Pitching Staff

[jay87shot]

Right now the bullpen is overworked and our starters are having a rough time getting though 5 innings or at least are not getting into the 6th. Woody and Civale (yesterday) are coming back but won't have a full workload for a few starts at least. Also Henderson and eventually Misi are going to have to have innings limit at some point this year. I love that we used a piggyback situation yesterday and would propose that the team actually put in a couple piggy back situations into play maybe for most of June. Here is how I would organize my staff and pen. The numbers are just the current order not how I would slot our starters by rank.

Current) 1)Peralta 2)Preister 3) Henderson 4) Patrick 5)Ciavale/CarRod    Other options) Myers, Woody, Misi, Hall, Ashby, Alexander

1)Peralta 2)Woody 5 innings/Hall 2-3 innings 3)Henderson 4-5/Misi 4-5 4)Patrick 5)Civale 5/Ashby or CarRod 2-3   pen Ashby, Hall, Misi, Mears, Anderson, Koenig, Uribe, Megill

In this option I would have 3 piggybacks, if Hall and/or Ashby can get out of there 2-3 innings in like 30-40 pitches it would open them up for an innings a few days after they pitch or it would make a bullpen day easy to plan if maybe Woody, Henderson, or Civale go 6+ in there 75-80 pitches. If need be we could taxi Myers or Priester back and forth to also help a bullpen day for Hall. That really only leaves a 5 man bullpen plus a couple maybes in Hall or Ashby with extra work. However in theory those 5 would only need to cover a max 2 innings a game 3 times a week and 3-4 twice a week. It would also be easy to move Misi or Ashby/CarRod back or forward a day to cover Patrick if need be.

Basically I want to see how everyone would manage this staff when we are healthy in like a week.

[Playing Catch]

Subscription required, I think...

Baseball America:  Breaking Down Jacob Misiorowski

Basically, they are really impressed with his start to 2025, and are feeling like he's been too promising lately to move to the pen. They feel like the best thing for Brewers (win now, put him in pen), and best thing for his development (let him develop as a starter in AAA) may be tricky to navigate.

[jay87shot]

Just now, Playing Catch said:

Subscription required, I think...

Baseball America:  Breaking Down Jacob Misiorowski

Basically, they are really impressed with his start to 2025, and are feeling like he's been too promising lately to move to the pen. They feel like the best thing for Brewers (win now, put him in pen), and best thing for his development (let him develop as a starter in AAA) may be tricky.

Yeah straight to the pen wouldn't make sense. I like the idea of piggybacking him with someone that way we can keep him stretched out and reduce innings so that he could be available for a playoff run if need be. I read posted somewhere else that the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel had an article speculating that the club might be dragging it's feet on a promotion until June 6th or as late as possible to eventually avoid super 2 status and save money through the arbitration process. 

[Soupy]

Keeping him under 50 innings this year keeps him eligible next year to be ROY and an incentive pick. 

[sveumrules]

2 minutes ago, Soupy said:

Keeping him under 50 innings this year keeps him eligible next year to be ROY and an incentive pick. 

45 days on the active roster (regardless of how many IP) would also disqualify him for ROY consideration in 2026.

[tmwiese55]

5 hours ago, Playing Catch said:

Subscription required, I think...

Baseball America:  Breaking Down Jacob Misiorowski

Basically, they are really impressed with his start to 2025, and are feeling like he's been too promising lately to move to the pen. They feel like the best thing for Brewers (win now, put him in pen), and best thing for his development (let him develop as a starter in AAA) may be tricky to navigate.

Kind of feels like they might have the Burnes/Woody route in mind here.   Keep developing as SP, and get innings built up for next year.  But later in this year as he approaches innings limit, come up and do 1-2 inning outings to help the team and get his feet wet before next year. 

[jay87shot]

What would everyone's end of the year rotation preference be, just straight 5 man. I think Misi and Henderson will both be in the bullpen as they hit innings limits.

1)Freddy   2)Woody   3) Patrick   4) Priester   5)Quintana     I really hope Gasser can get all the way back and make it back to the big league staff. It seems like the organization is determined to keep Priester there so hopefully he can continue to make small progressions like it seemed happened in his last start.  I still think to make a playoff run we will need Woody to come back strong. Quintana has shown more than Civale or Cortes so he gets 5. My bullpen would be Megill, Uribe, Yoho, Mears, Koenig (gets it back together), Ashby, Hall, Misi, Henderson in that instance allowing us to turn excess arms into usable pieces. 

