Following his team’s 2-1 victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers on Sunday, Milwaukee Brewers star Jake Bauers opened up about the sacrifices his wife makes for their family and the challenges of balancing fatherhood with an MLB career.
After playing for six teams over the last nine seasons, the 30-year-old Bauers almost retired after the 2024 season. After all, he only batted .199 and struck out 118 times in just 346 at-bats for the Brewers that season.
After a year like that, Jake Bauers intended to retire while his wife, Lauren, went back to teaching full-time. Then, just three days after making that decision, Lauren informed him that she was expecting their second child.
“She tells me she’s pregnant,” Bauers recalled to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “Obviously, she wasn’t going back to work, so we decided I was going to keep playing. … We needed health insurance.”
Changing his mind has yielded good results, but there has been a price
In 2025, Jake Bauers only played in 85 games and batted just .235. So he still wasn’t exactly lighting it up.
This year, however, Bauers had his breakout season. In 144 games with the Brewers, he hit .266 with a .389 on-base percentage, 26 home runs and 86 RBI. And now he is just three wins away from playing in the World Series.
On Sunday, Jake Bauers looked back at his career and the sacrifices that have had to be made in order for him to get to where he is today.
“There’s a lot of people I can give credit to, a lot on the staff here for sure, but also I was thinking a lot about my wife,” he told the media. “We have two kids, so she’s holding it down at home by herself a lot of the time, which is a lot. Those kids, they’re a blessing, and we love them, but man, they’re a handful.”
“So for her to do that and for her to allow me the opportunity to come here and kind of keep going and just support me in any way she can, it’s been crazy,” Bauers added. “It’s been crazy to see her growth as a woman and a mom.
“And, yeah, so I was standing out there last night listening to the National Anthem, and I was thinking about her, and just, she stuck by me this whole time when it wasn’t always easy,” he continued. “I wasn’t always the best husband. I wasn’t always the best father.”