ST. PETERSURG, FL — He’s one of their best friends, a beloved former co-worker, who now lives and works 1,200 miles away from Milwaukee.
They’ll forever cherish their memories together and still speak of him as if he’s family, but they realize it’ll be altogether different when they see him again Monday.
You see, he now is the enemy.
The Milwaukee Brewers, halfway to achieving their dream of winning the first World Series championship in franchise history, know that Freddy Peralta, now employed by the Tampa Bay Rays, is a huge obstacle standing in their way.
The Brewers will face Peralta on Monday at 8 p.m. ET at Tropicana Field knowing that if they win, they’ll have a commanding 3-0 lead in the best-of-seven World Series, an advantage that has never been squandered in World Series history.
And if the Brewers lose, it could flip the World Series script in a hurry, with the Rays having the best home-field advantage in baseball and certainly capable of winning three games in a row at "The Trop" and forcing the Series back to Milwaukee.
The Brewers, who traded Peralta last winter believing they’d have no prayer of keeping him as a free agent, now face the possibility of having Peralta ruin everything. They traded him to the New York Mets, believing it would be the last they’d see of him after he looked like a shell of himself with his struggles in Queens. Only now to see Peralta become resurrected after being traded to the Rays at the deadline and resurface as one of the finest pitchers in the game.
It leaves Peralta feeling a bit awkward with Brewers fans wildly cheering him during pregame introductions before Game 1, thanking him for everything he did while with the Brewers, and wishing him well in his future endeavors. Yet, with one commanding performance, they could be cursing him all winter, enraged that the Brewers ever traded him away.
"It is a little weird," Peralta says. "I've been trying to focus on what I have to focus on because even when I came out for practice, all the people, all the fans here (were) showing me some love, screaming my name. When I went to the bullpen last night, they were telling me, 'We still love you.'
"It's amazing, I just have to be professional and keep everything in the right direction."
A whole lot easier said than done facing some of his best friends in life.
Peralta, 30, spent the first eight years of his major-league career with the Brewers, becoming a two-time All-Star, winning 70 games, striking out 1,153 batters, and becoming an ultimate teammate and fan favorite. The Brewers wanted to keep him, but talks of a contract extension went nowhere so they traded him to the Mets.
Who’d imagine they’d now be facing him at the most critical time in the franchise’s history?
"I love that kid, man," Brewers manager Pat Murphy said. "I just do. This kid is just joyful. It's just a beautiful spirit that comes to do his job. He doesn't look at himself as better than others. He's just a great teammate. If you can't be around him for a while and not feel warm."
The feeling is mutual, Peralta says, who can’t stop raving about his experience in Milwaukee, knowing that if the Rays don’t win the World Series, he’d at least be thrilled for his buddies.
"I was very happy for them," Peralta said. "I texted some of the guys wishing them the best and they answered back telling me, 'We want to play against you guys because we want to see you.'
"But I want to make something clear. When I'm on the mound, I see everything like a competition. … I know that sometimes you have people that you love on the other side, but you have to do what you have to do. Then everything takes care of itself."
Certainly, this is a different Peralta than the one who struggled so badly with the Mets. He went 17-6 with a 2.70 ERA last season with the Brewers, but in New York, he was just 5-9 with a 4.99 ERA, struggling to even pitch five innings in starts.
What in the world happened?
"Sometimes," he said, "I ask the same question myself. I don't try to make excuses. I was feeling really good physically. I was trying to give the best of myself as always. I prepared how I should be preparing. But I don't know, for some reason, things weren't going my way. I was feeling bad because I couldn't do anything for them. I wasn't able to perform well over there. …
"I think that it was a lot of things going on for me and for the team too because we weren't playing well in general, and we were trying to make adjustments."
And, yes, besides the adjustments he made on the mound, it sure helps going from a flawed, defensive-challenged team like the Mets to the powerful Rays, who have one of the game’s best defenses.
"That's a huge part, man," Peralta said. "Sometimes I tell myself, just whatever I'm going to throw, just put it in the sun. Just looking for the hitter to hit the ball because I trust all the guys I have behind me. It’s been working pretty well."
Oh, to say the least.
Peralta is 7-0 with an 0.81 ERA over his last seven starts, including a 0.79 ERA in three postseason appearances, earning the American League Championship Series MVP.
"When I got traded here, I just felt different," Peralta said. "For some reason I got here, and I felt like myself again."
The Rays made several key adjustments with Peralta, pitching exclusively out of the stretch, tweaking his stride, using a higher arm slot, moving him to the third-base side of the pitching rubber. Voila! His fastball got faster, hitting 99.4-mph on the radar gun in the ALCS – the fastest pitch of his career – with 71 of his 99 pitches fastballs in his Game 2 start against Cleveland.
"We see that he’s in his element, man," Murphy said. "That’s Fastball Freddy."
Says Rays manager Kevin Cash: "I feel like he’s kind of come back to being Freddy Peralta with us."
Yep, the same Peralta that could derail the Brewers’ plans for a clinching in St. Petersburg, with Peralta still holding out hope that he can still make one postseason start on that same mound that was home for so many years at American Family Field.
"I know how special it is to pitch on this mound here in Milwaukee," Peralta said. "I would like to pitch here during the postseason."
To do so, that would require a Game 7.
And for the potential of a Game 7, it would require Peralta to shut down his former teammates Monday night, giving the Rays a chance to still make this an intriguing series.
"Crazy," Peralta said.
He broke into an expansive grin, and smiled.
No further words were needed.
Follow Bob Nightengale on X: @Bnightengale
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Freddy Peralta was beloved in Milwaukee. Now he stands in Brewers’ World Series path