[Brian]

What? No one has Tyler Alexander in the mix? 😁 

[edfunderburk]

Coming soon to a Brewers team near you …

Brandon Woodruff 

Check out his stat line from today in Appleton: 

[Playing Catch]

On 5/23/2025 at 3:07 PM, tmwiese55 said:

Kind of feels like they might have the Burnes/Woody route in mind here.   Keep developing as SP, and get innings built up for next year.  But later in this year as he approaches innings limit, come up and do 1-2 inning outings to help the team and get his feet wet before next year. 

This is certainly possible. My rationale is that Burnes/Woody had already "mastered" the art of starting, and that they need to hone their competitiveness pitching out of the pen. They needed to learn to trust their stuff in the zone. Learn how to pitch aggressively. I think for Misiorowski, even though he'd be dominant pitching that way out of the pen, if he's going to become a starter, he needs to practice reining it in, not going all out.

[Brian]

16 hours ago, edfunderburk said:

Coming soon to a Brewers team near you …

Brandon Woodruff 

Check out his stat line from today in Appleton: 

The single "A" Timber Rattlers is not that good a measuring stick for MLB success. That is like one step above college. Just sayen'. 

[TURBO]

1 hour ago, Brian said:

The single "A" Timber Rattlers is not that good a measuring stick for MLB success. That is like one step above college. Just sayen'. 

Timber Rattlers are High A, or A+ depending on how you want to word it.  They are far better than one step above college, but yeah, I'd temper my excitement a bit at this level...

[Turning2]

On 5/27/2025 at 10:43 AM, jay87shot said:

What would everyone's end of the year rotation preference be, just straight 5 man. I think Misi and Henderson will both be in the bullpen as they hit innings limits.

1)Freddy   2)Woody   3) Patrick   4) Priester   5)Quintana     I really hope Gasser can get all the way back and make it back to the big league staff. It seems like the organization is determined to keep Priester there so hopefully he can continue to make small progressions like it seemed happened in his last start.  I still think to make a playoff run we will need Woody to come back strong. Quintana has shown more than Civale or Cortes so he gets 5. My bullpen would be Megill, Uribe, Yoho, Mears, Koenig (gets it back together), Ashby, Hall, Misi, Henderson in that instance allowing us to turn excess arms into usable pieces. 

Kind of a quirk of circumstances and timing that Woody probably is at best their #2 assuming he produces like he had prior to the injury. When they gambled on him coming back, I always figured they viewed him as their ace. Had he returned on schedule, he probably would be. 

Can't say I have a preference because there is too much to choose from and some unknowns. Like, does Cortez factor in somewhere? One thing I will say is, Quintana probably isn't here much longer IF he can get a couple more good outings in before the trade deadline. Also, the end of the year's rotation depends on if they are in the hunt for a WC or not. 

[jay87shot]

42 minutes ago, Turning2 said:

Kind of a quirk of circumstances and timing that Woody probably is at best their #2 assuming he produces like he had prior to the injury. When they gambled on him coming back, I always figured they viewed him as their ace. Had he returned on schedule, he probably would be. 

Can't say I have a preference because there is too much to choose from and some unknowns. Like, does Cortez factor in somewhere? One thing I will say is, Quintana probably isn't here much longer IF he can get a couple more good outings in before the trade deadline. Also, the end of the year's rotation depends on if they are in the hunt for a WC or not. 

Agree, it is to difficult to gauge with the 10 or so options. I would love to just go Peralta and rookies Patrick, Henderson, Misi, Priester (maybe not rookie) with CarRod, Myers, and eventually Gasser as depth. However that isn't wise as most of those guys will have some innings limit. I want to give Woody as much of a chance as possible and I think Civale and Quintana will be consistent and needed as much as possible. We really could support 2 rotations.

old) Peralta, Woody, Quintana, Civale, Cortez, Alexander

young) Patrick, Henderson, Misi, Myers, Preister, CarRod, Gasser (Hall and Ashby possibly as well)

That is crazy depth.

[Team Canada]

1 hour ago, Turning2 said:

I always figured they viewed him as their ace. Had he returned on schedule, he probably would be. 

I doubt they counted on someone returning from shoulder surgery to be an ace, even in the best of scenarios.

Certainly not if he's throwing 92 now instead of 98.

[markedman5]

I’m good with however it plays out this year……what is really exciting is the depth of young controllable starters we have going forward  the next 4-6 years.

[Turning2]

26 minutes ago, Team Canada said:

I doubt they counted on someone returning from shoulder surgery to be an ace, even in the best of scenarios.

