The Milwaukee Brewers are off to their best start through the first 40 games of a season this year as they won their 26th game on 2022 on Saturday night in a 5-1 victory over the Washington Nationals.
Brandon Woodruff, who has had a tough start to the season overall, put up a solid outing, going six strong innings and allowing just one run. The Big Woo scattered just five hits and struck out six.
The Brewers offense was able to supply him with some run support early, with Andrew McCutchen hitting the first pitch he saw from Nationals lefty Patrick Corbin into Washington's bullpen for a leadoff home run. That was the 20th leadoff homer in McCutchen's career. Luis Urias and Christian Yelich followed with singles and a Hunter Renfroe sac fly brought home Urias to give Milwaukee a 2-0 lead in the first inning.
Woodruff made just one mistake on the day, allowing a home run to Lane Thomas in the 3rd inning to allow the Nationals to pull within one.
That would be as close as they got though as in the 5th inning Luis Urias slugged a 413 foot home run to center field, followed by back-to-back singles from Yelich and Renfroe. Mike Brosseau drew a walk to load the bases for Keston Hiura, who promptly lined a base hit to left field to score two more and make it a 5-1 Brewers lead.
Brad Boxberger, Trevor Gott, Hoby Milner, and Josh Hader finished the final three innings to close the deal on a 5-1 Brewers victory. Hader came in to get the final out as Milner ran into a little trouble in the 9th inning.
Woodruff gets the win and moves to 5-2 on the season, lowering his ERA to 4.76. Patrick Corbin takes the loss and falls to 0-7 on the year. Josh Hader picked up his 15th save of the season already.
The Brewers will go for a sweep on Sunday with Freddy Peralta (3-1, 3.53 ERA) taking the mound for the Crew facing Aaron Sanchez (2-3, 7.94 ERA) of the Nats.