Brewers Keep It Internal, Expected To Promote Pat Murphy To Open Manager Job

The Milwaukee Brewers had a managerial vacancy for only a week before they found their new skipper. According to The Athletic's Ken Rosenthal, the Brewers are expected to name Pat Murphy as the next manager following Craig Counsell's exit.

All along Murphy, soon to be 65 years old, seemed the most obvious internal candidate to take over the reins after Craig Counsell's decision to go to the rival Cubs. He's the most experienced coach on the staff, a baseball lifer, and beloved in Milwaukee's clubhouse.

Murphy has been Counsell's bench coach since 2016 and if he didn't get the job to manage the Brewers, it was widely expected he'd follow Counsell to the Cubs. Now, the Brewers keep Counsell's top choice from following him to Chicago and elevate a respected coach to the manager's chair.

With the Brewers arriving so late to the managerial interview process, some of the top external options were already off the board and an internal hire appeared more likely.

GM Matt Arnold stated that he had an extensive list of candidates for the managerial job that they were vetting. There were six names that Rosenthal earlier reported that were under consideration. One of those names, Joe Espada, was taken off the board when the Astros recently announced that they would be elevating him to their manager job. Another, Don Mattingly, recently received an elevated title of "offensive coordinator" with the Blue Jays on top of his bench coach duties.

Murphy getting the promotion keeps a certain level of continuity in leadership in Milwaukee. The Brewers have been successful in recent years, making the playoffs five of the last six seasons, and Murphy has been a part of all of them. That likely played a factor in the Brewers decision.

Arnold was looking for the "best human" for the job and that this opening gave them a chance to "reassess the entire franchise" and take a "fresh look" at the things they've done. With Murphy's hire, it appears that assessment and fresh look didn't result in the need for any dramatic changes.

This felt like Murphy's job to lose as soon as Counsell left and the entire process lasted less than a week. Murphy impressed Arnold and Mark Attanasio enough to prove to them he was deserving of the job, and it helped that he's quite familiar with them and the players he's looking to manage.