PHOENIX — Milwaukee Brewers manager Pat Murphy has agreed to a multiyear contract extension after leading the team to the National League Central title and getting selected as NL Manager of the Year in each of his first two seasons.
Murphy’s contract had been set to expire at the end of the season if he hadn’t agreed to an extension. He took over as Brewers manager after predecessor Craig Counsell let his contract run out after the 2023 season and then signed a lucrative deal with the rival Chicago Cubs.
The Brewers didn’t release terms when announcing the deal Friday. The Athletic, which first reported Murphy’s new deal, said he now has a three-year contract with a club option for 2029.
“Pat Murphy has been an incredible partner and leader here for over a decade,” Brewers president of baseball operations Matt Arnold said in a statement. “I’m thrilled that we have been able to come up with a framework that keeps Murph with the Brewers for years to come and maintains the special relationship that we have established. I look forward to continuing the pursuit of a World Series championship with Murph and his staff.”
Murphy, 67, owns a 190-134 record as Milwaukee’s manager and has helped the Brewers wildly outperform preseason forecasts each of the last two years. They won a franchise-record 97 games last season, won a third straight NL Central title and beat Counsell’s Cubs in the NL Division Series before getting swept in the NL Championship Series by the eventual World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers.
The Brewers went 93-69 and won the NL Central in 2024 before losing a wild-card series to the New York Mets.
Along the way, he has delighted Brewers fans and gained attention for his unique style, which has included pulling out pancakes from his pocket during a televised dugout interview and having his sons frequently sitting alongside him at postgame news conferences.
Murphy was the first Brewers manager to be named NL Manager of the Year, then repeated the honor last season. The only others to be selected as Manager of the Year in consecutive seasons are the Atlanta Braves’s Bobby Cox (2004-05), the Tampa Bay Rays’ Kevin Cash (2020-21) and the Cleveland Guardians’ Stephen Vogt (2024-25).
The Brewers hired Murphy to take over after he served as Counsell’s bench coach in Milwaukee for eight seasons. Murphy had been Counsell’s college coach at Notre Dame.
Murphy’s only previous major-league managerial experience came when he went 42-54 on an interim basis with the San Diego Padres in 2015 after the firing of Bud Black. He was a minor-league manager in the Padres organization from 2011-15.
Before that, Murphy posted a combined 947-400-2 coaching record at Notre Dame (1988-94) and Arizona State (1995-2009), reaching the 1998 College World Series championship game with the Sun Devils.
He had a total of 1,000 college wins in a career that also included stints at Division III Maryville (1983) and Claremont-Mudd-Scripps Colleges (1986-87).