Brewers vs. Rays Prediction: World Series Game 5 Picks and Best Bet

The Brewers sit one win from the first championship in franchise history, but the Rays just proved they will not go quietly, and Wednesday night they get Milwaukee’s Cy Young favorite with a bullpen game.

Quick take:

• Pick: Milwaukee Brewers moneyline
• Why: Jacob Misiorowski is the best pitcher in baseball, and Tampa Bay has no fully rested starter for a title-clinching game.
• The number to watch: Misiorowski’s 0.80 WHIP, the best in the majors this season.

Game 5 of the World Series is set for 8:00 PM ET at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, and Milwaukee leads the series 3-1. The Brewers won 103 games in the regular season and have been the more complete team for most of this series, taking Game 1 by 3-2, Game 2 by 5-4 and Game 3 by 10-1 on the back of a World Series record eight two-out runs in one inning.

Then came Game 4.

Tampa Bay, three outs from elimination, trailed 3-2 after Cooper Pratt’s go-ahead homer in the top of the 12th. The Rays answered in the bottom half, with Jonny DeLuca and pinch-hitter Ben Williamson both singling home runs in a 4-3 walk-off win. Their bullpen threw eight innings of one-run ball to get there, which is exactly why this game is more interesting than a 3-1 series deficit suggests.

A Short-Priced Favorite Against a Bullpen Game

The market sees this one pretty clearly. At FanDuel, Milwaukee is a -142 moneyline favorite with Tampa Bay at +120, and the total is set at 6.5 runs. The Brewers’ run line is -1.5 at +150. That is a modest price for a team with a title on the line and the best starter in the sport, which tells you the books are respecting how much the Rays showed in Game 4 and how thin Tampa Bay’s pitching plan looks. If you want to compare numbers across books before first pitch, the live MLB odds page keeps the current lines in one place.

Recent Form

The form and head-to-head data below tells the same story as the scoreboard: three of the four games have been decided by a single run, and the one blowout belonged to Milwaukee.

Showing 10 of last 10 meetings

Why the Miz Tilts the Math Toward Milwaukee

Jacob Misiorowski went 16-5 with a 1.80 ERA and a 0.80 WHIP this season, leading the majors in ERA, strikeouts (252) and WHIP while holding opponents to a .157 average. He started Game 1 of this series and allowed one run on four hits over five innings in the 3-2 win, and Milwaukee has won all three of his postseason starts. He will be working on four days of rest, and the Brewers made sure of that by keeping him out of the Game 4 bullpen even as the game stretched into extra innings.

The Rays, meanwhile, have burned through their entire rotation. Drew Rasmussen started Game 2, Freddy Peralta started Game 3, and Griffin Jax started Game 4 before Nick Martinez threw two relief innings and Ian Seymour added another. No starter has been announced, and the realistic plan is a bullpen game with the season on the line, using fresher arms like Cole Sulser, Steven Matz and Garrett Cleavinger.

Misiorowski has given up fewer than 1.5 earned runs in six of his last seven starts, and the Rays will be asking a patchwork pitching staff to match him.

That is a tall order against a lineup that keeps finding ways to score. Jackson Chourio is 10 for 20 in the Series, tying Babe Ruth’s 1928 mark for the most hits through the first four games of a World Series, and he now has 31 postseason hits before turning 23. William Contreras is hitting .383 with 28 total bases in 12 playoff games, and Pratt, the rookie shortstop, became the first rookie in World Series history to collect four hits in a potential clincher.

Tampa Bay is not without a pulse. Chandler Simpson had three hits in Game 4, Liam Hicks is starting to heat up, and Junior Caminero says he will play on his sore left foot. The bullpen also has room to maneuver because an off day follows Game 5, so Kevin Cash can empty it. Closer Bryan Baker, who led the majors with 41 saves, covered six outs in Game 4 and could be called on again.

Still, bullpen games are fragile. One shaky inning against a Brewers lineup that scored eight runs on seven straight hits in Game 3 can end the night before the late-inning arms ever matter.

Prediction and Best Bet

Tampa Bay has the home crowd, the momentum of a walk-off and a deep relief group, but it does not have a starter who can neutralize Misiorowski. Milwaukee should scratch out enough against a parade of relievers to close this out, with the Rays’ best chance coming from another low-scoring grind.

The pick:

1. Prediction: Brewers 4, Rays 2
2. Best Bet: Brewers on the moneyline

At -142, the Brewers are a fair price to bet on in a title-clinching spot with the best pitcher alive on the mound. If you are new to wagering, our betting calculator shows exactly what that price pays on any stake.