Brewers Hire Rickie Weeks, Pedro Alvarez To Front Office Roles

Rickie Weeks spent 11 years in the big leagues with the Milwaukee Brewers. Now, he’s back again.

He’s not back on the 26 man roster, but he’s on a different roster. The front office’s roster.

On Friday the Brewers announced two new additions to their front office and player development staff, hiring both Weeks and former Pirates infielder Pedro Alvarez.

Both of these former players have been named as assistants in player development with Alvarez also helping out in the baseball operations department.

The Brewers have brought a prior fan favorite and team leader in Rickie Weeks back into the organization in a new role, along with former Crew killer Pedro Alvarez.

If you remember Rickie Weeks, odds are you remember Pedro Alvarez, the corner infielder for the Pirates for a number of years that always destroyed Brewers pitching. In 85 games against Milwaukee, Alvarez hit 20 home runs, the most against any single opponent for Alvarez in his entire career.

Alvarez’s last big league game came in 2018 with the Baltimore Orioles. Also, Will Sammon has reported that Alvarez is also bench coach Pat Murphy‘s son-in-law. That helps explain why Alvarez is joining the Brewers player development staff and not the Pirates or Orioles staffs.

Weeks had over 1,000 hits in a Milwaukee uniform, including 148 homers, as well as a career 105 OPS+ in the blue and gold. He was named to the Brewers Wall of Honor in 2019.

Weeks was the 2nd overall pick in the 2003 MLB Draft, the highest selection the Brewers had since 1985 when they selected BJ Surhoff with the first overall pick. Alvarez, meanwhile, was the 2nd overall pick in the 2008 MLB Draft by the Pirates. So Milwaukee now has two No. 2 overall selections on their development staff.

Weeks and Alvarez both have a wealth of knowledge about the game of baseball and their experience is going to be invaluable working with the Crew’s minor leaguers in helping them get to the big leagues.

Alvarez additionally is going to have a role in the baseball operations department, though his exact duties in that department have not been specified. Plenty of former big leaguers take on scouting roles within front offices, either amateur or professional, and Alvarez could be ticketed for something like that, but that’s just speculation.

No matter what, this looks like a net positive for Milwaukee. They add a couple of players with big league experience to their player development team and bring back a Brewers alum who gave so many years to this organization on the field and now can continue to help them in the years ahead.