Willy Adames recruiting ex-Brewers star to Giants in free agency cuts deep

Entering the 2024-25 MLB offseason, two wildly favored members of the Brewers of recent past headlined the class of best available free agents. Willy Adames - a member of the 2024 Brewers who put up one of the best walk-year performances a player can have - and Corbin Burnes, who won the 2021 NL Cy Young Award for Milwaukee, stood out amongst the rest.

We all know how this unfolded, but it's a story worth bringing up again. Rather than taking a discount to remain the Brewers' shortstop for the better part of the next decade, Adames took his talents out west to sign a seven-year contract with the San Francisco Giants.

While a Burnes reunion was never in the cards this winter, it sounds like Adames may be planning to make the pain sting even worse and entice his friend and former teammate to join him in the NL West.

Pair of popular ex-Brewers may reunite on the Giants after Willy Adames contract decision

In his introductory press conference with the Giants, Adames said that he'd "definitely give a call." He continued, "Obviously you always want a guy like him. You're always going to have guys who are going to compete out there for you. And having a guy like that would be such an amazing addition. But that's something that is not in my hands, and obviously there's a lot of work to do for that. But I will give him a call later."

Seeing the two reunited on the Giants would be heartwarming for Brewers fans, but it'd also serve as a major "what if" for the Crew. Both of these players, at one point, were the best at what they did on the club's roster, but they simply became too expensive to be kept around. For a team like the Brewers, players becoming "too expensive" typically starts once they become worth a number far lower than most other clubs around the league.

Far too often, MLB owners cry poor when it comes to signing big-ticket free agents, and it frequently results in resentment from their organization's following. Adames and Burnes are two of the more popular Brewers players from the past decade-plus, but both of their respective futures will be continuing elsewhere.