Listen as Jacob Misiorowski comments on his big-league debut in Milwaukee
Jacob Misiorowski comments on his big-league debut at American Family Field on June 12, 2025, against the St. Louis Cardinals. Misiorowski pitched five innings without allowing a hit during a 6-0 Brewers win.
First, bean balls soared. Then, a game-changing home run did.
To cap it off, once sides had retired back to their respective clubhouses after a contentious game between division rivals, it was words that were flying.
Following his team’s 8-5 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers on June 14 at American Family Field in which he was involved in a collision at first base that drew ire from the home dugout, was hit by a pitch and later clubbed a home run, St. Louis Cardinals first baseman Willson Contreras didn’t mince words.
“One of their players, he liked to talk from far away, but then when he got in my face, didn’t say (s—),” Contreras said. “I was looking for more than that. He seems to be tougher. He’s a (expletive expletive). I’m not going to name no names. He knows who he is.”
Willson Contreras, Rhys Hoskins exchange words
Contreras may not have named a name, but it doesn’t take a sleuth to pinpoint who was the likely subject of his comments.
Brewers first baseman Rhys Hoskins was the loudest voice barking at Contreras during the play that became the genesis of the interdivisional kerfuffle.
On a Caleb Durbin ground out in the third inning, Contreras took a step with his left foot off the bag at first base after securing the catch and was in the running line of the 5-foot-8 Durbin, who then collided with him and fell to the ground.
“I know that I’m not here to hurt anybody,” said the 6-foot-1, 240-pound Contreras. “If I want to hurt the guy, I’ll do worse than that, believe me.”
Said Durbin: “I guess on throws up the line (that happens). I think it’s a judgment call whether it really took him up the line.”
The home dugout, already frustrated with Contreras over him stepping on home plate as Jacob Misiorowski threw a pitch during his MLB debut Thursday, certainly didn’t think the throw, which was directly on target, took him up the first-base line.
The loudest voice belonged to Hoskins.
“We were just talking about playing first base,” Hoskins said.
Hoskins, in his next trip to the plate in the fourth inning was hit by a fastball from Cardinals starter Andre Pallante on the hand. When he reached first base, Contreras had some words for Hoskins, who didn’t retaliate.
“He didn’t say nothing to me,” Contreras said. “I was expecting for him to say something, but he was looking away already. Look at my face. Just say it to my face, whatever you say from the dugout. And he was looking away…
“…Just get off the base. I was like, ‘Man, push me.’ He didn’t so it was good.”
Brewers return the favor but say it wasn’t intentional
To nobody’s surprise, a fastball from Brewers starter José Quintana, who suffered his worst outing with the team with seven runs allowed, ran a fastball in that plunked Contreras in his next trip to the batter’s box.
As umpires warned both dugouts, Contreras went to retrieve the ball and handed it to his former Cubs teammate on his way to first base.
“Just tried to pitch him (in) because the last two at-bats we stayed away with him,” Quintana said. “Tried to pitch close to him. We’re really close. We played for a long time together in Chicago. He knows it wasn’t on purpose.”
Despite all the bravado ball going on, both teams insisted none of the hit batsmen were on purpose.
“I don’t think anybody today was getting hit on purpose,” Brewers manager Pat Murphy said. “And if they do that kind of stuff, that’s player stuff. They work their own stuff out. That’s the health of the game, is that you let players, especially veterans like that, handle what they handle and react and do that kind of stuff that they do.
“There’s going to be tempers in games. That’s all part of it. Make sure everybody’s safe. If we feel like somebody’s thrown at on purpose, the umpires will take care of it.”
Two batters later, Quintana left a pitch over the plate that Cardinals second baseman Nolan Gorman crushed at 108 mph and 443 feet for a back-breaking, three-run homer. The blast pushed St. Louis’ lead to 7-1 with one out in the fifth and brought an end to Quintana’s day.
“Frustrating,” Quintana said of his day. “It wasn’t good at all.”
Willson Contreras homers, has words for the Brewers
Sure enough, Contreras was back in the spotlight before the game’s conclusion, even after the hit-by-pitches.
The festivities of the afternoon reached their climax in the top of the ninth when Contreras punished a baseball for a solo home run – and then made sure he let the Brewers hear about it.
Contreras smoked a Rob Zastryzny splitter out to right-center that pushed the Cardinals’ lead to 8-4, then as he rounded first base, stared in the direction of Hoskins and the Brewers dugout.
“Honestly I had turned around,” Hoskins said. “I didn’t even see it.”
Contreras and the Brewers have a history that predates his Cardinals tenure, with the former Cubs catcher barking at Milwaukee about being hit by pitch while he was with Chicago.
Contreras brothers carve a spot in MLB history
Then, in the bottom of the ninth inning, William Contreras, Willson’s younger brother, answered with his own home run for the Brewers to cut St. Louis’ lead to 8-5.
