Mayfield takes turn as coach for Brewers in spring training

PHOENIX >> Baker Mayfield wasn’t going to pass up this opportunity.

Fully aware the Brewers wanted to protect him, Mayfield knew he wouldn’t get into a spring training game during his two-day stay with the NL Central champions. But they let the Browns quarterback get real close — a surprise stint as the first base coach for three innings March 16.

As the split-squad Brewers came to bat in the bottom of the fourth, that’s when third base coach Eddie Sedar suddenly handed Mayfield a batting helmet and stop watch and told him to take over.

Did his baseball pals give him any advice?

“Pay attention,” Mayfield related. “Watch out for guys ripping one down the line.”

Mayfield is friends with Christian Yelich and joined the NL MVP and the Brewers on March 16. The 2017 Heisman Trophy winner took batting practice and showed off his arm strength by throwing passes to some of the team’s staff.

“I thought he did great,” Yelich said of Mayfield’s BP session. “It was a lot of fun. He’s got a pretty good swing.”

As the first base coach, Mayfield deftly handled a foul ball by Milwaukee’s Travis Shaw that ricocheted off the Brewers dugout in the fourth. But Mayfield bobbled a foul carom off the bat of Yelich in the sixth.

Mayfield quickly learned not to get too comfortable in the coach’s box.

“I don’t know why they have it painted right there,” Mayfield said. “It’s not regulation size and it’s too close. I’m looking over at Eddie at third base and he’s in the outfield.”

Mike Moustakas, though, might want Mayfield to hang around some more. The Brewers star hit a ball into the gap in right-center field in the fourth and Mayfield waved him on, pumping his arm as Moustakas reached second safely on the double.

In the sixth, Mayfield missed a chance to give Moustakas a high-five after the infielder hit a tworun home run. Mayfield then went to the Brewers dugout and leaned over the railing to celebrate.

“I run everything out until I see it go out so it’s hard for me to hit the first base coach on a high-five,” Moustakas said. “I wish I would’ve now. I left him hanging.”

Said Mayfield, proudly: “All I know is Malibu Mike was 2 for 2 when I was coaching first base.”

That was about as close as Mayfield got to a hit.

“He’s a professional athlete,” Brewers manager Craig Counsell said. “He looks like a ballplayer and he’s played plenty of baseball. We played a game (on March 15) in batting practice, a points game, and he was in it until the final round. He acquitted himself very well defensively, offensively for sure. And in the clubhouse. He did a nice job.”

The Brewers outfitted him perfectly with a No. 6 Brewers jersey. Someone updated it on March 16 with white tape saying “16 percent body fat.”

“I didn’t put that there,” Yelich said.

Mayfield and Yelich met at a gym in Westlake Village, California, when the quarterback was prepping for the NFL Scouting Combine and 2018 draft. Mayfield did play third base at Oklahoma, but he’s better known for leading the Sooners to the College Football Playoff semifinals twice in three years.