With the Milwaukee Brewers hosting the San Francisco Giants for a four-game series beginning Monday night, June 1, it marks the return of two familiar faces.
Shortstop Willy Adames is in the second year of the seven-year, $182 million contract with the Giants that he signed before the 2025 season, and starting pitcher Adrian Houser will face his old team in the series finale Thursday, June 4.
Adames, of course, was a central part of the Brewers lineup beginning in 2021 when he was acquired from the Tampa Bay Rays midseason. He stayed for the next three seasons. Houser made his debut with the Brewers in 2015 and then contributed regularly from 2019 through 2023, posting a 4.00 ERA during his time with the Brewers. He was traded after the 2023 season to the New York Mets in a deal that brought current Brewers starter Coleman Crow to Milwaukee.
How have they done this season?
Willy Adames hit a grand slam to cap a hot May
Adames belted a grand slam for the Giants in a 19-6 win over the Colorado Rockies on May 31, helping them snap a five-game losing streak.
For the month, Adames batted .292 with an .829 OPS, a huge improvement from his March/April numbers of a .197 batting average and a .593 OPS He’s up to a .707 OPS for the season, with eight homers, 23 RBIs and just a .281 on-base percentage.
The .707 is below where he finished last year (.740, when he hit 30 homers and drove in 87) and would mark a career-low. Adames posted a .794 OPS (32 homers, 112 RBIs) in his final year with the Brewers.
Adames, who will turn 31 in September, has seen his defense fall off, according to defensive metrics. In Outs Above Average, Adames was a plus-10 in 2022 with the Brewers and plus-16 in 2023 before falling back to an even zero in 2024. He was at plus-5 last year but stands at minus-8 this year.
Fielding Bible ranks Willy Adames at plus-2 defensive runs saved, which ranks him roughly average among MLB shortstops. Joey Ortiz, for what it’s worth, is also listed at plus-2 by the same metric, albeit in fewer innings. OAA considers Ortiz a plus-6 this year and plus-12 last year.
Last year in his return to Milwaukee, Adames homered in his first at-bat at American Family Field.
Adames has a 1.2 WAR, as measured by Baseball Reference, which is still pretty solid. For comparison, consider the Brewers’ second- and third-best hitters: Catcher William Contreras is at 1.4 and Jake Bauers is at 0.9.
Adrian Houser’s up-and-down career in a downturn at the moment
Houser’s career trajectory has been interesting.
After he was traded to the Mets in 2024, Houser didn’t stay with the franchise for long, jettisoned after he posted a 5.84 ERA in 23 games and seven starts. He landed on his feet in 2025 with the Chicago White Sox, sporting a 2.10 ERA in 11 starts, then was traded to Tampa Bay at the deadline.
With the Rays, he had a 4.79 ERA in 10 games, with an elevated WHIP of 1.349. It’s gotten worse this year with the Giants, with whom he signed a two-year deal worth $22 million in December.
The 33-year-old Houser has made 11 starts this year and has a 5.59 ERA, with a 1.562 WHIP and nine homers allowed in 56⅓ innings. He has 35 strikeouts and 21 walks.
It’s unclear which pitcher Houser will face Thursday, but there’s at least a chance he’ll face Crow, the minor-leaguer Milwaukee acquired in the deal that sent Tyrone Taylor and Houser to the Mets. Crow has a 3.14 ERA in three games (14⅓ innings), with a 0.977 WHIP and eight strikeouts.
One more familiar face is back: Eric Haase
Eric Haase, a backup catcher for the Brewers the past two seasons, is also on the Giants roster and has fared quite well in limited work, with a .928 OPS in 12 games (33 plate appearances). That includes three homers, two of which were hit in the same game against the Los Angeles Dodgers on May 12.
Haase proved to be a popular player in the Brewers clubhouse, and it was bittersweet for Brewers personnel when they traded for Danny Jansen at the trade deadline last season and designated Haase for assignment.
Haase, 33, is in his ninth big-league season.
Kyle Harrison will face the organization that developed him
Brewers lefty Kyle Harrison will face the Giants on June 2, for the first time against the team that drafted and developed him into a big-leaguer.
Harrison was selected in the third round of the 2020 draft, and he arrived in the big leagues in 2023 after earning the distinction of one of baseball’s best pitching prospects. But he was dealt to Boston in 2025 in the deal that brought Rafael Devers to the Giants.
Boston, in turn, traded Harrison this offseason to the Brewers in the deal that brought Caleb Durbin and others to the Red Sox. It’s paid off handsomely for Milwaukee, since Harrison has a 1.57 ERA in 10 starts and 61 strikeouts in 51⅔ innings.
Devers, for what it’s worth, has a .732 OPS this year, trending toward one of the lowest of his career. He has seven homers in 59 games.
Former Brewers minor-league coach Justin Meccage is the Giants’ pitching coach. Meccage is the uncle of Bryce Meccage, a Brewers pitching prospect and second-round draft pick in 2024.
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: How have former Brewers Willy Adames, Adrian Houser done with Giants?
Reporting by JR Radcliffe, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
