Brewers Minor League Starting Pitcher of the Month: May 2024

Not quite as strong a month as it was in April for the starters, but there were still quite a few candidates for this month's top five. We will begin, as always, with a few honorable mentions.

Honorable Mentions:

RHP - Hayden Robinson - ACL Brewers - 5 G, 3 GS, 15.1 IP, 0-0, 2.93 ERA, 3.94 FIP, 1.30 WHIP, 13 H , 7 BB, 21 K.

RHP -  Carlos F Rodriguez - Nashville Sounds - 5 G, 5 GS, 29.2 IP, 3-1, 3.03 ERA, 4.52 FIP, 1.18 WHIP, 21 H , 7 BB, 33 K.

RHP - Melvin Hernandez - ACL Brewers - 4 G, 2 GS, 13.2 IP, 0-0, 3.29 ERA, 3.60 FIP, 1.24 WHIP, 14 H , 3 BB, 18 K.

TOP 5 STARTING PITCHERS FOR MAY

#5 RHP - Jacob Misiorowski - Biloxi Shuckers - 5 G, 5 GS, 21.0 IP, 0-1, 1.71 ERA, 3.56 FIP, 1.67 WHIP, 17 H, 18 BB, 26 K.

The Brewers' second-round selection in the 2022 draft has one of the highest ceilings in all of baseball. A Junior College standout from Crowder College in Missouri, Misiorowski is a freak athlete on the mound, with long levers and a blazing fastball. Those traits have carried him into the top 50 on pretty much every publication's Top 100 lists. In May, Misiorowski showed the ceiling, and also some of the concerns with his profile.

Sporting a fastball that reaches triple digits, but sits in the 96-98 range the majority of the time, Misiorowski’s fastball is about more than just the velocity. At 6’7 he generates up to 7’6” of extension. For reference, Bryan Hudson is averaging 7’4” of extension and ranks in the 98th percentile. He also throws the fastball from an extremely low release height for somebody as tall as him, which also helps the fastball play up. His slider has been seen as his best secondary offering, and it is a very good pitch, sitting in the low-90s and misses a lot of bats. His mid-80s curveball made a huge leap in 2023. It has late drop, with above-average sweep, and hitters take it for a lot of strikes because of how tough it is to pick up. It probably surpassed the slider as the best secondary. Both of them have shown signs of being plus pitches.

In May, Misiorowski used his pure stuff to allow him to work around having nearly a walk rate of 18.8%. Some of his stuff is so filthy that umpires struggle with calling strikes on borderline pitches, but he did also have quite a few misses that were uncompetitive. The reason he was able to get through these starts with such a strong ERA, despite all the baserunners, was his ability to generate swing and miss. His whiff rate of 36.2% was 10th in Double-A for pitchers with at least 15 innings pitched in May (per TruMedia).

Misiorowski’s pure stuff is ready for MLB innings, but as he showed in May, the command still has a ways to go. He would likely be able to work around the command issues in a bullpen role, but if the plan is to continue starting he may be more than a year away from big league starts still. Either way, there are not many arms as talented as his and one way or another he will likely make a positive impact for the Brewers in the coming years.

#4 RHP - Chad Patrick - Nashville Sounds - 5 G, 5 GS, 29.1 IP, 3-1, 2.15 ERA, 3.74 FIP, 1.23 WHIP, 25 H, 11 BB, 31 K.
Unranked by all publications

Patrick was acquired this past offseason in a one-for-one trade that saw Abraham Toro go to the Oakland Athletics. He had been traded from Arizona to Oakland in exchange for Old Friend Jace Peterson this past trade deadline. At 25 years old and without any true standout pitches, the trade felt like a bit of a flier at the time. Patrick’s performance so far this season has shown that there might be more than what originally met the eye.

Patrick’s primary pitch is a cutter in the 86-89 range, a pitch that gets more swing and miss than most cutters do. He had a whiff rate of 29% on the cutter in May, while using it 35% of the time. His four seam fastball was used around 30% of the time, and while the average velocity on it is only around 92-93 he was able to get whiffs on 39% of the swings against it in May. He does this with a low release slot and a -4.4 Vertical Approach Angle that helps the fastball play well up in the zone or above. He also throws a changeup in the mid-80s, a low 90’s sinker and a low 80’s slider in for a five pitch mix. 

For the month, Patrick was causing hitters to swing and miss at a very high rate on a per-pitch basis, with a swinging strike rate of 14.3%, which placed him in the 90th percentile for Triple-A pitchers with at least 15 innings. His walk numbers were more reasonable than some of the other pitchers that made this list, but he did struggle a bit with the extra base hit, as he allowed six doubles, two triples and two home runs. His pitch qualities will likely always lead to the ball being elevated, so he will always need to miss some bats to help combat the damage that he will inevitably run into at times. In May he did exactly that.

Given the Brewers lack of healthy starting depth at the moment, Patrick seems to have moved himself into consideration to get an opportunity, if another starter underperforms or is injured. 

#3 LHP - Tate Kuehner - Wisconsin Timber Rattlers - 4 G, 3 GS, 17 IP, 2-0, 1.59 ERA, 3.65 FIP, 1.24 WHIP, 11 H, 10 BB, 21 K.
Unranked by all publications

The Brewers 7th round selection in 2023 out of Louisville, Kuehner was used in a swing man role by the Cardinals his senior year. He only threw three innings at the Complex League level last year after being drafted, but began the 2024 season with High-A Appleton where he has continued that swing man role, but in a more consistent starter role. Five of his eight appearances have come in a starting role and three of four in May.

