MILWAUKEE — Legend has it that ghosts reside in Milwaukee’s Pfister hotel, a common stopover for major-league visitors over the years.

Tales from that place made the rounds again this week when Teoscar Hernández revealed the Los Angeles Dodgers’ wives had seen their fair share of paranormal occurrences this week.

By the time the Dodgers boarded their flight back home Tuesday night, however, it was the Brewers who had to ward off the ghosts of possibly losing another National League Championship Series to the Dodgers. Los Angeles powered to a 5-1 victory to take a 2-0 series advantage in this 2018 NLCS rematch as the series heads to Dodger Stadium.

Yoshinobu Yamamoto surrendered a leadoff home run to Jackson Chourio but did not allow another run while delivering the Dodgers’ first postseason complete game since José Lima’s shutout of the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 3 of the 2004 National League Division Series.

The Brewers now face a formidable challenge. Since going to the 2-3-2 format, road teams that go up 2-0 in any best-of-seven postseason series have gone on to win the series 24 out of 27 times.

Teoscar Hernández got the Dodgers’ offensive party going with a home run in the second inning of Game 2. (John Fisher/Getty Images)

Teoscar Hernández’s bat is always the biggest equalizer in his game

His glove has been a problem this season. His base-running miscue in Game 1 of this series cost the Dodgers a run. But the Dodgers’ continued belief in Teoscar Hernández comes from what he’s able to provide with his bat — especially in October. He has now produced a 1.010 OPS in 36 plate appearances, and it should surprise no one that it was Hernández who jumped all over a Freddy Peralta curveball to level the score at 1-1 in the second inning. His fourth home run this postseason tops his three from last October, when his swings always came at a critical time.

Freddy finally falters at American Family Field

A day after emptying his bullpen and still losing Game 1, Murphy needed some innings from Freddy Peralta, Milwaukee’s No. 1 starter. Peralta matched his postseason career-high with 5 2/3 — but not before yielding three runs and exiting with the Brewers trailing.

His final pitch was a belt-high fastball that Max Muncy waffled over the center-field wall for a solo shot. The dinger took the life out of the crowd and ushered the Brewers closer to defeat.

Peralta put forth a fine effort. This marked only the fourth time this season he permitted three earned runs or more at American Family Field, where he finished the regular season with a 1.77 ERA. The Brewers needed him to approach that elevated standard on Tuesday. He came close, but still fell short.

Signs of life for Shohei Ohtani?

His struggles have been pronounced, though Philadelphia Phillies manager Rob Thomson and now Brewers manager Pat Murphy have still taken extra caution with the soon-to-be four-time MVP.

Ohtani did not break out of his slump in Game 2. He was 1 for his past 23 at-bats with 11 strikeouts when he grounded a single through the right side of a drawn-in infield in the seventh inning to bring across a run.

Both of Ohtani’s hits since the start of the NLDS have been singles. He struck out twice on Tuesday. But he isn’t beating himself the way he did during the Phillies series, and his other at-bat Tuesday ended in a 115.2 mph line drive that screamed right into Chourio’s glove in right.

Heavy usage on Abner Uribe, trouble down the road?

A few hours before Game 1, Murphy discussed the challenges of deploying his bullpen in a seven-game series.

“It’s one of those things where (the mantra is) win tonight, but when you get to about Game 4, you better be careful of what you’ve done to your pitching staff,” he said.

Yet Murphy managed on Tuesday as if it were something closer to Game 7. And maybe, for the Brewers, the prospect of losing two games at American Family Field, and the subsequent homefield advantage, was the equivalent of losing the series. Maybe the team could not conjure a scenario in which it fell twice at home and still managed to triumph over the Dodgers.

And so maybe that was why reliever Abner Uribe pitched for the third time in four days, and for the second day in a row while trailing. Uribe has functioned as the team’s closer since Trevor Megill missed most of September with a flexor strain. Uribe threw 22 pitches in a two-inning outing in Game 5 of the National League Division Series against the Chicago Cubs. He threw 24 pitches in an ineffective appearance a day later against the Dodgers. And on Tuesday, with the Brewers trailing by two runs, Uribe was the first man out of the bullpen in relief of Peralta.

The decision backfired. Uribe recorded the final out of the sixth, but then Murphy sent him back out for the seventh. A leadoff double by Kiké Hernandez led to an RBI single for Shohei Ohtani and a run charged to Uribe, making it 4-1.

The Brewers will have a day off before trying to save their season in Los Angeles. They will enter a three-game stretch at Dodger Stadium with a taxed closer.

Dodgers getting comfortable against Brewers’ bullpen

While the Brewers have amassed one of the best collections of arms in the sport, their bullpen-heavy approach means the Dodgers will get several looks at Milwaukee’s top relief arms over the course of the series — something the Dodgers, leaning on a premium starting rotation, won’t have to worry about should things all go right.

Dodgers hitters already got their second look at Uribe in as many games during the sixth inning. Same in the seventh inning against Aaron Ashby, who surrendered a valuable insurance run.

The aim is for those extra looks to benefit a Dodgers lineup that hasn’t produced as many runs as the quality of their at-bats would indicate.

The Dodgers, meanwhile, are up 2-0 as Blake Snell and Yoshinobu Yamamoto are the first pair of Dodgers to log 8+ innings in consecutive postseason games since Orel Hershiser and Tim Belcher in Games 1 and 2 of the 1988 NLCS.

Brewers’ atypical aggressive approach backfires

Jackson Chourio swung at the first pitch Yoshinobu Yamamoto threw and put it into the Dodgers’ bullpen in right field, igniting American Family Field and giving the Dodgers a 1-0 lead. Neither part of that is how the Brewers got to the NLCS, but it could be how they leave it.

No team swung at fewer first pitches in an at-bat this year than the Brewers, who offered at only 28.1 percent of the first pitches they saw in the regular season. And while Milwaukee was third in runs (806), only eight teams hit fewer than the Brewers’ 166 home runs.

Yes, home runs are good. But they’re not a sign of what led the Brewers to the best record in baseball. This is a team that had the fifth-best strikeout rate in baseball (20.3 percent), third-best batting average (.258), second-best on-base percentage (.332) and just the 12th-best slugging percentage (.403), while stealing more bases (164) than any team other than the Tampa Bay Rays.

In Yamamoto’s seven innings, the Brewers swung at the first pitch 12 times in 32 plate appearances, but six of those came in the first two innings across eight plate appearances. Yamamoto threw just 22 pitches in the first two innings and cruised from there.

Credit Yamamoto and Game 1 starter Blake Snell for silencing the Brewers bats, but Brewers batters didn’t make Yamamoto sweat, with just two hits off of him after Chourio’s leadoff homer, both singles and both coming with two outs.

Everyone knows the Dodgers’ weakness — the bullpen — but it’s only weak if it’s used. And the Brewers didn’t make Dave Roberts have to make any tough decisions, because when it comes to his bullpen, they’re all tough decisions.