Brewers News: Ben Sheets to Join Crew's Walk of Fame

The Milwaukee Brewers will be adding another player to their Walk of Fame this season. This time, the honor goes to one of the best pitchers to ever don a Brewer uniform.

Ben Sheets will have his name permanently added to the grounds outside American Family Field later this year. The team announced his induction on social media late Thursday afternoon.

Sheets makes it two straight seasons with a former player being inducted into the Walk of Fame after not having anyone honored in three years previous to that. Former first baseman Prince Fielder received the honor in 2022.

Now, former Milwaukee Brewers pitcher Ben Sheets joins him in the team's Walk of Fame.

Sheets was the 10th overall pick for the Brewers in the 1999 draft. He would make his debut for the team in 2001, but had already made a name for himself the previous year as the starting pitcher in the gold medal game, a game he ended up winning, for Team USA in the 2000 Olympics.

The Louisiana native came out hot in his first season for the Crew, winning 10 of his first 15 starts and pitching to the tune of a 3.35 ERA over that span. That was good enough for a first career All-Star nod in his rookie season.

Things would get better from there. Sheets would collect three more All-Star appearances in his career (2004, 2007, 2008) and finish eighth in Cy Young voting in '04 on the back of a 2.70 ERA, 0.983 WHIP, and whopping 264 strikeouts, still a franchise record for punch outs in a season.

Unfortunately, Sheets attracted the injury bug a bit in his career. After starting 34 games in three consecutive seasons from 2002 to 2004, he wouldn't start more than 22 games for the three seasons following those.

2008 saw Sheets return to form, though, as he started 31 games, had a 3.09 ERA, and led the league with three complete game shutouts. Of course, his season would have a bittersweet ending because while he helped lead the Brewers back to the postseason for the first time since 1982, he wouldn't get to pitch in the playoffs himself as a late September elbow injury would result in Tommy John surgery.

That would be his final season as a Brewer but it was enough to put his name all over the team's career leaderboard. Sheets sits second in franchise history among qualified pitchers in career pitcher's WAR (25.6) and strikeouts (1206) while owning the single season records for strikeouts, BB/9 (1.215), and K/BB ratio (8.25). Last offseason, we ranked him as the second best pitcher in franchise history.

Sheets becomes the 22nd player named to the Milwaukee Brewers Walk of Honor. It's an honor that is well deserved for one of the best pitchers the team has ever seen.