Brewers get a big assist from their ballpark roof to beat the Padres 3-2 in NLDS opener

MILWAUKEE (AP) — As soon as he swung the bat, Ty France believed he had hit a two-run homer to put the San Diego Padres ahead in the ninth inning of their NL Division Series opener against Milwaukee.

Brewers manager Pat Murphy figured France’s drive was heading foul instead.

Neither was correct.

In one of the most bizarre plays in American Family Field’s 25-year history, France hit a towering flyball that seemed as though it might be headed over the left-field wall until it struck a cable on the roof of the stadium. The ball then fell into the glove of Brewers left fielder Jackson Chourio on the warning track for the second out of the inning.

One out later, the Brewers had secured a 3-2 victory Saturday night to take the early lead in this best-of-five series.

“We joked about it at the umpire meeting today about what would happen if the ball hit the roof,” Padres manager Craig Stammen said. “And it was unlikely — but it happened.”

How unlikely?

“It’s the first time I’ve seen that in four years here,” said Brewers closer Trevor Megill, who gave up the long drive. “I had no idea what the ruling was until the home plate umpire came up and told me it’s a live ball, no matter what.”

Under the stadium’s ground rules, any batted ball striking the roof or one of its cables in fair territory is a fair ball that can be caught for an out. The Padres unsuccessfully challenged that France’s drive was a foul ball.

“Unfortunately, a bad break for us. Looked like it was a possible home run. Just didn’t go our way,” Stammen said.

The game-changing play came with Dustin Harris on first base following a leadoff single. France’s drive left his bat at 105.3 mph with a 49-degree launch angle, and it was caught 325 feet from home plate.

Megill was asked after the game what he thought once France connected.

“Oh, crap,” Megill said. “I’ll keep it PG for you.”

There has never been a home run at American Family Field with a launch angle greater than 46 degrees since Statcast tracking started in 2015. And there have only been 10 homers hit over the fence at any major league ballpark during that period with a launch angle of 49 degrees or higher.

France, however, had no doubt the ball would have cleared the left-field wall if it hadn’t hit the cable.

“The biggest question was, was it going to stay fair or foul,” France said. “I thought I back-spun it, and it was going to stay fair. I knew it was going out. It was just unfortunate.”

Murphy disagreed.

“It was going to be a foul ball, for sure. I’m standing right on that line,” he said. “A hitter that talented, they would have liked to have that hitter back up there with another strike.”

Instead, Chourio was in the right place at the right time as the ball landed harmlessly in his glove.

“I wasn’t all that sure of what the rule was, and I wasn’t really all that sure that it actually did hit anything,” Chourio said through interpreter Daniel de Mondesert. “I thought I had a chance on that ball kind of the whole time off the bat. Then the only thing I kind of realized (is) it changed direction a little bit, but I thought I had a bead on it for the majority of the time.”

Megill then completed his four-out save by retiring Jackson Merrill on a liner to right fielder Luis Lara.

It wasn’t the first time the American Family Field roof played a role in a Brewers playoff game. Milwaukee’s Craig Counsell caught a high pop fly from Philadelphia’s Jayson Werth that hit the roof during the 2008 NL Division Series.

Remarkably, it also wasn’t the first time this season the Padres lost a potential home run to a stadium’s unique ground rules.

Xander Bogaerts had a potential homer taken away at Tampa Bay’s Tropicana Field on Aug. 28 when his drive struck the stadium’s B-ring catwalk and was caught by Rays third baseman Junior Caminero. Bogaerts’ drive had been projected by Statcast to go 386 feet.

The fact that those types of projected distances are available had France wondering if something can be done to avoid these sort of circumstances in the future.

If it’s apparent the ball would have been a homer if it hadn’t hit the roof, why not just call it a homer?

“You would think with all the technology and data and everything we have now, we’d be able to make a clear call on that,” France said. “I don’t know if that’s ever been done before, but yeah, there should be something put in place right there. That shouldn’t be an out.”

