Is Milwaukee’s Pattern Of Pitching Development Sustainable?

I recently examined Milwaukee’s pitching staff and how, despite their strong numbers, there was a lack of intrinsic “stuff.” In a similar vein, I wrote another article in the middle of last season discussing the surprising number of pitchers on the team with a big difference between their FIPs and ERAs and whether that meant the team’s success was more fantasy than reality. 

Both are unique characteristics of the Brewers that seem to contradict much of what we know about modern-day analytics. Still, it’s also a testament to the sheer complexity of baseball. Ultimately, it leads to the broader question of whether the team can maintain their pitching productivity while still going against the grain.

To their credit, it’s not like they’re intentionally seeking out players with funky arm slots and awkward deliveries over those who can throw hard and spin the ball well. Instead, they do better than most teams by working with what they have. Every pitcher has a unique arsenal, mechanics, delivery, and skillset. Rather than over-indexing on those with apparent qualities, Milwaukee has been excellent at maximizing a pitcher’s strengths rather than trying to fit a square peg into a Wisconsin-shaped hole. 

Take Bryse Wilson, for example. After being drafted by the Braves in 2016, he made his big-league debut in 2018 and spent the next five seasons as a struggling starter with a 5.54 ERA over 43 starts. After arriving in Milwaukee, he became a long reliever, using his above-average durability but minimizing the downsides of his relatively shallow arsenal. In 2023, he posted a 2.58 ERA over 76 ⅔ innings and was an outstanding bullpen piece. He regressed to a 4.04 ERA in 2024 after he was slotted into the rotation to fill an injury gap. When entering the game in relief, he still had a perfectly serviceable 3.75 ERA.

Colin Rea is another instance of this development practice. Before 2023, he had bounced around between several MLB and NPB organizations, never throwing more than 115 innings in a full season outside the minors. When he was signed and tasked with holding down the back of the rotation, he leaned more heavily on a sinker/cutter duo over a traditional four-seam fastball. Also, he introduced a sweeper as his main breaking ball offering. By remaining tricksy and relying on command, his lack of velocity and physics-defying movement didn’t prevent him from being a full-time big-league starter.

At the same time, Milwaukee has also had its fair share of obviously talented arms in recent years. Corbin Burnes, Devin Williams, and Josh Hader were homegrown talents (yes, Hader technically was drafted by the Orioles and traded to the Astros, but you get my point) who were highly sought-after by many teams. But an organization can’t depend on exceptional pitching talent to consistently fall into their laps. Especially with the increased prevalence of arm injuries and the Brewers’ dislike of long-term contracts worth hundreds of millions of dollars, it would be impossible for the organization to simply draft or buy their way to consistent success on the mound. 

As much as people may try, it will likely never be possible to define the caliber of a baseball player solely by a number or set of numbers, especially if those numbers simply measure one aspect of what is inherently a multidimensional game. Even with fine-tuning and multiple iterations, statistics like Stuff+, FIP, and WAR do not capture all a given pitcher can do. It’s true that the game is generally skewing more towards superhuman velocity and spin rates, but don’t be fooled by all the bells and whistles. A pitcher’s job is to get outs; whether they do that by throwing gas or just being a little mischievous doesn’t matter much at the end of the day. Thus far, Milwaukee has done a bang-up job of finding the best use for each of their arms, and there doesn’t seem to be a lot of reason they can’t keep it up for the foreseeable future.