Brewers: Plenty of Team Alumni Remain In 2020 MLB Division Series

The Milwaukee Brewers suffered a quick exit in this year’s playoffs. So if you still want to root for some Brewers, why not cheer for some former ones?

The MLB Division Series began earlier today, with eight of the best teams in baseball fighting for a chance to hoist the World Series trophy. Milwaukee Brewers fans, of course, are not one of the lucky fanbases to be represented by those eight teams.

The Brewers, despite all their shortcomings, were able to back their way into 2020’s expanded playoff field, matching up against the top-seeded Los Angeles Dodgers. The matchup was just as one-sided as expected as the Dodgers swept the Brewers out of the Wild Card round in two games.

So if you are a Milwaukee fan who still wants to watch baseball, what direction do you go from here? You certainly can’t root for another team from the Central division, either in the AL or NL, since all six were knocked out in the Wild Card round as well. So pick a team at random? One that’s the most fun to watch? Just generally hope for good baseball?

It would be completely understandable to go with any of those solid options. But if you’re the type of person who needs to root for a specific team and needs a good reason to do so, might I suggest this alternate option?

Why not cheer for some of your favorite former Brewers? It’s the next closest thing to getting to pull for the Crew itself, plus you already know everything about them from the time they spent in a Brewer uniform anyway, right?

The MLB Division Series features plenty of teams with players who represented the great city of Milwaukee over the past several years. Some of their service time with the Brewers even dates back as far as 2010!

Whether you decide to just cheer for a certain former Brewer or two or temporarily adopt a team, there are plenty of options out there for you. Let’s take a little trip down Brewers Memory Lane and see which former members are still out there competing in this year’s playoffs.

San Diego Padres

So the Marlins are fun, but a lot of the former Brewers on the team were actually former prospects. If you’re looking for a team with some former Brewers who played in Milwaukee more recently, then look no further than the Padres.

Like Miami, San Diego also had the pleasure of knocking out one of Milwaukee’s divisional opponents. The Padres matched up as the No. 4 seed against the No. 5 St. Louis Cardinals, winning the series two games to one.

Much of the offseason for Brewers general manager David Stearns involved picking up a handful of free agents and signing them to one-year contracts with or without a second year option. But there were a couple trades that went down as well.

The most noteworthy of which happened right before Thanksgiving of 2019. In that trade, the Brewers sent veteran pitcher Zach Davies and outfielder Trent Grisham to the Padres for infielder Luis Urias and pitcher Eric Lauer, two players still in their early 20s.

Since making his MLB debut with Milwaukee in 2015, Davies was a stable of Brewer starting rotations the last four seasons. His 580 1/3 innings pitched where the most combined innings pitched over those four years and he left with the team with a 4.22 ERA in a Brewer uniform.

2020 led to a career year for Davies, as he went 7-4 for San Diego with a 2.73 ERA and 1.067 WHIP in twelve starts. His postseason start for the Padres wasn’t as stellar as he gave up four earned runs over just two innings in their second Wild Card game against the Cardinals.

Grisham, who exploded on to the scene with Milwaukee last year, also had a fine year after his change of scenery. He played in 59 of 60 games for San Diego and had a .808 OPS with 10 homers as the team’s primary starting center fielder.

Joining those two this year was fellow 2019 Brewers contributor Drew Pomeranz who signed with the Padres as a free agent. Like last year, Pomeranz was dominant out of the bullpen, nearly going the entire season without giving up a single earned run before the streak was broken when he gave up three in his final outing, finishing his season with a 1.45 ERA in 18 2/3 innings.

Rooting for the Padres would be hard for plenty of Milwaukee fans, though. Despite a roster with three former Brewers, it also has Manny Machado, whose antics in the 2018 postseason as a member of the Dodgers drew the ire of some Brewers players as well as many of their fans. That might be too much for some to overcome.

