Victor Caratini smacks walk-off three-run home run in bottom of 10th inning to help Brewers rally past Cubs

Each of the first four times Milwaukee Brewers catcher Victor Caratini strolled to the plate against his former team on Independence Day afternoon, he was given a one-way ticket back to the dugout on strikes.

The fifth time, he made a different kind of trip before heading back to his teammates. This time around, Gatorade cooler prepared for a ceremonial soaking, they greeted him a bit differently.

Caratini hit a walk-off three run homer with two outs in the 10th inning to lift the Brewers to a 5-2 win over the Chicago Cubs on Monday at American Family Field.

The homer came on a 2-1 pitch from Cubs reliever Scott Effross, sailing over the fence in center. It was the perfect revenge for Caratini, who first came up in the majors with the Cubs and was 0 for 4 with four strikeouts to start the day.

Milwaukee, which improved to 47-35, was down to its last out during a wild ninth inning that saw a go-ahead inside-the-park homer in the top half of the frame against the top relief pitcher in baseball.

With one out in a 1-1 game in the ninth, Seiya Suzuki laced a 2-0 fastball down the middle from Josh Hader deep to left-center. Scalded off the bat at 110 mph, the ball caromed hard off the angled outfield wall and rolled on the warning track toward center field.

Brewers centerfielder Jonathan Davis, relatively new to the outfield at American Family Field, didn’t play the angle well and had to chase the ball down as it trickled away from him. Second baseman Luis Urías had a chance to get Suzuki at home with a perfect relay throw but it was slightly up the line, allowing the slide into home to get past the tag of catcher Pedro Severino.

That same few feet of real estate where Suzuki's hit landed were front and center not long after.

With one out and Urías at first, Keston Hiura drove a double to the gap in left-center, a ball sure to score the runner and tie the game had it not bounced on a hop over the fence for a ground-rule double.

This time, though, it wound up not mattering as Christian Yelich drew a bases-loaded walk to even the score with two outs off Cubs closer David Robertson, the same result as if Hiura's ball had stayed in play.

Robertson then, with the help of a pair of called strikes on pitches outside the zone, struck out Willy Adames to escape the threat.

Before the game turned over to the bullpens, it was dominated by a pair of lefty starters.

For the Brewers, Eric Lauer corrected his course after a string of shaky starts. Over his last four outings entering Monday, he had allowed 20 runs, all earned, over 21⅔ innings with eight home runs against.

The Cubs did tag Lauer for another homer when Nelson Velazquez hit the first of his career for a solo shot with one out in the third but outside of that they had little brewing.

Lauer struck out nine while allowing only two hits and two walks as his four-seam fastball was untouchable, generating 21 swings and misses. The Cubs had only two at-bats with a runner in scoring position against Lauer as he went six innings allowing just the one run.

His counterpart, Chicago’s Justin Steele, was just as good. Steele was one strike away from completing seven shutout innings until Severino, making his first appearance with the Brewers following an 80-game suspension, tied the game with an RBI double to left.

Steele went 6⅔ innings and mirrored Lauer by allowing two hits and striking out nine.

Cubs reliever Brandon Hughes replaced Steele with the go-ahead run on second and got Yelich to ground out to end the inning.

While Caratini was the one on the receiving end of the postgame dousing, reliever Brad Boxberger was just as much a hero for his role in the 10th.

The Cubs loaded the bases with one out against Boxberger, though the first batter of the inning reached base after what should have been called the third strike went for a ball, with Willson Contreras and Ian Happ due up. Boxberger fanned Contreras, Chicago's best hitter, on three pitches before battling back from behind 3-1 in the count to strike out Happ.

In the bottom of the 10th, Andrew McCutchen and Urías flew out with a Rowdy Tellez intentional walk sandwiched in between. Caratini made sure Boxberger's inning didn't go for naught, elevating a sinker from Effross 411 feet for his second career walk-off homer.

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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Victor Caratini's three-run blast leads Brewers past Cubs