Well folks, you don't get to twenty-five starts in a row allowing three earned runs or fewer without eventually running into a night like this one. Every streak ends somewhere. Turns out this one ended at Wrigley Field, and it ended because of one guy in particular: Alex Bregman.
Let's be clear about something first, because it matters. This wasn't the kid losing anything off the fastball. His top five pitches of the night all sat 102.0 to 102.4 — right in his normal range, same stuff that's been unhittable most of the summer. This was a command night, not a stuff night, and there's a difference. Bregman found the difference and made him pay for it, over and over.
Four innings, five runs, five strikeouts, four walks. The command just wasn't there, and against a lineup with Bregman in it, that's how you end up trailing 5-3 by the time you hand the ball over in the fourth. The streak — tied with Dwight Gooden's 1985 mark of twenty-five straight starts under the three-run threshold, three shy of Claude Osteen's all-time record of twenty-eight — ends right there. No shame in it. That's rarefied company to have been standing next to in the first place.
Here's the good news: the Brewers weren't done. The bullpen held the line, the lineup chipped away, and Milwaukee turned a 5-3 deficit into a 9-5 win by the final out. Miz didn't factor into the decision either way — he'd already left trailing, and the team came all the way back, so the record book logs it as a no-decision. Not a loss. Not a win. Just a rough four innings on an otherwise very good season, with the stuff fully intact and a lineup that had his back when he needed it.
Season ERA moves to 1.97 after the outing. Still a very good number. Just not tonight's number.