How Wade Miley called the Carlos Santana trade

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.

ATLANTA -- Nobody, and we mean nobody, loves a juicy trade rumor more than Wade Miley, and in the case of the Brewers swapping with the Pirates for switch-hitting first baseman Carlos Santana, Miley got his man.

In the clubhouse, on the field and even in some informal settings with Milwaukee GM Matt Arnold in attendance over the past few weeks, Miley had been singing Santana’s praises to anyone who would listen. On Thursday, it actually happened; the Brewers sent shortstop prospect Jhonny Severino to Pittsburgh for Santana, who is expected to be in Milwaukee’s lineup Saturday night against the Braves.

“I don’t know if I called this,” Miley said. “You just look around. I got some of this from Zack Greinke. He’s all into the Minor League stuff and prospects and who’s available. It’s intriguing to me how that process works. I like thinking about ways to make our team better.

“Look, it’s no disrespect to anybody. I want to be clear about that. It’s just, injuries happen, things happen and we’re trying to win, and if you’re trying to win you’re trying to put the best team out there. Can a team win with what it’s got? No doubt, that’s the beautiful thing about baseball. But you get a good vibe in the clubhouse when you see the front office trying to help.

“It fires you up. It gets you going.”

The best example Miley has seen in his career was 2019 in Houston, when the Astros acquired Greinke from the D-backs at the Deadline and added him to a rotation that had Justin Verlander, Gerrit Cole and Miley, who made 33 regular season starts that year with a 3.98 ERA. Greinke was 8-1 with a 3.02 ERA in 10 Astros starts over the remainder of the regular season.

“I remember when we got him, it was like a party,” Miley said. “I felt bad about it because we got Greinke and Martín Maldonado, and Max Stassi was my catcher every time, and now he was on the way out. But we were better.”

That Miley considers what a Trade Deadline move can mean for a teammate is part of what makes him so popular in the clubhouse. He might sound like a future front office man once his pitching days are done, but Miley actually envisions a post-playing career in coaching instead.

His interest in the transaction wire is mostly limited to the Trade Deadline, and he said he doesn’t play any fantasy sports.

“Wade is a baseball rat,” Brewers bench coach Pat Murphy said. “He loves the game. He talks about retiring every year, and he’s not even close to it. He’s working the hardest of his entire life. He’s so into it.

“But his greatest value is the way he helps others. I’ve seen him help Corbin [Burnes], I’ve seen him help Woody [Brandon Woodruff]. I’ve been in the game 43 years, and in all my years I’ve never been around anybody who’s a better teammate. That’s a fact.”

By the way, Miley has more ideas if anyone is willing to listen. He thinks the Mets’ Tommy Pham or Mark Canha could look good in a Brewers uniform, and he said he’s joked with Arnold about snagging both Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado from the Cardinals.

Arnold, in turn, told Miley he was ready to start fielding offers for … Miley.