Pat Murphy last week became the Brewers’ 20th manager in franchise history after eight seasons as the Milwaukee Brewers bench manager. The job came open after former manager and Whitefish Bay native Craig Counsell made a jump to what he called his “dream job” with the Chicago Cubs.
Here’s what you need to know about the Brewers’ new skipper:
Murphy, 64, was born in Syracuse, New York. He has a daughter, Keli, and three sons, Kai, Austin and Jaxon. Kai is an outfielder in the San Diego Padres organization.
It’s time to pick your Milwaukee favorites for the year!
He and Counsell have a long-standing relationship going back to Counsell’s college days at Notre Dame, where Murphy was the manager of the Fighting Irish baseball team and recruited his protege. Murphy is still so revered in South Bend, the locker room was named in his honor at Notre Dame.
As a player, Murphy was a right-handed pitcher who spent three years as a professional in the minor leagues in the ’80s, never making past A ball. Murphy played 1983, ’85 and ’86 with the Salem Redbirds in the Carolina League and the Tri-Cities Triplets in the Northwest League.
He found more success as a manager, making three consecutive trips to the NCAA regional finals in 1992-94 with Notre Dame. (Counsell was the team MVP as a senior infielder on the 1992 team.) He moved on to Arizona State the following season and led the Sun Devils to four College World Series in 15 seasons.
In his last three years at Arizona State from 2007-09, Murphy and the Sun Devils were 113-12 at home with 29 players selected in the Major League Baseball Draft. Murphy was named Pac-10 Coach of the Year on four occasions (2000, ’07, ’08 and ’09) and was the youngest collegiate coach to reach 500 career victories.
That successful run ended in controversy as he was forced out amid an NCAA probe of improprieties in his program. At the time Murphy said he was being made a fall guy for violations, which included improper telephone calls to recruits. During the NCAA’s investigation and since, Murphy has described the alleged violations as minor and the results has described the violations as unintentional and a result of inadequate oversight. Murphy has said that the entire experience “cut him down to the core.” He credits his children for getting him through the tough time, deciding to become a stronger person for them.
Murphy showed his resilience by moving on to pro ball, spending 2010-15 with the San Diego Padres organization as a manager at various minor league levels, including serving as interim manager for the big-league club when Bud Black was fired in June 2015. During that time, Murphy managed the club to a 42-54 record and the Padres hired Andy Green as their full-time manager after the 2015 season. That’s when Craig Counsell asked Murphy to join his staff in Milwaukee.
Murphy takes over a team that went 92-70 and won the NL Central this year before getting swept by the Arizona Diamondbacks in a wild card series. But the Brewers also find themselves at a crossroads because of the contract status of several key players. Among them, the Brewers on Friday did not offer a contract to star starting pitcher Brandon Woodruff, who had a serious shoulder surgery in October.
