MILWAUKEE -- Is the Brewers’ longest-tenured player in or out for the World Series?
Not even Brandon Woodruff knew the answer as the team prepared to work out on the eve of Friday’s Game 1. Neither did president of baseball operations Matt Arnold.
As one person in the know put it Thursday afternoon, “It’s literally a 50-50 tossup right now.”
Those were pretty good odds considering that Woodruff, 33, was supposed to be in the beginning stages of his recovery from another right shoulder surgery right now. It was scheduled to take place in August, which was about a month after Woodruff walked off the mound at Chase Field in Arizona after the latest setback with his surgically repaired shoulder. After missing the past three postseasons because of that injury, he was going to miss another.
Then came a development that surprised everyone. An August scan of his shoulder showed surprising improvement, so Woodruff cancelled surgery and started a throwing program. If everything worked out exactly right, it would put him in position to be ready to pitch just in time for the World Series, if the Brewers could get that far.
Well, they got that far.
Woodruff faced hitters for the first time on Tuesday and bounced back fine.
Now, the parties have to decide what to do.
“I care about one thing, and that’s winning,” Woodruff said. “I know it’s not an easy decision.”
It’s not easy because of the risk that Woodruff could be injured again. Typically, an injured player can be replaced on the roster, but the Brewers worry that Major League Baseball would not approve a substitution in this case because it would fall under a preexisting injury. The club's best understanding as of Thursday afternoon is that such a request likely would be denied.
But the Brewers, MLB and Woodruff’s agent, Bo McKinnis, were still working through that scenario. Arnold met with Woodruff for a face-to-face discussion about it on Thursday afternoon.
Time is running short to make a call. A 26-man roster is due at 10 a.m. CT on Friday.
“Once I started throwing, I just wanted to be an option at this point,” Woodruff said. “I know what I bring to the table as a player, and I’ll always believe in myself, but I also realize I haven’t pitched in a game in three months. There’s a lot that goes into the decision.”
The Brewers carried 13 pitchers and 13 position players in the first two rounds of the postseason, but they used only 11 of the pitchers while beating the Padres in four games in the NLDS and sweeping the Dodgers in four games in the NLCS. The two idle pitchers were right-hander Chad Patrick and left-hander Kyle Harrison, so the Brewers would have to decide which of those two arms to leave off in favor of Woodruff.
Then there is the question of his stuff. Known for an “angry” four-seam fastball that once touched triple digits, Woodruff said he was sitting 90-92 in his 23-pitch simulated game on Tuesday, facing the heart of the Brewers’ lineup: Jackson Chourio, Brice Turang, William Contreras, Christian Yelich and, when he needed an extra hitter to hit his pitch count, Jake Bauers.
He would expect a bump in velocity pitching in front of 42,000-plus fans at American Family Field in the World Series. But is that good enough to get outs? And can he stay durable enough to help carry the load in the event the teams get into an extra-inning game, with no runner at second base to begin innings in the postseason?
“The velocity was there,” Contreras said. “I’m not going to say if he’s going to make the team or not, because that’s the team’s decision. But a lot of credit to him for all of the work that he did in order to get back. As a player, everybody wants ‘Big Woo’ on the team.”
Big Woo has been a big part of the Brewers since his Major League debut in 2017. He’s had injuries along the way, but is 55-30 with a 3.10 ERA in 790 1/3 innings over the past nine seasons when healthy, and he made All-Star teams in 2019 and ‘21. His ERA is the best in franchise history for a pitcher who has logged at least 500 innings.
It’s not lost on anyone what Woodruff has done to make this a decision in the first place.
“We talk about it. The willingness to keep going and keep pushing through it,” said Turang. “The dude’s willing to do whatever it takes to win a game.”
“We know he wants to go out there and throw, wants to be part of this,” Chourio said. “If he does make it and he is part of the team, we’ll be excited to have him.”
“You don’t know what’s going to happen, whether he’ll be on the roster or not,” Bauers said, “But either way, just having him here with us has been huge for our young pitchers [and] the team as a whole. He’s a big piece of the entire culture here, this entire organization and the turnaround that it’s been through. We’re always grateful for Big Woo.”