No one loves a good debate quite like baseball fans, and with that in mind, we asked each of our beat reporters to rank the top five players by position in the history of their franchise, based on their career while playing for that club. These rankings are for fun and debates purposes only, and are updated through the end of the 2025 season.
Here is Adam McCalvy’s ranking of the top 5 second basemen in Brewers history.
1) Jim Gantner, 1976-92
Key fact: No. 17 is not formally retired, but the Brewers have not issued it to anyone since
Robin Yount, Paul Molitor and Jim Gantner played together for 15 years, the longest tenure for a trio of teammates in Major League history until the Yankees’ Derek Jeter, Jorge Posada and Mariano Rivera broke the mark in 2010. Two of the Brewers’ trio wound up in the Hall of Fame. The other was a 12th-round Draft pick from central Wisconsin, the son of a factory worker who took a blue-collar approach to playing big league baseball. Gantner was famously feisty, often tangling with opponents on the field and sometimes in the barroom. He batted .274 in his career, and while he didn’t hit for much power -- Gantner’s homer off Oakland’s Dave Stewart on Sept. 3, 1991, was his first since ’87, spanning 1,762 at-bats and 544 games -- Gantner became a steady hand at second base thanks in part to a strong throwing arm he’d honed as a boy playing catcher.
“I don’t think Jimmy would mind me saying that he was an overachiever,” Molitor said. “He went on to have a very good, very consistent career. He was fearless at second base. And he got a lot of big hits for us over the years. One of the most enjoyable things about my career is that I got to spend all 15 years with him and Robin.”
• All-time Brewers rankings: First basemen | Catchers
2) Rickie Weeks, 2003, '05-14
Key fact: Top 10 in franchise history in games, runs, extra-base hits, stolen bases
The Brewers drafted him second overall in 2003 -- Delmon Young went first to Tampa Bay -- and Rickie Weeks Jr. joined a crop of Milwaukee Minor Leaguers that already included J.J. Hardy, Corey Hart and old friend Prince Fielder, another product of the Orlando area. The two had played travel ball together and quickly resumed a friendship that advanced to Double-A, Triple-A and then the Major Leagues, having lots of success as a group before uniting in Milwaukee to help the Brewers end a decades-long slump.
Whether Weeks reached the sky-high expectations that accompany such a high Draft position remains a matter of debate. But he was a capable and dangerous leadoff man -- Weeks’ .347 on-base percentage is 11th in franchise history among players with at least 2,500 at-bats through 2025; and his 148 home runs rank 13th -- atop a lineup that was one of the National League’s best in the late 2000s. And while he didn’t have Gantner’s longevity or defensive skill, Weeks did bring similar toughness.
“People don’t give Rickie so much credit,” said former teammate Martín Maldonado, “but Rickie should have a lot of credit over here.”
3) Brice Turang, 2023-
Key fact: Became the first Brewers player to win the Platinum Glove Award from Rawlings in 2024
There are athletic families, and then there is the veritable Olympic team that is the Turang clan of Corona, Calif. The patriarch, Brian, is a one-time Brewers Draft pick who made it to the Major Leagues as a Mariners utility man in the early 1990s. The matriarch, Carrie, played in the NCAA softball championship for Long Beach State. Their four daughters all were college athletes. Brianna won a national championship in softball at Oklahoma and played four years of soccer. Carissa played softball at Southern Miss and Cal State Fullerton. Cabria played four years of soccer at Utah. And Bailee was an all-conference outside hitter for the Southern Nazarene (Okla.) University volleyball team. Among the sisters’ spouses is a college pole vaulter and an NFL player. Brianna’s husband, Tress Way, was elected to his third Pro Bowl in 2025 as the punter for the Washington Commanders.
The youngest of the bunch was Brice, who played baseball, basketball and football in high school and had a baseball scholarship waiting at LSU before the Brewers made him their first-round Draft pick in 2018, starting Turang on a career that saw him play young at every level. He was 23 years old when he shifted from shortstop to second base for his debut Major League season in 2023, and 24 years old when he stole 50 bases in 2024 and was awarded a Rawlings Platinum Glove as the NL’s top overall defender. When Turang accessed his power in 2025, posting a 121 OPS+ and 5.6 bWAR, he vaulted onto this list.
4) Fernando Viña, 1995-99
Key fact: Ranks 21st in MLB history with 157 hit-by-pitches
Fernando Viña made his only All-Star Game in 1998, the year he slashed .311/386/.427 with a career-high 39 doubles and a 114 adjusted OPS. It was the best of Viña’s five years with the Brewers before a trade to the Cardinals in a regrettable deal that netted Juan Acevedo, Eliezer Alfonzo and Matt Parker. Viña won a couple of Gold Glove Awards in St. Louis before finishing his 12-year big league career in Detroit.
But nothing he did gained more notoriety than the eighth inning on May 31, 1996, when Viña fielded a grounder in a game against the Indians and went to tag Albert Belle between first and second base in hopes of starting a double play. Belle lowered his right shoulder and sent Viña sprawling to the dirt. It was a magnified version of a similar play five innings earlier, when Belle was chided by then-Indians first-base coach (and later Brewers coach, television analyst and front-office official) Dave Nelson for not doing more to break up a double play. Belle was suspended and fined by the American League for the incident.
5) Scooter Gennett, 2013-16
Key fact: Full name is Ryan Joseph Gennett; “Scooter” came from the TV show “Muppet Babies”
Gennett could always hit. Yet the Brewers waived Gennett during 2017 Spring Training because they felt covered on the middle infield with Orlando Arcia and Jonathan Villar, only to watch Gennett hit 50 home runs and log an .859 OPS over the next two seasons in Cincinnati.
Honorable mentions
We did not forget about Paul Molitor and Mark Loretta, who each played a good bit of second base during their years with Brewers. But Molitor made about twice as many appearances at third base in a Milwaukee uniform than at second, and Loretta played more than twice as many innings at shortstop. So they were each categorized at those other positions.
Pedro Garcia played in four seasons for the Brewers from 1973-76 and led the AL with 32 doubles in ’73.
An argument can be made to rank Willie Randolph ahead of Gennett on the strength of one fantastic season in a Brewers uniform, 1991, when Randolph slashed .327/.424/.374 and was worth 4.0 fWAR, just ahead of Kirby Puckett, Cecil Fielder and Rickey Henderson … Ronnie Belliard also gets consideration for his 416 games as Milwaukee’s second baseman, though his best years came after he left as a free agent following the 2002 season.