Manny Parra bounced back from his string of mediocre starts with a strong outing on Sunday at Miller Park.  He limited the Washington Nationals to 1 earned run on 6 hits in 7 innings.  He struck out 9 and walked none.  The Crew fell behind in the sixth inning, when Parra yielded a run-scoring single to Lastings Milledge with two outs that scored shortstop Christian Guzman and gave Washington a 1-0 lead.  But thanks to a Bill Hall sacrifice fly to score Gabe Kapler in the bottom of the sixth, the game was knotted up right away.

Neither offense made a move until the top of the eighth inning, when the Nats pounded recently-reliable reliever Eric Gagne for 3 runs off of a double and back-to-back homeruns.  Ryan Zimmerman (the Washington third-baseman) fought back from down 0-2 to a 3-2 count, and on the 12th pitch of the battle, he doubled down the left field line.  Austin Kearns, also down 0-2 to Gagne, fought back and hit a booming homerun to put his club ahead.  The next batter, Lastings Milledge, also went deep to swell the Milwaukee deficit to 4-1.  In the bottom of the eighth, Prince Fielder walked with one out (a very unselfish approach considering his hit streak was on the line), Corey Hart struck out looking on a very close call, Bill Hall hit an single that Ryan Zimmerman could do no more with than keep it in the infield, and then Mike Cameron walked to load the bases.  After a pitching change brought the talented Joel Hanrahan into the game, backup catcher Mike Rivera sent a pitch to the left field wall that unloaded the bases and sent the sellout crowd into a frenzy.

With the game tied, the Brewers could not finish the game in their half of the ninth, tenth, eleventh, or twelfth innings.  They managed to draw a season-high 13 walks on Sunday, but stranded a whopping 16 baserunners.  Thanks to solid performances from relievers Salomon Torres, who pitched the ninth and tenth innings, Carlos Villanueva, who pitched the eleventh and twelfth, and Guillermo Mota, who threw a scoreless thirteenth, the Crew was afforded a lot of time to get their act together.  Gabe Kapler was facing an 0-7 day at the plate in the thirteenth, but he wasted little time in clinching victory for the Brewers and the largely reduced crowd.  He hit a walk-off homerun to left for the first such homerun of his career and the first walk-off round-tripper by Milwaukee this season.  Thanks to a St. Louis loss, the Brewers climbed to 3.0 games ahead of Tony La Russa’s ballclub.

Offensive MVP: Mike Rivera (2-3/0R/12B/3RBI/3BB/0K)

Pitching MVP: Manny Parra (7IP/6H/1ER/0BB/9SO/0HR)

Alex’s Take:

This one sure took long enough.  The fact that Milwaukee is now up 3-0 in the series against a very beatable opponent shows that perhaps they have turned their home struggles around.  Sweeping the series would be very nice, but it should be considered a successful series regardless of Monday’s outcome.  The Brewers patience at the plate was extremely encouraging, but their nasty habit of stranding runners hurt them all day long.  They could have just as easily lost this game if one of the relievers had slipped up.  But thankfully, no one did except Eric Gagne in the eighth, and it turned out to be a very exciting 67th 2008 win for the Crew.