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 -- “I'm being pretty candid with you,” Brewers right-hander Brandon Woodruff says at one juncture of a conversation about his long comeback from shoulder surgery. “I know we talked about it a little bit during the season, but I'm in such a different place now than I was when we last saw each other in Milwaukee.

“So, I'm giving you my honest opinion of where I'm at.”

Getting Woodruff to go there last year was the reporting equivalent of throwing a perfect game. After undergoing major right shoulder repair in October 2023, he knew he’d miss all of ‘24, and he politely informed the media that he wasn’t going to be a story. Not while the Brewers, with a burst of youthful energy from their position players but absent their top two starting pitchers -- Corbin Burnes was traded and Woodruff was hurt -- were cruising to a second straight National League Central crown.

But with Spring Training on deck, Woodruff knows he’ll have to answer these questions soon enough. So, he let down his guard on Monday. Yes, he is throwing bullpens twice a week in Mississippi as part of a normal offseason progression. Yes, his arm feels great. No, he hasn’t seen any radar gun readings, and that’s by design.

Then there’s the big question for a Brewers team trying to hold its window of winning open for yet another year: Will Woodruff be ready by Opening Day?

“I honestly can't answer that question, but I can tell you my mindset is to get ready for that,” he said. “I'm preparing to go and pitch, whether that's in New York [the site of Milwaukee’s opening series against the Yankees], whether I'm on the back end of the rotation, who knows?

“But I’ve got to go out and prove it, which I love. Essentially, I'm on a one-year deal and I'm out to prove when I’m on the field that I can still do what I can do. So that's good for me. It gives me a good mindset going into this year, and I’ll just take it for what it is. But I can't answer that question for you [about when I’ll be ready]. I really just don't know.”

Like left-hander Aaron Ashby before him, Woodruff learned the hard way that a side effect of shoulder injuries is uncertainty. Take the end of last season, when, quietly, Woodruff’s up-and-down summer ended with disappointment. For weeks, he was on track to face hitters in live BP during the Brewers’ final regular-season series against the Mets. It would have been an uplifting way to end a hard season.

His shoulder declined to cooperate.

“I just wasn't ready. Like, I couldn't do it,” Woodruff said. “And now I look back on that, I'm like, ‘Gosh, that wasn't but three months ago, and look at where I'm at now. I've made so much progress.’ And quite frankly, I'm in a really, really good spot.”

Woodruff traveled to Dallas after the season to see his surgeon, Dr. Keith Meister, who instructed him to have a normal offseason. Woodruff complied, returning to the offseason protocol he followed throughout a career that saw him go 46-26 with a 3.10 ERA over parts of seven Brewers seasons from 2017-23, with two All-Star appearances and a top-five finish in NL Cy Young Award balloting in 2021. He’s throwing bullpen sessions on Tuesdays and Fridays, about to reach the 30-pitch plateau. After that, he’ll be ready to simulate multiple innings. And after that, he’ll be ready to face hitters and get feedback from their swings.

Next week, Woodruff will travel to American Family Fields of Phoenix with two missions. One, he’ll visit with a group of Brewers pitching prospects in town for a minicamp and perhaps impart some motivation by telling his story of an 11th-round Draft pick developing into an ace. Two, he’ll throw in the Brewers’ pitching lab and get a status report on his stuff.

“Bryn has visited multiple times and I’ve been doing everything I can,” said Woodruff, referring to Bryn Hester, a Brewers assistant athletic trainer and physical therapist, and a holdover on a medical staff that recently underwent a major makeover. “What I've learned is pushing the envelope of this thing and stressing it. Then, when your shoulder tells you to back off, you back off, and then you basically do it again until your shoulder gets used to doing what it's meant to do, and that's to throw a baseball.

“The further I get out, the more months that I get under my belt, the better it is. Really, these first couple months coming up during the season are crucial. I think if I can get through those okay and do just fine, I'll be okay.”

Woodruff will be patient. If it takes adjustments to his pitch mix to succeed, he says he’s open to it. He doesn’t expect to get a true estimate of his velocity and stuff until the second half. And he’ll push forward with a renewed love for the game, knowing how it feels when baseball is taken away.

“At this time last year, I'm three and a half months out [from surgery], and that was miserable. If I made a wrong move either which way, it would almost break me down to my knees,” Woodruff said. “Now, I know I’m technically still in rehab. I haven’t faced a hitter in 15 months.

“But gosh, I feel good.”