France didn’t get his homer. He just got a natural topic of conversation the next time he and Megill cross paths. The two have a history together from shared Southern California backgrounds.

“Him and I go way back,” France said. “We played on the same high school scout ball team, so I’ve known him for a long time.”

While the Padres could blame their loss on a cruel twist of fate, Murphy believed he knew exactly who to thank for this improbable finish. He thought of longtime broadcaster Bob Uecker, who remains the most beloved figure in Brewers history less than two years after dying at age 90.

“Ueck decided to put his hand on it and swat it down so Chourio could catch it,” Murphy said. “So thanks, Ueck.”

See AP’s full MLB coverage here

San Diego Padres' Ty France talks to Milwaukee Brewers' William Contreras about hitting a cable near the roof during the ninth inning of Game 1 of a National League Divisional baseball playoff series Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, in Milwaukee. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

San Diego Padres' Ty France hits a ball that hit a cable near the roof during the ninth inning of Game 1 of a National League Divisional baseball playoff series against the Milwaukee Brewers Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, in Milwaukee. (AP Photo/Kayla Wolf)

Milwaukee Brewers' Jackson Chourio catches a ball hit by San Diego Padres' Ty France after the ball hit a cable near the roof during the ninth inning in Game 1 of a National League Divisional baseball playoff series Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, in Milwaukee. (AP Photo/Kayla Wolf)

San Diego Padres' Ty France reacts after being called out during the ninth inning in Game 1 of a National League Divisional baseball playoff series against the Milwaukee Brewers Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, in Milwaukee. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

San Diego Padres' Ty France watches his ball hit a cable near the roof of American Family Field during the ninth inning of Game 1 of a National League Divisional baseball playoff series Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026, in Milwaukee. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) — Polls opened Sunday morning in Bosnia for a general election in which most citizens of the multi-ethnic Balkan nation are focused on everyday problems, while some mainstream politicians are whipping up war-era tensions that have kept the country divided since its brutal 1992-95 conflict.

Around 3.4 million voters in Bosnia are choosing the three members of the country's multi-ethnic presidency, lawmakers for the national Parliament, and heads of institutions for the country's two entities: the Muslim-majority Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Republika Srpska, which is dominated by ethnic Serbs.

Bosnia has a complex web of governing institutions that were created by a U.S.-brokered peace agreement in 1995 in an effort to manage the ethnic divisions between Muslim Bosniaks, Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croats that gave rise to the war.

On Sunday morning, Associated Press journalists reported seeing multiple polling places where voting could not begin on time due to difficulties with new digital voting technology, a measure introduced to address earlier concerns over vote tampering.

Taking center stage in the contest is a staunchly pro-Russian politician who, despite not appearing on the ballot, has dominated the campaign and inflamed divisions that have sparked fears of renewed instability.

Milorad Dodik, the separatist and nationalist former president of the Serb-majority Republika Srpska, has been banned from holding public office after being convicted of defying decisions by the international envoy overseeing the 1995 peace agreement.

Just back from a trip to Moscow where he met with Russian President Vladimir Putin, Dodik's party, the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats, is likely to win the election in Republika Srpska.

At his party's final election rally Friday night in Banja Luka, Republika Srpska's administrative capital, Dodik told supporters that Bosnia “is dead."

"It is an impossible country. It doesn’t make any sense,” Dodik said at the rally, which was also attended by the Russian ambassador to Bosnia and Herzegovina, Igor Khalabukov.

Dragan Bursac, an analyst, said despite Dodik not appearing on the ballot for the first time in nearly 30 years, he “is still in command. He is everywhere.”

“He is all over the media, not only in the entity of Republika Srpska, but in all of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is obvious that these measures to ban him from political life are not working, and he is using them,” Bursac said.

While Bosnia has been peaceful in recent years, its politicians have kept alive the divisions between the country's Bosniaks, who are mainly Muslim, and its Serbs and Croats. Bosnian Serb leaders like Dodik have pushed for the separation of their entity from the rest of Bosnia, which has led to concerns among Western countries that tensions could once again spill over.