Certainly not if he's throwing 92 now instead of 98.

First, they had no idea what his velocity would be at present.

Secondly, they ate $2.5 million knowing that they would get NOTHING in return for one full season, and gambled an additional $7.5 million for 2025 HOPING he could give them most of a productive season. And they were prepared to spend another $20 million on a mutual option for 2026. A small market team with budgetary constraints doesn't usually take that risk. Appears to me like they hoped he could come back and be an ace rather than play second fiddle again. He just might by the time late July rolls around.  If he does, it will be his swansong in MKE. Some fans think he will give them a hometown discount out of loyalty and gratitude for paying him so much to heal and rehab, giving him a chance to extend his MLB career. I don't. He'll jump ship if a big enough payday comes his way. 

[Playing Catch]

I really don't mean this to sound like an "I told you so," (because I'm not big on proving/disproving past opinions, so long as they were expressed as opinion, and not fact), but it seems to me that this was the plan for the Brewers all along. We were ALL fretting over covering innings in the off-season, and I felt at the time that it was their intention to split up all of the innings throughout the season using their tremendous depth of average-ness. I particularly was intrigued by Patrick, following the success they had with Myers last season. This, of course, counted on spectacular defense, which we have yet to see. But I think the plan all along has been to save their best* pitchers until later this season.

*upon reflection of this comment, I should rephrase as, "strongest pitching staff". I guess I just mean that I can envision Freddy coming up with a sprained ankle at some point when other guys get back. It doesn't change the idea that they are trying to spread innings out among their starters, and their willingness to use 2+ inning relievers and openers.

[kestrel79]

Is this our deepest starting pitching rotation ever in franchise history? Man how many different starters have we had so far this year? And for the most part except for the one dude who got lit up opening day at home all have been pretty darn good so far.

Gone are the 5-6 man rotations and replaced by 8-10 guys it seems. But it's really worked out but hard to follow as a fan.

[Samurai Bucky]

22 hours ago, kestrel79 said:

Is this our deepest starting pitching rotation ever in franchise history? Man how many different starters have we had so far this year? And for the most part except for the one dude who got lit up opening day at home all have been pretty darn good so far.

Gone are the 5-6 man rotations and replaced by 8-10 guys it seems. But it's really worked out but hard to follow as a fan.

Let's be careful.  A few weeks ago, the sky was falling.  We were overpaying with trades for other pitchers and people were calling for the Brewers to sell now.

I agree -- the staff looks very deep.  This is very good because it gives the Brewers options if there are injuries and also trade chips at the trade deadline to fill holes.  My only concern is if there are 8-10 guys, how do they keep the players "happy" who could start but aren't.

[Playing Catch]

23 hours ago, Samurai Bucky said:

Let's be careful.  A few weeks ago, the sky was falling.  We were overpaying with trades for other pitchers and people were calling for the Brewers to sell now.

I agree -- the staff looks very deep.  This is very good because it gives the Brewers options if there are injuries and also trade chips at the trade deadline to fill holes.  My only concern is if there are 8-10 guys, how do they keep the players "happy" who could start but aren't.

For most of those guys, they are probably just happy to have a role and to be succeeding in that role.

[Ro Mueller]

On 5/29/2025 at 8:46 PM, Team Canada said:

I doubt they counted on someone returning from shoulder surgery to be an ace, even in the best of scenarios.

Certainly not if he's throwing 92 now instead of 98.

Isn’t he getting a minimum of $17.5m to throw one season? - $2.5m last year, $5.0m this year, $10.0m this winter (buyout).

[Brian]

On 5/30/2025 at 10:47 AM, Playing Catch said:

But I think the plan all along has been to save their best* pitchers until later this season.

I agree Woody's first appearance either right before or after the All Star break if everything stays on track. That's still about 6 weeks away.  Hopefully all go's well for him and the team until then. 

[wibadgers23]

15 minutes ago, Brian said:

I agree Woody's first appearance either right before or after the All Star break if everything stays on track. That's still about 6 weeks away.  Hopefully all go's well for him and the team until then. 

6 weeks would mean something went wrong.  He has one more rehab in Nashville and then should be pitching in Milwaukee.

[Outlander]

1 hour ago, Ro Mueller said:

Isn’t he getting a minimum of $17.5m to throw one season? - $2.5m last year, $5.0m this year, $10.0m this winter (buyout).

Exactly, if they didn't think he could return to form they shouldn't have signed him. He may never be an Ace again but sure hope the Brewers thought that.