MILWAUKEE – In the postseason, you can’t hide from the moment. The lights are bright, the crowd is loud, and every pitch could determine the outcome of a team’s season.
When those three things happened for the Brewers on Wednesday, the 20-year-old with the big smile was there.
“He’s… he’s special,” Brewers manager Pat Murphy said, fighting back emotions, of outfielder Jackson Chourio after his team’s 5-3 victory over the Mets in Game 2 of their National League wild card series.
When the Brewers began spring training, Chourio pressed on. Fresh off an $82 million extension, a record for a player with no major league experience, the rookie, who would become the youngest player in the major leagues, was clearly trying to show the world he deserved it.
Throughout this season, Chourio was calm, with a calm demeanor. You could have even called him shy. But as he rounded the bases not once but twice in Wednesday’s Game 2, he let every emotion out of his body as his two-home run day saved the Brewers’ season.
The boy from Maracaibo, Venezuela, is no longer shy. He and anyone watching now knows it has arrived.
“I’m ready to put on a show for the big leagues and all the fans who haven’t been able to see me play,” Chourio told Yahoo Sports in March.
Fast forward to today, and that’s exactly what he’s doing. Throughout the season, Chourio has been the Brewers’ spark plug. First the youngest player in baseball, then the youngest player in MLB history to record a 20-20 season, he continued to improve with every step. How much more can you ask a child to do?
But after the team’s star outfielder, Christian Yelich, went down due to season-ending back surgery, Chourio appeared to take on an even bigger role. And on Wednesday, with his team against the wall and the season on the line, Chourio took matters into his own hands.
“The pressure will always be there,” he said after the game. “So, as a player, our job is to control it in the best way possible. “It’s about going out there and finding the time where we can control it, keep going out there and doing what we do.”
The Brewers left fielder began his monster night by hitting a leadoff home run into the Mets bullpen, putting Milwaukee on the board in the first inning and setting the tone for his team. The home run made Chourio the fifth-youngest player to hit a home run in the MLB postseason.
The playoffs tend to feature great moments for stars to shine. And at the end of the game, with Milwaukee facing a 3-2 deficit and an early October elimination, you could sense something special on the horizon. The crowd was buzzing with anticipation, and in the eighth inning, when the Brewers needed some magic, Chourio was there.
On a 1-1 count, he drove a hanging cutter from Mets reliever Phil Maton deep into right field to tie the game. The Brewers dugout erupted and when the ball hit the second-floor façade, Chourio electrified the crowd of more than 40,000 at American Family Field.
That home run made Chourio just the second player in MLB history to have a multi-homer postseason game before turning 21, joining Braves great Andruw Jones, who did so when he was 19. It also made Chourio the second player in MLB history to hit two game-tying home runs in a postseason game, joining Babe Ruth in Game 4 of the 1928 World Series.
“I think the adrenaline is still getting to me. “I think I still feel the adrenaline,” he said after the game. “It was a very special moment for me and I will remember it for the rest of my life.”
Mets manager Carlos Mendoza offered: “The entire time we were going through the situation, we wanted a matchup between Maton and Chourio.
“It just didn’t work.”
Two batters later, Garrett Mitchell put a seal on the game for the Brewers, hitting a two-run shot to help Milwaukee secure the victory and tie the series at 1-1.
“It all starts with (Chourio),” Mitchell said afterward. “It all starts with that at-bat he put together.”
Throughout the season, there were several moments where things clicked for Chourio. After starting to find his way eight months ago, he is becoming exactly the player the organization thought he could be.
“I think you saw it on defense (first),” Murphy said. “He showed some aggression in the outfield and it was like, ‘Wow.’ … There were a few takes (in early June) and all of a sudden I thought, ‘This kid is getting it.’
“…But the boy came with a big smile. “He is a great human being.”
This season, Chourio proved to anyone paying attention that he’s a star, and now, the youngest player in the postseason, who, fittingly, also caught the final out of the game, shines when the lights are brightest.
“These are moments we can share together, both myself personally and the city of Milwaukee,” he said. “So I’m very happy that we can celebrate this together.”