One of the poorest countries in Europe, Bosnia is still struggling to recover decades after the war that started in 1992 after Bosnia declared independence from the Serb-led former Yugoslavia and ethnic Serbs took up arms to carve out their own state and join Serbia.

The conflict killed more than 100,000 people and displaced millions.

Bosnia is formally seeking to join the European Union, but progress toward membership has been stalled despite EU efforts to encourage Bosnia's divided leaders to work together for reform.

Ahead of Election Day, Durak Miler, a resident of the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo, said governing politicians “just poison people when they talk.”

“We should change the old faces,” he said. “They have been governing for 35 years ... I think whoever comes next will work better for retired people and the poor.”

The country's wartime wounds were recently revived by a public homage in Serbia and among Bosnian Serbs to the wartime army commander Ratko Mladic, who died in late August while serving a life sentence for genocide and other war crimes.

Bosnian Serbs view Mladic as a hero despite his conviction by a U.N. court over the massacre of more than 8,000 Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica in 1995, and other atrocities.

Key Bosnian Serb officials attended the funeral service for Mladic in Belgrade that sparked harsh EU criticism and angered Bosniak politicians.

Authorities are for the first time using electronic identification of voters and ballot scanners to prevent irregularities or organized voter manipulation, which have cast doubt on the fairness of previous elections.

On Sunday, some voters in Banja Luka expressed concern that the new digital systems could confuse older voters. Republika Srpska's interior ministry said in a press release that of 1,957 polling stations in the entity, there had been delays at 201.

But voter Radomir Vukelic said the experience of casting his ballot “was great.”

"This is why I expect the results to be correct. You've got a scanner, you've got a paper, you've got it all,” he said.

Most of Bosnia's 75 political parties running in the election are organized along ethnic lines in the country's Serb-controlled Republika Srpska and the Bosniak-Croat Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina. The two entities are bound together by the central presidency and Parliament.

The Bosniak nationalist Party of Democratic Action has focused its campaign on efforts to keep Bosnia united against Serb separatism. Bosnian Croats, too, largely support their ethnic parties, including the Bosnian branch of Croatia's ruling conservative Croatian Democratic Union.

Polls will close at 7 p.m. local time.

Many disillusioned citizens say politicians are using nationalism to avoid solving important problems such as poor living standards and an exodus of youth from the country.

Ivan Silic, from the southern town of Mostar, said ahead of the election: “I don’t see that anything is getting better, from the moment I started to vote.”

“We all know who lives well,” he said. "It is better for (politicians), and for the rest of us everything is the same.”

A woman places her ballot into an electronic ballot box during the general election in Sarajevo, Bosnia, Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Armin Durgut)

An elderly man is assisted by an official to place his ballot into an electronic ballot box during the general election in Sarajevo, Bosnia, Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Armin Durgut)

A woman places her ballot into an electronic ballot box during the general election in Sarajevo, Bosnia, Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Armin Durgut)

People cast their ballots during the general election in Sarajevo, Bosnia, Sunday, Oct. 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Armin Durgut)

A man rides a bicycle beneath an election poster featuring Our Party (NS) candidates for the upcoming general elections in Sarajevo, Bosnia, on Sept. 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Armin Durgut)

A boy rides a bicycle past an election poster featuring Red Lines (CL) candidates in the upcoming general elections in Sarajevo, Bosnia, on Sept. 30, 2026. (AP Photo/Armin Durgut)

An election poster featuring Nermin Muzur, People and Justice Party (NiP) candidate, hangs from a pole ahead of the upcoming general elections in Sarajevo, Bosnia, on Sept. 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Armin Durgut)

A man walks beneath an election poster featuring People and Justice Party (NiP) candidates for the upcoming general elections in Sarajevo, Bosnia, on Sept. 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Armin Durgut)

A man walks beneath an election poster featuring Our Party (NS) candidates for the upcoming general elections in Sarajevo, Bosnia, on Sept. 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Armin Durgut)