They overcame their mistakes on Friday night for the kind of win that was typical of Milwaukee's promising first half. Bill Hall was the usual suspect in many of those come-from-behind wins, and he homered on Friday, but Fielder was the hero this time, yanking a game-winning single with two outs in the bottom of the ninth inning for a 3-2 win over the Astros at Miller Park.
"You always want to be in that situation," said Fielder, a rookie who is being asked to play a much larger role for the Carlos Lee-less Brewers. "The key for me is to know you're in that situation but not get too excited. You have to try to relax. You can't be over-tense in that situation."
It was certainly tense in the Brewers' dugout before Fielder's clutch hit. Ohka pitched seven innings and surrendered only one hit to the final 20 batters he faced, including 12 consecutive outs to end his outing. But his second-inning throwing error let in an Astros run.
"You can't give them runs when you're struggling to score," Brewers manager Ned Yost said. "We've got to make them earn it. That could have ended up biting us there."
Instead, the Brewers rallied for their 34th come-from-behind win this season -- including 27 at Miller Park -- and their 10th walk-off win. Brewers closer Francisco Cordero (1-0) induced an inning-ending double play in the top of the ninth and picked up his first National League win.
Ohka's only troublesome inning was the second. With the Brewers leading, 1-0, red-hot Astros rookie Luke Scott hit a leadoff double and scored the tying run on Aubrey Huff's ground-rule double. With Huff at third and two outs, Houston starter Brandon Backe hit a weak grounder to Ohka, who should have thrown to first base but instead turned and fired to third base before David Bell could cover. Ohka's throw resulted in an error and gave the Astros a 2-1 lead.
Hall tied the game with a solo home run in the fourth inning, but the error loomed large when the teams remained tied at 2 in the ninth. The miscue cost Ohka a chance for his first win since July 23.
"He knew he messed up," Yost said. "He came in, stood right there, looked at me, shook his head and said, 'Stupid play.'"
Then there was Hart in the bottom of the ninth, called on to bunt with two on and no outs against struggling Astros reliever Brad Lidge (0-4), who hit the first Brewers batter in the ninth and then committed an error of his own on Jeff Cirillo's sacrifice bunt.
All 30,294 fans in the stands knew Hart would be bunting as well. The Astros knew, too, and Lidge fielded a comebacker and easily retired the lead runner at third base.
"Not very good, huh?" said Hart, who had doubled and scored a run in the first inning. "I'm glad Prince was able to pick me up and we were able to get the win."
"That's a situation where Corey knows what he's supposed to do, he just didn't do [it]. When they're running the 'wheel' there, you 'slash,'" said Yost, referring to a hitter pulling back his bunt and trying to bounce a hit past charging infielders. "We told him twice. Those are situations that you need to be able to realize [how to execute] if you're going to help us win ballgames.
"He's a kid that's going to be here a long time and he's going to help us win ballgames, and the sooner he realizes what it takes to win baseball games, the better off he's going to be."
Lidge struck out Tony Graffanino, and Astros manager Phil Garner made a move for Dan Wheeler to face Fielder, who was 0-for-3 to that point in the game and had eight hits in his last 45 at-bats. The first pitch was low in the strike zone, but Fielder pulled it into right field, scoring Cirillo with the winning run.
"We had runners in scoring position the last inning or two, and you're just looking for one big hit, somewhere," Yost said. "I'm glad that Prince got it."
But what was the pitch? Fielder had no idea. He knew it was a pitch down in the zone and figured it was a fastball.
"With runners in scoring position, you want the first pitch that you can hit," Fielder said. "You have to try to attack it. I don't want to let a good pitch go."
Fielder needed to relax. He decided a good way to do that was to look in the stands, and he channeled Red Sox slugger Manny Ramirez by doing a few neck rolls "and pretending I was going to fall asleep."
"It worked," he said. "I might try doing that every time."