• Preview
• Recap
• Bleachers
• Game Tracker

Braun homers as Brewers complete sweep of Cubs

Apr 21, 2013 - 10:50 PM Milwaukee, WI (Sports Network) - Ryan Braun crushed a three-run homer prior to his eighth-inning ejection, and the Milwaukee Brewers finished off a three- game sweep of the Chicago Cubs with a 4-2 victory on Sunday at Miller Park.

Braun was tossed from the game for flipping his bat after taking a questionable called strike three, but his homer three frames earlier put Milwaukee ahead for good.

The Brewers, winners in seven straight games, received 6 2/3 solid innings from starter Wily Peralta (1-1), who gave up just one hit after surrendering a two-run homer to Anthony Rizzo in the third.

"His fastball stayed pretty consistent, his command was better, he threw a couple of nice changeups and sliders," said Milwaukee manager Ron Roenicke. "His stuff was better."

Jim Henderson came on in the ninth and preserved the win with his fourth save.

Chicago has now dropped 17 of its last 22 meetings with the Brewers, and was again plagued by poor defense. The Cubs committed two more errors on Sunday to give them 17 on the season.

Starter Scott Feldman (0-3), who committed one of the errors, had six strikeouts and was charged with four runs -- one earned -- on three hits over five frames. Starlin Castro scored a run for Chicago and had a single to extend his hitting streak to a major league-best 13 games.

The Cubs plated their only runs on Rizzo's homer in the third, going 0-for-6 with runners in scoring position.

Feldman allowed just one base runner through first three innings, but faced a one-out, bases-loaded jam in the fourth after walking Jean Segura, Rickie Weeks and Martin Maldonado.

The Brewers, though, only manufactured one run on Alex Gonzalez's ground out, but took the lead the following frame.

Feldman allowed a leadoff double in the fifth to Yuniesky Betancourt, but struck out the next two batters before making a fielding error on Segura's grounder. Braun then stepped up to the plate and crushed a pitch well into the left-field seats for a 4-2 Milwaukee lead.

"I made a mistake there and he hit what he hit," said Feldman. "If I make a better pitch to Braun, you wouldn't even be talking about the error."

Chicago had a chance in the seventh, but was unable to capitalize. Milwaukee reliever John Axford replaced Peralta after the latter put two runners on, and promptly threw a wild pitch to advance both to second and third. David DeJesus, though, flew out to end the inning.

Henderson took over in the ninth after Tom Gorzelanny issued a leadoff walk to Nate Schierholtz, who stole second on Henderson's strikeout of Welington Castillo but never got any further. Luis Valbuena then fanned and Henderson got Darwin Barney to ground out to end the game.

Game Notes

Nine of the Cubs' 17 errors have occurred against Milwaukee this season ... Chicago has had 14 of their 17 games decided by three runs or less. It is 4-10 in those contests ... Milwaukee's Carlos Gomez recorded his 500th career hit.