No matter who comes out on top in this year’s World Series, a Sonoma County native will be bringing home some hardware.
Both the Milwaukee Brewers and Tampa Bay Rays, who will begin the best-of-seven Major League Baseball championship series on Friday, have individuals with local ties.
The Brewers have Maria Carrillo grad Andrew Vaughn, a first baseman/designated hitter, who’s had a resurgence since joining the club via trade last summer.
Milwaukee also has former El Molino High School and Santa Rosa Junior College standout Jason Lane working as their offense and strategy coach.
Milwaukee Brewers coach Jason Lane throws during batting practice before a 2018 spring training game. (Carlos Osorio – ASSOCIATED PRESS)
Tampa Bay won’t have any locals on the field or in the dugout in the series, but does have former Montgomery and SRJC standout Brandon Hyde working in the front office as a senior advisor for baseball operations.
Hyde starred for the Vikings and Bear Cubs in the 1990s and got into coaching in the early 2000s. In 2019 he was named the manager of the Baltimore Orioles and was named AL Manager of the Year in 2023, when he helped lead the club to a 101-win season and a first-place finish in the AL East.
Brandon Hyde, senior adviser for the Tampa Bay Rays. (Baltimore Sun)
Hyde was relieved of his duties in the middle of the 2025 season after a 15-28 start and was hired by Tampa Bay in December.
Tampa Bay finished with the best record in the American League at 98-64 atop the AL East. The Rays swept the Yankees in the first round of the playoffs before beating the Cleveland Guardians in six games to reach their first World Series since 2020.
Milwaukee won a club-record 103 games this season to finish as the top overall team in all of Major League Baseball and is now playing in their first World Series since 1982 in pursuit of a first-ever championship.
Vaughn, who starred at Cal before going pro, joined the Brewers via a trade last season from the White Sox and turned around what had been a somewhat disappointing career for the No. 3 overall pick in the 2019 draft.
In 64 games with the Brewers to close out the regular season last year, he hit nine home runs with 46 RBIs and batted .308 with an OPS of .868.
He’s served in more of a reserve role this year but had six home runs, 43 RBIs, a .306 batting average and an OPS of .834 in 288 at-bats in the regular season.
He’s appeared in four games this postseason and has a double and two walks in seven at-bats.
Lane, the California Junior College Northern California Player of the Year in 1997 for the Bear Cubs, played seven years in the majors and officially retired in 2014. He joined the Brewers staff as a hitting coach in 2015 and has steadily worked up the ranks. In 2020, he became their first base coach and later served as third base coach. In January, he was promoted into his current role as offense and strategy coordinator.
Game 1 of the World Series is set for 5 p.m. Friday in Milwaukee.