Another Night, Another Notch of Difficulty Rising in Setting Brewers' Playoff Rotation

Over the last 30 days, the Brewers' starting pitching has see-sawed somewhat in terms of performance. Where both Colin Rea and Tobias Myers have seen some regression to the mean in their peripheral numbers (though Myers's numbers remain strong, and his stuff still looks lively), Aaron Civale and Frankie Montas have soared within the Brewers' pitching setup. They’ve altered their pitch mixes and usage significantly, and the results are hard to argue. Can a case be made for both to move up the pecking order when crunch time comes around?

Both Montas and Civale are using their arsenals very differently with the Brewers, compared with their times at the Reds and Rays, respectively. Frankie Montas is accentuating his three fastball variations to extreme levels and limiting the usage of his most hyped pitch, the splitter. Eighty percent of his pitches thrown are fastball variants, and the Brewers have managed to unlock an extra tick of velocity in each of the four-seamer, sinker and cutter.

Montas is also locating the fastballs differently. Whereas he was previously using them heavily in zone to set up a well-tunneled chase of his splitter, he’s now nibbling around the edges of the zone and giving hitters a lot of different looks--and earning more swings and misses as a result.

Civale has seen a similar transformation, leaning more heavily on his sinker in particular and increasing his overall fastball usage (again the four-seamer, sinker and cutter) from 62% to 69% while adding in a seventh pitch to his arsenal in the form of a short slider that tunnels better with his fastballs due to the later break on the pitch (For more info, Jack Stern covered it brilliantly here).

The biggest boost Civale has had is not so much in the swing-and-miss aspect, but in the types of contact he’s generating. Through a variety of pitches moving in different ways in an east-west profile of the strike zone, Civale’s seen a strong drop off in the number of line drives he was giving up with Tampa Bay, and a spike in ground balls and pop-ups:

The reason for the damage against him in Tampa Bay was from that incredibly low GB/FB ratio, which has trended upward of late--although it is still quite low.

Then you come to Colin Rea and Tobias Myers. Both have struggled recently. Rea's difficulties have been more apparent, but Myers has been grinding out starts with a lot of men on base. Some of the things he got away with against the Rockies during the last homestand won't work against better offenses. When you compare them over the last 30 days with Civale and Montas, the latter pair have done a better job in:

• Home runs allowed
• Average exit velocities
• WHIP (by a large margin)
• Sweet spot launch angles
• ERA

In the playoffs, the best route to success is the ability to limit home runs and baserunners. Constant traffic on the basepaths means one home run can hurt hard, and vice-versa: you can live with home runs if you limit the overall men on base.

Frankie Montas and Aaron Civale have done a great job in controlling their men on base. They’ve been better at controlling the long ball and letting the Brewers defense cover behind them. 

There’s also the question of workloads. Both Civale and Montas are MLB veterans who have pitched over 130 innings regularly; Montas actually pitched 187 innings in 2021. Myers is a rookie pitcher who is approaching his career high of innings, while being significantly more stressed due to the more advanced level. Rea is sitting at 154 innings having maxed out at 142 since 2020. 

Both of these arms have carried a lot of strain throughout the Brewers season as the glue that held the rotation together, but it would be entirely understandable if both were beginning to feel a little heavier in the arm as the regular season comes to a close. The experience of Montas and Civale in going through this may equip them to maintain their form through October more than Rea or Myers, and it’s yet another reason why they could push their way into the conversation.

Can you honestly say that, given the results over the last month, you would trust Rea and Myers more than Civale and Montas? Do their early-season heroics give them more standing as the Brewers approach the playoffs? I like to lean toward form and experience, but I think it’s a much larger conversation than most would care to admit at this point.

What do you think of the rotation composition in the playoffs? Are Civale and Montas edging out Rea and Myers? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!