It’s been very clear over the past few days that there is no love lost between the Milwaukee Brewers and Los Angeles Dodgers ahead of their National League Championship Series, which is a rematch of the 2025 NLCS.
LA swept the Brewers in the NLCS a year ago, and the Brewers have not forgotten, and the same goes for Brewers’ skipper Pat Murphy.
Before the NLCS began, Murphy sounded off on Dodgers’ starter Tarik Skubal with a very blunt message for what the Brewers need to do in order to beat the back-to-back Cy Young Award winner.
Worth noting, Milwaukee has a likely future Cy Young winner in Jacob Misiorowski getting the ball in Game One as well, which makes for one of the most exciting pitching matchups of the year.
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Pat Murphy’s Message on How to Beat Tarik Skubal
Tarik Skubal has emerged as one of the best pitchers in the MLB playoffs over the past two seasons.
He’s been flat-out dominant, and the Brewers understand it’s a tough assignment ahead, but Pat Murphy has a lot of faith in his squad’s tenacity.
Per @DodgersNation, here is Pat Murphy’s message for facing Tarik Skubal:
“Step on his throat… respectfully.”
“I mean that respectfully because I really like Tarik. My brain can’t go any place else. Go to work, that’s the only mentality I can have.”
“I mean that respectfully because I really like Tarik. My brain can’t go any place else. Go to work, that’s the only mentality I can have.”
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What Do Brewers Need to do to Top Los Angeles Dodgers?
After being swept in last year’s NLCS, the Brewers are just as strong (if not stronger) as a group as they were in 2025.
However, the Brewers’ approach to this series will need to be different.
“I just wanna step on his throat. I mean that respectfully, ’cause I really like Tarik. […] I’m sure he’s gonna be able to feed his family and be a great dad. He can lose tonight and be fine.” 😭
It starts with timely hitting from their top stars (Jackson Chourio, William Contreras, Jake Bauers), and home runs, home runs, home runs.
The Dodgers have virtually scored all of their runs via the home run in the MLB playoffs, and the Brewers’ offensive attack is usually based on a ‘smaller ball’ style, which features bunting, moving runners over, and timely hitting.
Against starters like Tarik Skubal and Yoshinobu Yamamoto, it will be very difficult to string hits together, so Milwaukee would really benefit if a couple of players could run into a long ball or two.
With that being said, this Brewers team could be built for this moment more than last year’s, as the Brewers are still in search of their first-ever World Series title.
Pat Murphy Sounds Off On Tarik Skubal Before Dodgers-Brewers NLCS