In doing so, the Contreras brothers became the first siblings on opposing teams to homer in the same inning in the expansion era (since 1961) in MLB.
It was a precarious position that William, who had only two extra-base hits in June and no homers since May 23 before his swing off of St. Louis closer Ryan Helsley, found himself during the three-hour, 10-minute affair.
“We talked about it a little bit there during the game, but, yeah, that’s how he goes out there and he plays the game,” William Contreras said in reference to his older brother. “Maybe there will be a point in time where he plays it a little bit differently, but that’s how he plays the game.”
One false rally after another
Milwaukee wasn’t without its chances to climb all the way back, but its bats stranded a combined seven runners between the sixth and eighth innings, including a chomp-on-your-tongue frustrating eighth.
Trailing by three, the Brewers loaded the bases with one out against reliever Phil Maton for Sal Frelick and Jackson Chourio, their two hottest hitters. Yet it was Maton who buckled down, striking out Frelick on three pitches and then getting Chourio to whiff through a sweeper for out No. 3.
In the seventh, Frelick led off with a double and William Contreras walked, bringing the tying run to the plate for Christian Yelich and Rhys Hoskins, who flew out.
The inning prior, Joey Ortiz nearly tied the ballgame but his two-out fly ball with two on died at the warning track in center.
“Felt like we had plenty of chances to win that game, which I think is a good feeling for us,” Hoskins said.
Response from the Brewers offense in fifth
Down six runs entering the bottom half of the fifth, the Brewers put up three with RBI hits from Sal Frelick and Jackson Chourio to draw within 7-4.
Brice Turang led off with a single and Durbin followed with a walk. After a Joey Ortiz sacrifice bunt trailing by six, Frelick snuck a double down the left-field line to plate a pair and Chourio followed by dumping a two-strike pitch from Andre Pallante into center to draw within three runs.
That was all the Brewers would get, though, as the big bats in the middle of the order were once again unable to produce. William Contreras, facing the newly-entered Kyle Leahy, popped out and Christian Yelich flew out.
Jackson Chourio makes a run happen by himself
It took Jackson Chourio doing the whole thing himself, but the Brewers got on the board in the fourth. Chourio led off the frame with a triple into the right-center gap and scored two batters later on a passed ball. That wound up being the only way Chourio would have scored because William Contreras and Christian Yelich struck out, and Isaac Collins popped out to end the inning.
Quintana eventually gets burned in fourth
Through three innings, Quintana had worked his way off the hook with some well-timed strikeouts and weak contact. In the fourth, there was no escape route.
Thanks in part to some shoddy defense from the Brewers, the Cardinals put up three runs to push their lead to 4-0 all the while right-hander Andre Pallante was no-hitting Milwaukee’s offense. Quintana allowed a leadoff single and walked the second hitter in the fourth before getting Jordan Walker to pound a two-chopper to third base. Caleb Durbin, rather than charging the ball, waited back on the second bounce and ultimately rushed a throw to second that sailed over the glove of Brice Turang.
“Played it well,” said Durbin. “I thought turned it into a long hop because I read it as it was kind of going to be a tweener. So either go do-or-die and come in, and obviously I took the safe route getting the long out and that kind of eliminates the play going to third, stepping on it and going to first. So it just got a little away from me. Unfortunate, but part of the game.”
The Cardinals then pushed their lead to four when Victor Scott II lined a two-run single to left.
Cardinals strike first
After slow offensive nights the first two games of the series, the Cardinals put the first tally on the board against Quintana in the first inning.
Masyn Winn led off the game with a two-strike single to center and, after Ivan Herrera followed with a walk, he scored on Alec Burleson’s seeing-eye single up the middle.
The Brewers defense helped quell the rally, with Chourio throwing out Herrera at third on the play, and Quintana escaped without further damage.
What time is the Brewers game today?
Time: 3:10 p.m.
What channel is the Brewers game on today?
TV Channel: FanDuel Sports Wisconsin, FS1.
Brewers lineupSal Frelick RFJackson Chourio CFWilliam Contreras CChristian Yelich DHRhys Hoskins 1BIsaac Collins LFBrice Turang 2BCaleb Durbin 3BJoey Ortiz SSCardinals lineupMasyn Winn SSIvan Herrera DHAlec Burleson LFWillson Contreras 1BNolan Arenado 3BNolan Gorman 2BJordan Walker RFPedro Pages CVictor Scott IIBrewers schedule
Brewers vs. Cardinals, 1:10 p.m., June 15. Milwaukee RHP Quinn Priester (4-2, 3.65) vs. St. Louis RHP Miles Mikolas (4-3, 4.48). TV – FanDuel Sports Wisconsin. Radio – AM-620 WTMJ.
Off day, June 16.