MILWAUKEE -- The Brewers checked an item off their offseason to-do list Wednesday when they signed 31-year-old catcher Eric Haase to a one-year deal, positioning him to be the backup to starting backstop William Contreras.
As the Winter Meetings wound down in Nashville, Tenn., earlier this month, Milwaukee GM Matt Arnold cited catching depth as one of his target areas for the remainder of the winter after the team’s previous No. 2, Victor Caratini, landed a multi-year free agent contract with Houston. Catcher was Milwaukee’s strongest position last year; with Contreras and Caratini covering every inning, Brewers catchers led the Majors with 6.2 fWAR and ranked second with a 117 wRC+.
The Brewers found their man in Haase, a former Top 30 prospect in Cleveland’s system who collected a handful of Major League at-bats for three straight seasons -- from 2018-20 with the Guardians and Tigers -- before putting up his best season in 2021, when he hit 22 home runs and played in 98 Major League games. Overall, he logged a .667 OPS in 323 games over six seasons between Cleveland and Detroit before electing free agency in October when he was removed from the Guardians’ 40-man roster.
Adding Haase allows the Brewers some patience with the other catcher on their 40-man roster, 21-year-old Jeferson Quero, who has climbed to No. 2 on MLB Pipeline’s Brewers Top 30 prospects list, and to No. 32 on the overall Top 100. Quero impressed once again last season by holding his own as a 20-year-old in the Double-A Southern League, where he had a .779 OPS and won the Minor League Gold Glove Award for catchers across Minor League Baseball.
Those two represent the next line of defense behind Contreras, who was named Brewers MVP in 2023 after leading the Brewers with 5.4 fWAR. That earned him an extra $813,344 in salary, the Associated Press reported this week, as part of the $50 million doled out to the top-performing pre-arbitration players.
Contreras still has one year remaining at a pre-arbitration salary before he’s due for a more significant raise over three additional seasons in arbitration.