The Buzz · October 21, 2026
The Buzz — Wednesday, October 21
The World Series is set for Friday, and the Game 1 starter on both sides carries a storyline that runs deeper than the box score. Under each name, the number that settles what is real.
Jacob Misiorowski
The take Brewers ace dominating talks as World Series rotation force
The regular season is the whole case, and it is overwhelming: 16-5, a 1.80 ERA, 252 strikeouts, a 0.80 WHIP, and an opponents' average of .157 — four major-league categories led in the same year, across 174.2 innings. The Brewers built their October around it: Game 1 of the NLDS, Game 1 of the NLCS, now Game 1 of the World Series on Friday.
The postseason reads differently. He is 0-0 with a 3.24 ERA across 8.1 innings, and he did not finish five in either start — 4.0 against the Padres, 4.1 against the Dodgers — with the Brewers winning both on the bullpen's back. The fastball still averaged 101 mph, 96 of 122 at 100-plus, tops of 104. The arm is not failing. What changed is that hitters are spoiling the pitch instead of missing it: the four-seam whiff rate dropped from 40% to 16% in October, with fouls on over half the swings against him.
The force is real — but eleven days of rest is the club betting the extra week gets the swing-and-miss back. If it does, Milwaukee has the ace the crowd says it has. If it does not, the Brewers are asking a bullpen to cover four innings again, and that works until it does not.
Jacob Misiorowski cards on eBay →(paid link)
Drew Rasmussen
The take Likely WS Game 1 starter vs former Brewers team
The reunion is real and the backstory is good copy — drafted by the Brewers in the sixth round in 2018, debuted in Milwaukee in 2020, traded to Tampa Bay in 2021 in the deal that brought Willy Adames back. The reason he gets the ball Friday is a 1.29 ERA across 21.0 postseason innings, with 23 strikeouts and three walks — the line that settles who starts Game 1 before the narrative enters the room. He has made three postseason starts for the Rays, and MLB.com has him listed as the likely Game 1 arm on four days' rest. The Brewers dealt him for a shortstop five years ago. Friday he walks to the mound with the best October line of any starter in this series, and the storyline is the least interesting thing about him.
Drew Rasmussen cards on eBay →(paid link)
Friday is where the series breaks
Misiorowski's regular season was the best in baseball, and Rasmussen's October has been better. That is the Game 1 tension: Milwaukee's ace has 11 days to find a whiff rate that fell from 40% to 16%, while the Rays hand the ball to a pitcher who has given them 21 innings and a 1.29 ERA this postseason. The Brewers won both of Misiorowski's short starts behind a bullpen that has not been taxed the way a seven-game series taxes one. If Game 1 turns on which arm finds its October self first, the Rays have the warmer one.