Young pitching...innings pitched...September and October

[Trail]

The Brewers are leaning very heavily on their young starters...and its working out really well.  I worry about late season and the playoffs.  Most of these guys have not pitched a full-year MLB schedule, and we know that for their long term health they can only increase innings year to year by a certain percentage.  Even the second year guys (Miz, Patrick) I'm sure will have some sort of a cap.  Anyone else concerned about this?  We could be in the middle of a pennant race and have to cut some of these guys way back.  Could this be a reason Murphy is leaning heavily on middle relief this year (Ashby, Patrick, Drohan, etc)?  Could this be a reason to bring in a veteran starter before the deadline?  

[homer]

I'm keeping track of Miz's innings. He's on pace for 205. I doubt he gets to 200. I'll be curious to see what they do to pare him back. I am less concerned about Harrison. He is on pace for 149. I think that's manageable given his workload in prior seasons.

[Brian]

33 minutes ago, Trail said:

Could this be a reason to bring in a veteran starter before the deadline?  

It all depends on the Priester, Woodruff, Henderson forecasts.  Because I'm sure not ready to see Gasser up here again any time soon. 

[OldHeidelberg]

24 minutes ago, homer said:

I'm keeping track of Miz's innings. He's on pace for 205. I doubt he gets to 200. I'll be curious to see what they do to pare him back. I am less concerned about Harrison. He is on pace for 149. I think that's manageable given his workload in prior seasons.

They have been keeping his pitch count down, seems like once he hits 80 or so it's his last inning rather than the traditional 100. It's a credit to how far he has come this year that he is still getting 6-7 inning most nights. They have also given him 6 days off a few times. 

[TwinsBrewersWorldSeries]

I wonder if we will still see Patrick starting this week.  When he initially came in yesterday, I was wondering if that was going to be a reverse piggyback… but then he only pitched once and I started to wonder if that was going to be a simulated bullpen session between starts…

Right now it really seems like Patrick is our third best starting option, with Henderson when healthy as the fourth.

I can deal with Sproat’s growing pains if he is the fifth starter that gets skipped sometimes.  Sproat and Gasser seems unworkable.

[LouisEly]

The Brewers are going to maximize the limit of 5x a player can be optioned with their young starters to limit their innings.

Starters are really expensive this early in the season.  Come late July, if there is still concern, then they will likely add a starter.

[Trail]

1 hour ago, Brian said:

It all depends on the Priester, Woodruff, Henderson forecasts.  Because I'm sure not ready to see Gasser up here again any time soon. 

yes, but Henderson is part of the issue.  Another "rookie" who's innings will have to be carefully managed.  

[Thurston Fluff]

I think we have enough young pitchers to share the workload to make it all work without adding a inning eater veteran. I'm not counting on Priester coming back which hurts but I'm also not writing Gasser off just yet. He's coming off a long layoff and major surgery. It takes time to get back to where he was. I wouldn't be at all surprised by late July or August he's starting in round into form and can be a spot starter.

 

[tmwiese55]

A lot of this discussion probably comes down to Woodruff and if can come back by end of June and generally pitch a normal workload to finish the year.   That helps them be able to shuffle guys up and down or with IL stints to take a break.    I'm with the person who is not planning on anything from Priester at this point.  Essentially, just saying adding Woodruff would be the equivalent of adding someone via trade.

I'd also throw out that Crow can be added to this mix of the guys sharing this workload going up and down. He looks legit to me and someone you can trust for starts

[Trail]

10 minutes ago, Thurston Fluff said:

I think we have enough young pitchers to share the workload to make it all work without adding a inning eater veteran. I'm not counting on Priester coming back which hurts but I'm also not writing Gasser off just yet. He's coming off a long layoff and major surgery. It takes time to get back to where he was. I wouldn't be at all surprised by late July or August he's starting in round into form and can be a spot starter.

 

I hope so.  My concern is 3 or 4 of these guys get to the "we have to pare them back" stage at about the same time (probably early Sept?).  I'm sure the Brewers are well on top of this....but its still a little bit scary.  Good news I guess is they have plenty of solid relief options in AAA to absorb the extra innings the pen might have to carry.

In the meantime....I'm going to have to remember to not be too frustrated when Henderson or whomever is dominating over 5 or 6 innings and gets pulled!  Hopefully that's the plan...

[Jim French Stepstool]

1 hour ago, Thurston Fluff said:

I'm also not writing Gasser off just yet. He's coming off a long layoff and major surgery. It takes time to get back to where he was. I wouldn't be at all surprised by late July or August he's starting in round into form and can be a spot starter.

 

I agree with this. I think people forget how solid he looked in 2024 before the surgery. Let's let him get further removed from that event & see where he is down the road.

[owbc]

At least with the way things are trending right now we may have to battle the full 162 for a first round bye. 

I’m not terribly worried about it. Pitching over 162+postseason is often a war of attrition and we’re better positioned than our competition with our depth. 
 

That bye is just so critical so our TOR arms can go games 1-2 in the NLDS. It’s a huge advantage over the wild card team. 

[Jim French Stepstool]

1 hour ago, tmwiese55 said:

A lot of this discussion probably comes down to Woodruff and if can come back by end of June and generally pitch a normal workload to finish the year.   That helps them be able to shuffle guys up and down or with IL stints to take a break.    I'm with the person who is not planning on anything from Priester at this point.  Essentially, just saying adding Woodruff would be the equivalent of adding someone via trade.

I'd also throw out that Crow can be added to this mix of the guys sharing this workload going up and down. He looks legit to me and someone you can trust for starts

Agree with all.

