Brewers Make History & the Timberwolves’ Big Decision | The Story with Rachel Nichols

The 2-1 pitch.

Ground ball, second base, Turang has it, goes to first.

The wait is over.

Brewers have won the World Series.

What a moment.

Wow, I'm Rachel Nichols, and this is the story.

So do you want to know how people in Milwaukee feel about the Brewers?

The only other time they were in the World Series, 100,000 fans held a raucous parade for the team, even though they had just lost Game seven the day before.

Really?

And you'd think it would be all sad, all those folks, including the players who had just had their hearts broken, but it actually wasn't.

Robin Yount was doing burnouts on his dirt bike.

The thing is that even though it wasn't a victory parade, it was a celebration of a bond between a franchise and a city, the kind of bond that happens when a team shows up day after day, summer night after summer night.

That bond is still there.

And when the Brewers beat the Rays to win Game 5 and clinch this year's World Series title, you could feel the warmth of it, even if most of their fans were thousands.

Miles away.

It's the first World Series title in franchise history and the first for the city of Milwaukee since the Braves won it back in 1957.

For a franchise that started out in 1969 as the Seattle Pilots and moved to Milwaukee the next spring, that is 57 full seasons of waiting.

And the Brewers did it as the smallest market in baseball with the 19th highest payroll.

They won one.

1103 games anyway, more than anybody else, and they didn't need the long ball to do it.

In game three of this series, they scored 10 runs without hitting a single home run.

As Milwaukee manager Pat Murphy said after sweeping the Dodgers, LA may have the Hall of Famers, but his team had a bunch of gamers.

I love that line, mostly because the gamers have gone out through this entire playoffs and.

Backed it up.

They did it for the diehard fans, some well into middle age, who had never seen the title.

They did it for the franchise's icons like Yount, who threw out the first pitch before game one of the series.

You did that, by the way, wearing one of the trademark plaid sports coats that belonged to Bob Uecker, another legend who called Brewers games for 54 seasons before he died last year at 90 years old.

And yeah, they did it for 92-year-old Bud Selig, who brought baseball back to Milwaukee in 1970 , and who did actually question city officials back in 1982.

Do you really want to hold a parade for us, for a team that just lost?

Ted Simmons, the Hall of Fame catcher on that 1982 team, once looked back on that parade, and he said, If we had won, they couldn't have done it any bigger.

Well, Ted, I have a feeling they actually could.

And later this week, we will get to find out.

All right, let's get to the NBA where this morning Timberwolves star Anthony Edwards is having arthroscopic surgery on his right knee, a procedure that will knock him out for at least 2 months.

Now it's a little odd that a guy suddenly goes under the knife without some sort of on-court collision or accident sparking things, especially when that guy scored 45 and 47 in two of the 4 games he's played so far.

But yesterday, Wolves president of basketball operations, Tim Conley said that after an MRI showed that Ant's knee, which also caused him to miss some time last season, started showing changes.

They decided to make the move for Ant's quote, long term health.

He added that Ant was kicking and screaming about missing the time, but that Connolly thinks the team is deep enough to soldier on without him, in part because basketball front offices around the country have realized with all the injuries we see in today's game, a deep bench is a necessity.

Take a listen to Tim.

Like every team, we do.

These research projects and the game has just changed, right, not just the pace of the game, but the style of the game.

So 15 years ago if you were a center, you could be down the court the whole time.

Now you're in 50 actions every possession.

So we're trying to learn more and more.

It's unfortunate that these things have become more and more prevalent.

The minutes and the force of which plays with it's always going to be a challenge because there's no one more competitive, no one plays harder, but I think depth is increasingly important.

But I do think league-wide it's something that we should further study.

Indeed, Edwards is far from being the only big name sidelined just two weeks into the season.

The Thunder will be without both Jalen Williams and Cason Wallace for months to come.

Ben Simmons is going to miss the whole season after tearing his Achilles.

The Jazz won't have Jaren Jackson Jr.

back for another 6 to 8 weeks, and Paolo Banquero is missing time down in Orlando.

And that's not even counting the guys whose injuries from last year are still carrying over now.

So, is the NBA actually seeing more stars go down, or does it just feel that way?

Last season, Commissioner Adam Silver said the league's data showed the lowest number of injuries in the last 3 years, which is notable .

Still, I would say the total number isn't really the story, that the kind of injury is.

Take calf injuries, which in turn can lead to Achilles tears.

Kirk Goldsberry at the Ringer tracked more than 13,000 NBA injuries over 16 seasons.

Now back in 2011, he found 18 calf injuries.

Nearly 15 years later, that number was 60, and last season it hit 86.

Longtime Warriors assistant coach Ron Adams told Goldsbury that the style of play was partly what was to blame.

He noted basketball used to be a two-foot sport, but now with all the stepbacks and Eurosteps, players are often planting and exploding off one leg, and they're also doing it more often.

Compare today's NBA game to 20 years ago.

And every NBA team now gets about 9 more trips up the floor a game, which over a season adds up to about 700 extra trips each.

Of course, there's no magic fix for everything.

Injuries like Jay Dubs over in OKC are really just flukes that come with the way players can land on the court.

