Braun's record-setting career, as told by his Crew-mates

This story was excerpted from Adam McCalvy’s Brewers Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

MILWAUKEE – Welcome to the roast of Ryan Braun.

You didn’t think Braun’s former coaches and teammates would miss a chance to take some shots when No. 8 passed through town last month for his induction to the Brewers Walk of Fame, did you? For every mention of one of Braun’s clutch home runs, there was equal mention of an errant throw from his third-base days, and the confidence that produced some comments no one will forget.

So, on the ninth anniversary of Braun breaking Robin Yount’s franchise record for home runs on Aug. 19, 2015 (22 years to the day after Yount’s last homer), here is a look back at some of the highlights from the perspective of his Brewers counterparts:

Former Rookie-ball manager Ed Sedar

“I was probably the first person he met in pro ball. He came to me, and he’s hitting like .600 through the first four or five games. All of a sudden there’s a knock on my office door. I just look up and go, ‘Yeah, Ryan, what do you need?’ He goes, ‘Do you mind if I use my home run swing today?’”

Sedar wasn’t exactly sure whether Braun was serious. But in the second or third at-bat of that game, Braun homered. Remember, it’s the Minor Leagues, so Sedar was doubling as third-base coach.

“He comes around third base and goes, ‘What do you think of that swing?” Sedar said. “So when people asked me about him, I go, ‘We’re going to have a pretty good guy on our hands here.’”

Bench coach-turned-manager Pat Murphy

“I watched Ryan play when he was a junior in high school and still have the report and what I wrote on it. I sent it to him later on. I got lucky enough to be part of his stay here in Milwaukee, and the one thing I always said to people [is] you could put your head down in BP and know he was hitting. It was different. I thought his bats were different, and we had to have those checked.”

Outfielder Mike Cameron

“Coming here at 35 in the dwindling stages of my career, I got a chance to be rejuvenated. I called this guy R&B because he was so smooth, he talked so much mess and he was really, really good.”

Infielder Bill Hall

“Obviously, confidence is a running theme here today. I have a confidence story. Ryan was here and on the field for our BP the day [he signed]. He walks up to Carlos Lee and taps him and says, ‘Don’t worry about it, you’ll have some protection in this lineup soon.’ At the time, Carlos Lee is our best hitter, our best-paid player, and he walks up to our No. 4 hitter and tells him this. Now, if you look back and see all the stats and things he’s been able to accomplish, that confidence really propelled him to be the player he became. It rubbed off on us.”

Pitcher-turned-player development exec Carlos Villanueva

“Seeing all these guys here, they’re all position players. I’m the only pitcher, so I can say I’m a survivor of Ryan Braun’s third-base days.”

Outfielder Corey Hart

“We were on a bus to Tucson [in Spring Training] the first time I met Ryan. One of those games, he had a typical Ryan third-base game. He had two errors. The first throwing error landed in the stands, and the other one hit the dugout. But he had two hits.

“On the way back, as a young guy you’re usually trying to stay quiet and keep away from attention. But he was loud talking on his phone. He was talking to a friend, and he’s like, ‘Yeah, I made a few errors, but, shoot, they saw the arm strength.’”

Shortstop J.J. Hardy

“I think all of us tried to have the confidence he had, but it was more internal. We wouldn’t voice what we felt. I think I maybe tried it once where I told someone I was going to have a good game, and then I went 0-for-4 with a bunch of punchouts.

“I remember Brauny watching some video before a game, and he stops the video, walks out and says, ‘I guarantee I’m going to hit two homers today.’ I go, ‘OK, here come a couple of punchouts for Brauny. He’s going to get humbled.’ Nope. First two at-bats, two homers. I can count five other times he did that, and I don’t think he ever got humbled. Pretty special.”

Villanueva (again)

“He got called up in San Diego. We saw the stats. We saw him crush balls in the Minor Leagues. So he comes up, and we were facing Greg Maddux in his first game. They asked him, ‘How do you feel about facing Maddux?’ And he says, ‘I’ve got a couple of things for Maddux today.’ I’m thinking, what are we doing here? So the first at-bat, he flies out to the wall. The second at-bat is a double.

“After the game, they were like, ‘What do you think about your first day in the big leagues?’ He goes, ‘Oh, they’re just lucky I had travel-day bat speed.’ That was just a taste. I thought, this could either go really, really bad, or…

“And obviously, here we are, all these years later.”