Regarding Priester----yeah, it would be foolish to count on him in '26. At the same time, I'm reminded of Ashby in 2024. He was at almost a walk per inning at Nashville, just horrible numbers. I thought the braintrust was losing it when they brought him back to Milwaukee, but he was pretty damned good to finish the season. All I'm saying re Priester is nerve issues can be weird. Let's not pin hopes on him but at the same time let's let it play out.

[endaround]

I think this is a bigger issue that most realize.  The Brewers would have to really push some of their pitchers year over year inning increases to get to 150 innings in 2026.

Misiorowski pitched 99.1 innings between AAA and MLB last year.  Going to 150 would be a large increase and may have future ramifications in addition to tiring during this year.

Harrison pitched 111 innings between the minors and MLB last year. He pitched 124.1 in 2024. So while getting to 150 might be pushing it, he likely is OK.

Henderson pitched 103 innings last year, so even a healthy Henderson likely couldn't reach 150.

Gasser is older so likely less concern but he only pitched 42 innings last year.

Counting on anything from Woodruff is risky.

Sproat was at 140 innings last year which may explain why he is holding on to his rotation spot. With the hope he can find it again and provide some inning coverage.

Patrick pitched 162 innings between AA and MLB last year so it is strange they haven't given him a starting  role.

This is not just a rotation issue. Ashby of course is already at 50% of his innings of last year.

[Thurston Fluff]

2 hours ago, Trail said:

I hope so.  My concern is 3 or 4 of these guys get to the "we have to pare them back" stage at about the same time (probably early Sept?).  I'm sure the Brewers are well on top of this....but its still a little bit scary.  Good news I guess is they have plenty of solid relief options in AAA to absorb the extra innings the pen might have to carry.

In the meantime....I'm going to have to remember to not be too frustrated when Henderson or whomever is dominating over 5 or 6 innings and gets pulled!  Hopefully that's the plan...

Henderson going on the DL is going to help him with his workload. Patrick being in long relief also reduces his innings. The three major pitchers is Sprout, Harrison and Miz that we have to worry about. I think Sprout will either be optioned or put in the pen if he doesn't start to pick it up a bit soon. Which leaves us with Miz and Harrison. I think both will either see some inning reductions, a skipped start or two along with getting an extra day off here and there starting in June or July. It's also possible one or both have a small issue like Henderson did and the problem will cure itself.

 

BTW anyone else have problems not mixing up Henderson and Harrison's name or am I the only one? 

[sveumrules]

26 minutes ago, endaround said:

Misiorowski pitched 99.1 innings between AAA and MLB last year.  Going to 150 would be a large increase and may have future ramifications in addition to tiring during this year.

I'm seeing 63.1 IP at AAA, then 66 IP in MLB, plus another 12 IP in the postseason totaling 141.1 IP for Misio last year.

[TURBO]

All the young guys I'm sure will be watched closely by the Brewers staff, but I do think that Miz shouldn't be taking the ball every 5 days all season.  I think he needs to pitch on 6 days more frequently, but like I said, the staff is watching and keeping track, so all we can do is assume they have a handle on everything.

[sveumrules]

1 minute ago, TURBO said:

All the young guys I'm sure will be watched closely by the Brewers staff, but I do think that Miz shouldn't be taking the ball every 5 days all season.  I think he needs to pitch on 6 days more frequently, but like I said, the staff is watching and keeping track, so all we can do is assume they have a handle on everything.

Misio's game log on BRef has two starts on standard four days rest this year, seven starts with an extra fifth day of rest, and then two more on six days rest.

[endaround]

36 minutes ago, sveumrules said:

I'm seeing 63.1 IP at AAA, then 66 IP in MLB, plus another 12 IP in the postseason totaling 141.1 IP for Misio last year.

Somehow I read 63..1 as 33.1. So Miz should be fine with some minor reductions to save him a bit for the post season.

[RWeeksFan23]

2 hours ago, owbc said:

At least with the way things are trending right now we may have to battle the full 162 for a first round bye. 

I’m not terribly worried about it. Pitching over 162+postseason is often a war of attrition and we’re better positioned than our competition with our depth. 
 

That bye is just so critical so our TOR arms can go games 1-2 in the NLDS. It’s a huge advantage over the wild card team. 

yep. it's a shame because last year the ball bounced our way all season, getting that first round bye, and then just ran into the buzzsaw known as the dodgers.

[markedman5]

Brewers will manage the workload as needed to make sure the guys that need to pitch in October can pitch in October.

It might mean some interesting choices have to be made at times but in Hook and Henderson we should all trust.

[BruisedCrew]

The biggest challenge is going to be navigating the long stretches without off days, including the current one of 13 days and the one of 18 games in 17 days coming up before the All Star break. With only 2 reliable starters there will have to be some creative use of openers, piggybacking, and the Nashville shuttle to keep from overtaxing the staff.

Some more offense than they’ve gotten the last few weeks (last night notwithstanding) would help.

 

[Brian]

14 hours ago, Trail said:

yes, but Henderson is part of the issue.  Another "rookie" who's innings will have to be carefully managed.  

Yes but It all depends on how bad his back issues are.  Even in Nashville he was being pulled in the 4th or 5th inning.  He may be one of those guys that you cannot stretch out beyond 4 innings up here.  He's basically only a long reliever. 

[kestrel79]

Yep it would be nice to have a large group of starters healthy for that 18 game stretch next month before the all star break. There's another long one in there at the end of the season too I think. Pretty brutal schedule. Really could use Woody and Priester for those.