When Wade Miley went under the knife for Tommy John surgery last April, unsure if he would ever return to the big league mound. He told Adam McCalvy of MLB.com that he will wait to complete his training before deciding whether or not to retire, although he added that he would prefer to sit out the injury, saying “I still feel like I’ve got a lot in the tank.”
Today, Curt Hogg of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel provided an update on Miley’s rehab and future plans. Long story short, the veteran southpaw is doing his best to get back on the field. Not only is he planning to pitch in 2025, he wants to pitch as soon as possible. It’s been less than eight months since he received TJS last May, but he hopes to be back in action by the end of spring training and ready to hit the majors in late April/early May. The typical recovery timeline for pitchers who get TJS is 12 to 18 months, and Miley is not your average patient – she was 37 when she had the surgery and turns 38 in August. However, he is hopeful that he can return to the highest level of competition just a year after hitting the shelf.
Interestingly, Miley suggests that her age may help her bounce back faster. While the young striker may choose to use extreme caution when thinking about the future of his career, Miley is only thinking in the short term. His priority is not to extend his career as long as possible, it is to return to action as soon as possible. “I don’t drag [out] this thing for 14 to 16 months,” he explained. “…If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work. And that’s up to me.”
The 2024 season was a lost year for Miley, who threw just seven innings in two games. Last year, he made 23 starts for the Brewers. He pitched to a 3.14 ERA, 4.33 xERA, and 5.04 SIERA over 120 1/3 innings between two stints in the IL with back and elbow problems. He put up slightly better numbers for the Cubs the year before that, though more injuries limited him to just 37 innings. His last eligible season came with the Reds in 2021. He threw 163 innings in 28 starts with a 3.37 ERA, 4.09 xERA, and 4.52 SIERA.
All that said, Miley can still be a productive hitter when healthy, although health has been difficult for him to achieve. Maybe that’s enough to earn the veteran a one-year, major league contract. If not, it should make him a worthy candidate for an incentive-based minor league contract. The big question though is whether he will be able to find a club willing to allow him to attempt a quick comeback from TJS. Most teams may prefer that he take a slow and steady approach to his roster, both to keep him healthy and to keep him on the 60-day IL until they need him deep later in the year.
As bad as she wants to hit 2025, Miley made it clear she won’t be signing anywhere. For one thing, he’s not interested in joining a team that would keep him in the IL for the first few months of the season. In addition, geography seems important to him, perhaps because he does not want to move his family across the country. To that end, he expressed his preference to sign with a Central Division team; has been in the NL Central since signing with the Reds before the 2020 campaign. In particular, Miley was very vocal that the Brewers will always be her favorite team. “I was going to sign and go back to Central, preferably wearing blue,” he said. “Dark blue.”
Hogg notes the interest is mutual, and the Brewers talked to Miley this winter about a new contract. While the two sides haven’t made much progress, that doesn’t mean a deal won’t come together. Miley’s representatives are trying to get him a guaranteed major league contract, while the Brewers are unwilling to offer more than a minor league contract. However, in the end, Miley told Hogg that she would be happy to sign a non-guaranteed contract with financial incentives. She’s not doing her employees any favors by saying that out loud, but it seems like Miley doesn’t really care about money.
As for the Brewers, they rarely spend big on free agents. Combine that fact with Miley’s injury history, and it’s not hard to see why they would hesitate to give him a big league deal. In addition, Milwaukee already has a full circuit that includes Freddy Peralta, Brandon Woodruff, Nestor Cortes, Tobias Myersagain Aaron Civaleas well as DL Hall again Aaron Ashby. However, this team knows better than anyone that there is no such thing as starting depth — their rotation has been plagued by injuries throughout the 2024 season — and they clearly like what Miley brings to the table. They’ve already got him three times before, and for what it’s worth, they’ve won their division in all three years (2018, ’23, ’24). Therefore, it is not difficult to imagine these two sides coming together in a new agreement in 2025.
With all that said, it’s not a guarantee that Miley will pitch for the Brewers, or anyone, in 2025. He pointed out to Hogg that he would rather retire than sign with the wrong team. He also made it clear that he does not want to run in the big league if he is not going to produce. “I don’t want to burden everyone and start three times and then finish,” he said.
Until then, Miley talks about how the bone spurs on the back of her elbow have been a problem so far in her rehab. If the bone spurs continue to cause trouble and prevent him from throwing this spring, it’s certainly possible he’ll decide to hang up his hat. After all, he told Hogg that he had accomplished everything he “had ever dreamed of” in Major League Baseball during his 14-year career.
