Nostalgic Peralta appreciative of 2nd nod to rep Brewers at All-Star Game

MIAMI -- You probably remember the 13-strikeout Mother’s Day game in 2018, but Freddy Peralta's big league career actually began the day before with proper introductions. He’d joined the Brewers at Coors Field as a 21-year-old with braces, a big smile and just enough English to get by, plus a precocious personality that bemused his more veteran teammates as Peralta circled the clubhouse with an extended right hand.

“Hi,” Peralta said to each person he encountered. “I’m Freddy.”

Seven years later, it’s the teammates who come to Peralta, now 29 and creeping toward free agency as the rotation mainstay for a team that wins with run prevention. He’s made every start for the past three years, which is the best on-field representation of who he is for the Brewers off the field. Fastball Freddy? Today, it’s more like Steady Freddy.

Peralta is also now All-Star Freddy for the second time. Peralta, previously a National League All-Star in 2021, was the lone Brewers player to get that good news that he will represent Milwaukee at the MLB All-Star Game presented by Mastercard at Truist Park in Atlanta on July 15. It reached Peralta via manager Pat Murphy in front of the whole team.

“It was very special what he said,” Peralta said. “He gave me a lot of credit, and he said that he was proud of what he’s seen from me since I got here back in 2018. It was a great feeling while he was speaking, because it reminds me of a lot of things when I was 21 years old.”

The Brewers’ Opening Day starter for the second straight season, Peralta is 9-4 with a 2.91 ERA in 18 starts heading into Monday’s outing against the Dodgers at American Family Field. He was tied for the NL lead in victories going into Sunday’s games, and he ranked fifth among the league’s qualifiers with a .202 average against, ninth in ERA and 10th with a 1.09 WHIP.

Another number matters most to Peralta: His 18 starts, after 33 last season and 30 the year before.

“Being able to take the ball every five days and feel good is [the] most important achievement so far this season, Peralta said. “I remember that in my fourth or fifth game, my groin wasn’t feeling good and I got through that. The adjustments that me and [catcher] William [Contreras] have been making together is something very special, the relationship that we’ve built.”

Peralta's a different pitcher than he was in 2018 for his magical debut, when 90 of his 98 pitches were four-seam fastballs, and even in 2021 for his first All-Star nod, when he made a slider and a changeup more serious parts of his arsenal.

This season, Peralta's slider usage is way down and the changeup is more than 20 percent of his pitches for the first time, an adjustment he pondered in the offseason before putting into effect at the start of Spring Training.

“I think it’s understanding how good my fastball is and combining that with the changeup, it’s been the best idea that we took,” Peralta said. “It wasn’t only me, it was me, ‘Villa’ [Brewers special assistant Carlos Villanueva], ‘Hooky’ [pitching coach Chris Hook] and Contreras. We all decided together that the combination of the fastball and changeup was a really good idea, that we had nothing to lose if we put that in practice, and that’s what we’ve been doing.”

Only Peralta, Brandon Woodruff and Christian Yelich remain from the 2018 team that began the Brewers’ recent run of regular-season success. The team has won four division titles in the last seven seasons and made the playoffs six times.

Back then, did Peralta ever dream of All-Star Games?

“Not really,” he said. “Back then I was just trying to protect my career, to try to pitch good to stay here. I had no idea how it was going to be. I was just pitching to not go down to Triple-A.

“Then all the work that we put in every day, when you have the right people around and have good conversations, everything can be great in the future.”