But smart teams like the Wolves have taken the larger data and made the kinds of decisions we didn't really see even just a few years ago, like.

Taking a player who is still functioning at an extremely high level, and putting him under the knife before that function takes a steep dip.

So yeah, it may seem like an odd tack to take with a guy who just dropped 47.

But Minnesota is hoping it's the smart one as well.

All right, let's get over to football, where Falcons quarterback Michael Pennox Junior got a nice little surprise when he got to work yesterday.

For the first time in his career, he'd been named the NFC's Offensive Player of the Week.

Now guys, you know, normally I'm not out here citing an award like that as if it was a big deal.

But for Atlanta, let's be honest, having a quarterback who can pull off even that is a huge step in the right direction.

And the bigger deal is why Penn earned the honor.

Last weekend, he threw 3 touchdown passes with no turnovers as Atlanta took down the previously undefeated 49ers.

It was Pennox's 2nd straight game with 3 TDs, which is a huge breath of fresh air compared to the way the Falcons opened the season.

Remember, they were without him and they lost both games.

He didn't play, scoring 16 points total.

But since Pennix came back from last year's ACL tear, they're 3 and 2, and he's thrown 9 touchdown passes against just one interception.

Now, nobody is crowning these guys Super Bowl champions, I promise.

The Falcons are still under 500.

And did you see what happened against Chicago earlier this month?

They fell behind 31 to 7 before they had a bit of 1/4 quarter rally.

But the quarterback looks like a different player, and a lot of that traces back to the new guy in charge.

Yeah, I'm talking about Kevin Stefansky, who the Browns fired at the end of last season, and the Falcons picked up less than 2 weeks later.

Now, since then, Stefanski has really changed a lot of what Pennix was used to seeing in his 1st 2 seasons.

Michael lined up almost exclusively in the shotgun.

Stefansky's staff put him under center, and they built a lot more of the offense around play action.

The result?

Well, in his first two games back, Pennix got rid of the ball faster than any quarterback in the league, and his accuracy has jumped overall as well.

Last season, he completed about 60% of his passes.

This season, he's at nearly 67%.

He also just has a more confident air about him, which he explained after practice yesterday.

You know, you always build confidence, as time goes on, you know, the first time you do something.

And you, you know, you, you got to get used to it, you know, when you get into this role and you're playing at the professional level, it's, it's a lot of high expectations.

For me, I just want to, you know, be the best version of myself I can each and every day.

And like, like I said, with time it's going to come with more confidence, and I would hope I got more confidence since 2 years ago.

Now Pennix didn't mention his health there, but it is always going to be something to watch.

He tore an ACL twice.

College and had a couple of shoulder injuries on top of that.

And then he tore the ACL in his other knee last year.

But right now he's healthy and he's ready to go down to Tampa Bay this weekend.

That game is going to mean a little extra to Pennix, who grew up in that area, and it will also be a little extra in general thanks to Bucks quarterback Baker Mayfield.

As you may remember, Baker was Stefansy's first quarterback when he got to Cleveland and the.

Partnership did not end well.

In fact, when Stefansky got the Atlanta job earlier this year, Baker tweeted this.

Still waiting on a text call from him after I got shipped off like a piece of garbage.

Can't wait to see it twice a year, coach.

Stefansky actually started 13 different quarterbacks in 6 seasons in Cleveland.

Now in Atlanta, he might have found his answer in year one.

And to close out today's show, you know that moment when you run into an ex, you're all braced for something awkward, but it turns out both sides are actually doing kind of great.

Well, tonight, John Morant and his new look Trail Blazers host his longtime Grizzlies team, and in a situation no one predicted, both squads are walking in undefeated.

Granted, with Morant, it's hard to ever know what to predict.

Still, while we've learned not to make any grand sweeping declarations.

What we can say is that he is off to a very strong start on a Portland team where there have been a lot of questions about fit.

And yeah, the Blazers do have 3 guards who all like the ball.

But the other night in Los Angeles, the Portland coaching staff showed how they plan to make it all work.

Drew Holiday came off the bench, but still got enough minutes to comfortably score 22.

J had 23.

Damian Lillard had 21, and when it got tight, it was those two who closed it.

J hit two buckets in the final two minutes, and Dame, of course, took the Blazers' last shot, a 25 ft 3 pointer that he also, of course, buried.

The evening marked the Lakers' only loss of the season so far, and it moved the Blazers to 3-0.

While meanwhile, the visiting Grizzlies are 4-0 behind some eye-opening play from Ty Jerome.

So who won the breakup?

I'd still wait a while on that one because trades like this get graded over years, not weeks.

To me, Portland needs to worry less about whether all three guards can share the floor and more about just keeping them on the floor.

J has played just 79 games over the past 3 seasons, and Dame's coming back from that Achilles injury.

If they're both.

Still out there in April, Portland will feel very good about this deal.

If they're not, well, that's when the relationship regrets might come.

For now though, both sides can enjoy their glow ups because here at Sports Illustrated, the games may end, but the stories don't.

I'm Rachel Nichols.

Thanks for watching.

We'll see you tomorrow.