Tampa Bay Rays

The Marlins and the Padres are generally the most common teams who get mentioned when it comes to teams with former Brewers players. But there’s a team over in the American League who has a few of the team’s alumni as well.

The Tampa Bay Rays stormed through the regular season to the tune of 40 wins and the No. 1 seed in the AL. They swept the Toronto Blue Jays, who had three former Brewers of their own in Chase Anderson, Travis Shaw, and Jonathan Villar, in the Wild Card round.

The former Brewers who reside on the Rays’ roster is a bit more of an eccentric mix than the two previously mentioned team. The trio includes two cult heroes as well as one of the most well-traveled relievers in MLB history.

First you have first baseman Ji-Man Choi, who hit .230 in 42 games for Tampa in 2020. The lefty had an interesting tenure on the 2018 Brewers’ playoff team. Choi scored the game-winning run on Opening Day that year, only to be optioned to the minors the next day.

Then, after being recalled to the Brewers in mid-May, he would come off the bench to hit a pinch hit grand slam in a win over the Phillies on June 9th. So naturally he would be traded to the Rays the day after that game.

Then you have Brett Phillips. The outfielder with the unique laugh was a fan-favorite while in the Milwaukee organization but never received much playing time with the club and was also traded away in 2018 in the move that brought Mike Moustakas over from the Kansas City Royals.

Phillips didn’t receive much playing time with the Royals either, playing in 84 games over parts of three seasons and hitting .178 with the team. He was traded to the Rays in a deadline deal this season, going 3 for 20 in 17 games and making the team’s postseason roster.

Finally, there’s Oliver Drake. The right-handed reliever pitched for Milwaukee in 2017 and 2018, compiling a 4.82 ERA. The Brewers would end up designating him for assignment in early May and Drake would go on to set an MLB record by pitching for five different teams that season! He joined the Rays in 2019 and made the playoff roster despite a 5.73 ERA in 11 innings this year.

Oh one more reason to pull for the Rays: they match up in the Division Series against the New York Yankees. As a smaller market team, Brewers fans are officially obligated to root against the Evil Empire, right?

Houston Astros and Oakland A’s

Why aren’t the Houston Astros and Oakland A’s split up into separate sections, you ask? That’s because both teams feature Brewer alumni and happen to be playing each other in the ALDS. So each game features all kinds of former Brewers across the rosters!

On the A’s side, the most famous of which would be Mike Fiers. The A’s starter spent the first three and a half years of his major league career in Milwaukee before being traded to the Houston Astros in 2015 in a move that brought the aforementioned Brett Phillips to the Brewers, along with Josh Hader, Adrian Houser, and Domingo Santana.

Fiers would spend two more years in Houston before moving on to the Detroit Tigers for a year and then finally the A’s. Once with Oakland, Fiers ended up being the one to publicly reveal Astros’ cheating scandal, ultimately sending a ripple effect across the league.

The A’s also feature former Brewer slugger Khris Davis, who hit 40+ homers in three straight seasons after leaving Milwaukee, and Nate Orf, who has only played in 21 career regular season games, including six with Oakland this year, and still found his way on to the playoff roster.

In the other dugout, the Brewer alumni are led by starting pitcher Zack Greinke. The quirky righty was a huge part of Milwaukee’s 2011 playoff run and had a 4.03 ERA with Houston this season. More interestingly, he apparently now calls his own pitches from the mound at times.

Greinke was also a part of the 2012 Brewers team for a time, as was fellow Milwaukee alum Martin Maldonado. The backstop started 46 games at catcher for Houston this season, batting .215 with six home runs.

And continuing with the theme of trading former Brewers during playoff runs is outfielder Michael Brantley. The former Milwaukee prospect was shipped off to the Cleveland Indians in the trade that brought CC Sabathia to the Brewers in 2008. Brantley spent ten years in Cleveland before signing with the Astros last season.

So while the Brewers may no longer be in the playoffs, plenty of their alumni still are. If you decide you want to cheer for some of them, there’s plenty from which to choose!