Kuehner was sitting in the upper-80’s as a junior in college, but made a jump into the 92-95 range as a senior, which is where he is at now. He throws from a very low slot, and started generating more run on the pitch his senior year. That slot allows the pitch to play well up in the zone due to the Vertical Approach Angle, and also to play down, because of the run. His best secondary offering is his low-80s sweeper, which has a lot of sweep, but also quite a bit of vertical drop and is his best swing and miss pitch. He mixes in a changeup as well, which appears to be in a better spot than where it was at Louisville, where he struggled to land any of his secondaries for strikes.

In May he posted a whiff rate of 34%, placing him in the 87th percentile for High-A pitchers with at least 15 innings pitched. His 30.9% strikeout rate placed him in the 83rd percentile. He didn’t generate ground balls at the same level as he had in April, but he did still do a good job of limiting the extra base hits, allowing one home run and one double. Not unlike a lot of the pitchers on this list, the one knock on his month would fall in the “too many walks” category. His 14.7% walk rate was in the 8th percentile. However, he was able to work around those issues to have strong surface level results and find his way onto this list.

Kuehner is 23 years old, so he’s certainly a candidate to see Double-A at some point this year, though it might behoove the Brewers to allow him to continue to work through some of his walk issues at the lower level in Appleton.

#2 RHP - Shane Smith - Biloxi Shuckers - 6 G, 3 GS, 22 IP, 1-1, 2.86 ERA, 1.50 FIP, 1.09 WHIP, 18 H , 6 BB, 29 K, 1 SV

An undrafted free agent that was signed out of Wake Forest following the 2021 MLB Draft, Smith seems to have been a great find by the Brewers scouting department. The Demon Deacons closer in the COVID-shortened 2020 season, Smith had grabbed hold of a starting spot in 2021 before he suffered a season ending UCL injury after only two starts. His loss in this case appears to have been the Brewers gain. Smith only threw three innings in 2022 as he was rehabbing from the Tommy John surgery he had undergone while at Wake Forest. 

With a fastball that sits in the 94-95 range, reaching as high as 97, Smith has been able to hold that type of velocity even as he throws more pitches and more innings. His low-80’s curveball has fantastic characteristics as well, with a shape and velocity reminiscent of Sonny Gray’s curveball. He also throws a slider less often than the curve, in the mid-80’s. It’s a shorter slider that has very little horizontal movement, but late, sharp vertical movement.

In 2023, he flew through the system, in a strictly relief role, going from Low-A Carolina and making it all the way to AA Biloxi, which is where he began this year as well. In April he had still been in a strict relief role. However when May began, he was starting to stretch those relief appearances out. His first three outings were of three innings apiece. At that point he began making starts, and his final three outings were in a starting role.

In those three starts, Smith posted a 2.84 ERA with 15 strikeouts in 13 innings. Smith generated a 31% whiff rate in May which put him in the 76th percentile for Double-A pitchers with at least 15 innings. His called strike rate of 37.5% placed him in the 97th percentile, and is largely carried by his ability to command his fastball, as well as to drop his curveball in at the bottom of the zone. His overall strikeout rate of 33.3% for the month also placed in the 97th percentile. His ability to strike hitters out, while also limiting walks and not allowing any home runs helped contribute to the FIP that checked in over a run lower than his ERA for the month.

Smith’s move to the rotation is extremely interesting. He had the appearance of a reliever who could potentially impact the Brewers this season, but he would obviously carry more potential value if he can stick as a mid-rotation type of starter. Either way, one has to wonder if a promotion to AAA Nashville is on the horizon, and whether this is an arm we still might see in Milwaukee this season.

#1 RHP – Alexander Cornielle – Wisconsin Timber Rattlers - 4 G, 4 GS, 23.2 IP, 2-0, 0.76 ERA, 3.63 FIP, 0.89 WHIP, 10 H, 11 BB, 19 K.
Unranked by all publications

Cornielle was signed by the Brewers in the 2019 International signing class and at first was moving quickly through the system, making it all the way to High-A in 2022. He spent all of 2023 back with the Timber Rattlers and returned there again this season. After a slow start in April, Cornielle had a very strong May to take the top spot in this month’s article.

For the past couple of seasons, he has been sitting in the 89-92 range on his four seam fastball. Cornielle mentioned in an interview with Brewer Fanatic’s Seth Stohs that one of the reasons for his successful May was a slight uptick in his velocity due to a more enhanced focus on his throwing program and with the help of his pitching coach to smooth out some of his mechanics. 

He touched 95 MPH multiple times in May, something we had not seen much (or possibly any) of in the past, and it was sitting more 92-93, rather than 89-92. The fastball plays well at the top of the zone, and appears to get a good amount of ride. His cutter usually sits in the mid 80’s but was touching 88-89 at times in May. He rounds out his repertoire with a low-80’s slider/sweeper and a changeup in the upper 80’s as well. In the aforementioned interview, Cornielle also mentioned that he used his entire pitch mix more often in May, and believes that helped contribute to his success as well. 

Beginning the month with 20 consecutive scoreless innings, Cornielle did not allow a run until the third inning of his final start on May 26th. In his first three starts he went six, seven and five scoreless. He struck out six, seven and four in those starts, respectively. 

The only real blemish on the month for Cornielle was the number of walks. His 12.1% walk rate for the month is higher than you would hope for it to be, but even with that number he did such a fantastic job limiting base hits that his WHIP was still only 0.89.  He wasn’t generating a lot of swing and miss, but he did a fantastic job limiting hard contact. For the month he only allowed three extra base hits, all of which were doubles. Courtesy of TruMedia, Cornielle’s 0.79 ERA ranked seventh in all of High-A for the month of May (min. 15 IP).

Cornielle will be Rule 5 eligible this offseason, and if he continues to perform anywhere close to what he showed in May, he could be a candidate for a promotion to Double-A at some point.

Please share your opinions! Who should have made it that didn’t? Who made it, but should not have?

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