Brewers had...

a pep rally yesterday.

JSOnline.com Photo Credit: Jeffrey Phelps

Wearing everything from throwback jerseys to wild-card T-shirts while waving white towels and chanting, “Let’s go, Brewers,” fans jammed the Miller Lite Oasis at the Summerfest grounds to cheer on the Crew before the team left for Philadelphia, bound for a first-round matchup with the Phillies that begins Wednesday afternoon.

The Brewers said 14,188 people attended the rally.

The crowd roared as the Brewers took the stage about 5:15 p.m., the fans releasing 26 years of pent-up frustration capped by one final month of nerve-rattling baseball.

See who is starting Game One of the NLDS?

“I’m going to try my hardest (to stay calm),” Yovani Gallardo said Monday after being informed by interim manager Dale Sveum that he would be starting Game 1 of the National League Division Series against Philadelphia at 2 p.m. at Citizens Bank Park.

The Phillies...The Phillies...I seem to remember a Brewer series in Philadelphia...and so does Anthony Witrado.

On Sept. 11, the Brewers walked into the [Citizens Bank Park] for a four-game series holding a four-game lead in the wild-card standings. Their terrible final month of the season was already under way with a 3-7 home stand, but they didn’t lose much ground because the Phillies, the team chasing them, weren’t playing much better.

Philadelphia’s fortunes changed with that series. The Phillies swept the Brewers — Milwaukee’s second four-game sweep of the season — to pull into a tie for the wild card.

At the completion of that series, Brewers owner Mark Attanasio phoned general manager Doug Melvin to broach the subject of firing Yost. As the story goes, the two slept on the thought, but the next morning, Yost was removed from his post and Dale Sveum became interim manager.

It was a surprise firing for nearly everyone involved. The hope was that the shock of the move would spark a fire in the team. It did, but not until the Brewers returned home last week to win five of their last six games to clinch their first playoff berth in 26 years.

Now, the Phillies await them for a best-of-five series. And the Phils like their chances.

They are 5-1 against the Brewers, and that four-game sweep helped turn Philadelphia into a division champion. The Phillies went 13-3 in the final 16 games of the season but are saying that the uplifting sweep of the Brewers is a distant memory now that everyone is 0-0.

Tenuous Timber Rattler tie-in: Philadelphia pitcher Jamie Moyer was traded by the Mariners to the Phillies on August 19, 2006 for Andy Baldwin and Andrew Barb. Barb was the Timber Rattler closer in 2007 and pitched in the Midwest League All-Star game.

Thinking about getting a ticket to Game Three on Saturday?

“If they split the two games in Philadelphia or win both, tickets for Saturday or Sunday will be very hard to find,” said Don Vaccaro, who runs Ticketnetwork.com, a company that sells ticket software to secondary ticket brokers. “As far as ticket prices are concerned, there will be a huge demand in Milwaukee.”

The Brewers have largely worked out the logistics for season-ticket holders, but some fans have had to be relocated to other areas of the ballpark.

The reason is simple. As is the custom with most playoff games, Major League Baseball reserves approximately 10,000 seats for its own use. Those tickets are allotted to other major-league teams, MLB executives, broadcast media partners and key sponsors.

The rest, for the most part, are left to the Brewers.

Rick Schlesinger, executive vice president for business operations, said season-ticket holders were taken care of first.