Peralta shows ace-like dominance with 11 K's in Crew's tough loss

MILWAUKEE -- Freddy Peralta showed signs of dominance on the mound on Tuesday night against the Cubs, striking out 11 batters, including four in a row to start the game and seven in the first three innings.

Manager Pat Murphy lifted Peralta with two outs in the sixth with the right-hander sitting at a career-high 111 pitches and the Brewers trailing 1-0 while being no-hit to that point by Cubs starter Ben Brown.

The no-decision for Peralta (3-3), in a game the Brewers would lose, 6-3, in 10 innings, means the Brewers' ace hasn't recorded a win in five starts in May, as he lost three of those five starts and had no-decisions in the two others.

But Peralta finished the month on a high note with back-to-back strong outings. In his previous start, Peralta gave up just four hits and one run in seven innings while striking out seven in a 1-0 loss to the Marlins in Miami.

Peralta gave up three hits and one run on Tuesday night -- a home run to Michael Busch on the first pitch he threw in the third -- over 5 2/3 innings. He walked two batters and struck out 11.

“Freddy was very good. He pitched like a number one [starter] tonight,” Murphy said.

Peralta also reached 98.6 mph on his fastball on his 105th pitch of the game.

“That’s crazy. I don’t know how [I did that],” Peralta said. “I’ve been feeling great.”

It marked the 14th time in Peralta’s career that he’s struck out 10 or more batters in a game and the second time this season.

“I wasn’t trying to get a lot of strikeouts,” Peralta said. “Sometimes, I want to get deep in a game. I was having a lot of swings and misses today and some foul balls. That’s why my pitch count was way high today.”

Peralta’s effort, along with clutch performances out of the bullpen by Jared Koenig, Enoli Paredes, Joel Payamps and Elvis Peguero, kept the Brewers within striking distance.

Brown was pulled after seven innings with the no-hitter intact, but Sal Frelick’s hard single up the middle with one out in the eighth off Hayden Wesneski gave the Brewers their first hit.

The Brewers then staged an improbable rally with two outs in the ninth when Christian Yelich walked, moved to second on a balk and scored on a single by Willy Adames, who was thrown out at second trying to stretch it to a double. The out call stood after a review, sending the game to extra innings.

Closer Trevor Megill came on in the 10th and was struck on the pitching elbow by a line drive off the bat of Mike Tauchman. While Megill walked around the mound in pain, pinch-runner Luis Vazquez, who began the inning at second base, came around to score and give the Cubs a 2-1 lead.

Hoby Milner replaced Megill and surrendered four hits as the Cubs tallied five runs in the inning to take a 6-1 lead. The Brewers scored twice in their half of the 10th to cut the final margin to three runs.

Murphy said following the game that Megill didn’t sustain a fracture.

“He got drilled pretty hard. He’s going to be good and sore for a while,” he said.

In five games this season, the Brewers have failed to score a single run in 32 innings against Cubs’ starters.

“We’ve got to find a way to do better,” Yelich said. “That’s how baseball goes sometimes, but you’d like to go out and win those games when Freddy goes out and gives you those kinds of outings. You’ve got to take advantage of it, and we really haven’t.”

Murphy also credited Peralta for showing strong leadership in a conversation he had in the dugout with Jackson Chourio after a blooper fell in front of the rookie outfielder.

“I knew he was feeling bad. I just reminded him that he’s here because he’s great,” Peralta said. “I was just trying to make him feel good. I know that he’s young, and I know things aren’t going his way right now. I was just trying to make him remember how good he is.”

With the loss, the Brewers failed to get to 10 games above .500 for the seventh time and fell to 2-3 against the Cubs this season.