Dodgers, you cannot take the field thinking that you’re down three games. All you have to do is win one game.”

Roberts made the same immediate demand of his team.

“We’ve played in a lot of elimination games and we just got to get a win and we got to find a way to build some momentum and it takes all of us.”