The Brewers and Dodgers on Friday gave baseball followers all the items they might most likely hope to see in an October matchup. A Christian Yelich home run, a celeb pitcher vs. a celeb hitter in a pivotal second and a late home run to interrupt a deadlock evoked reminiscences of last 12 months’s winner-take-all NLCS Game 7 for the correct to play in the World Series.

MORE: Watch ‘ChangeUp,’ a model new MLB keep whiparound current on DAZN

Kike’ Hernandez’s three-run homer off Josh Hader in the eighth inning helped ship the Brewers home losers as soon as extra as Los Angeles held on to win 5-3. The Dodgers have taken the first two video video games of the four-game weekend set.

Hernandez is the first batter ever to go deep in the direction of Hader on an 0-2 pitch.

https://twitter.com/MLBStats/standing/1119462183233040384

Yelich’s record-setting tempo, a pair of back-to-back homers, a curtain identify in a participant’s first occupation at-bat and a couple of alarming pitcher stat strains had been the coolest things from Friday baseball.

This was an element, too:

https://twitter.com/MLBStats/standing/1119413166012862464

4. Taxing day on the mound

Monday might have been the deadline to file taxes, nonetheless the arms of Madison Bumgarner and Drew Smyly paid a heavy worth Friday.

MadBum wished 38 pitches to get via the first inning as he allowed 4 runs and 4 hits to the Pirates. He settled down to allow just one hit over the subsequent 11 batters, nonetheless Pittsburgh nonetheless beat the Giants 4-1.

Bumgarner’s harmful inning was solely outdone by Texas’ Drew Smyly.

Smyly someway managed to strike out eight Houston batters sooner than the fourth inning was over, nonetheless in doing so, he grew to turn into the seventh Rangers pitcher to ever throw over 100 pitches in decrease than 4 innings.

https://twitter.com/FOXSportsSW/standing/1119413707740553217

3. Welcome to the Show

St. Louis’ Lane Thomas hit an opposite-field home run in his first occupation MLB at-bat. Thomas and the Cardinals couldn’t scrape collectively a win over the Mets, nonetheless Thomas did get a curtain identify.

Thomas was a fifth-round draft determine by the Blue Jays in 2014 and was recalled to the majors Wednesday after Harrison Bader was positioned on the 10-day injured itemizing.

https://twitter.com/Cardinals/standing/1119430805820968960

https://twitter.com/FSMidwest/standing/1119431314795417600

2. Back-to-back jacks (plural)

If one set of back-to-back home runs is cool, then two are even cooler. Jose Altuve and Alex Bregman acquired the celebration started in the first inning of Houston’s 7-2 win over Texas.

Altuve has hit seven homers in his last 9 video video games and has eight for the season. He hit 13 all of last 12 months.

Boston’s Mookie Betts and Mitch Moreland joined the back-to-back membership shortly after with a pair of home runs in the eighth inning of the Red Sox’s 6-4 victory over Tampa Bay.

https://twitter.com/MLB/standing/1119417099150155781

Moreland’s sixth jack of the season surprisingly leads all Red Sox hitters, which can make clear partially why Boston finds itself staring up at the other 4 teams in the AL East.

1. Yelich won’t decelerate

Christian Yelich wished all of 1 plate look Friday to say the standing of MLB’s home run chief from Kris Davis and Cody Bellinger.

https://twitter.com/fswisconsin/standing/1119396038421274624

His 11th home run of the season tied Yelich with Eric Thames for the most home runs in Brewers historic previous in March and April. The good news for Yelich is that he nonetheless has 10 additional video video games this month to interrupt the doc.