Jacob Misiorowski's Mystifying Stuff Was on Full Display Tuesday—for Good and Ill

The center-field camera angle at the spring training home of the Cincinnati Reds and Cleveland Guardians is awful. It's not even really a center-field camera; it's from the vantage of a center fielder only if they've charged far into the gap in left-center to collect a double. That was one disappointing aspect of getting an otherwise exciting glimpse of Jacob Misiorowski in a sustained appearance against (basically) the starting lineup of the defending AL Central champions. Another was that, perhaps as vexed as the rest of us by the skew of that particular camera, the Statcast system there is in shoddy shape, yielding at least as many unread pitches and contact events as valid numbers. 

Still, it was a lot of fun to watch Misiorowski go after Steven Kwan and Carlos Santana, two of the most quintessentially professional hitters in the game, to lead off the bottom of the first. He got a pop-up from Kwan and then struck out Santana, thanks to a 99-mph fastball with such deceptive run that the grizzled veteran gave up on it, thinking it would be inside, only to have it slice off the inside edge of the zone. Santana was so sure he'd read the pitch right that he asked for a review from the automated ball-strike system, and he lost it, anyway. The day could not have started better.

And then it could not have gone worse. Misiorowski walked the next three batters, then allowed a two-run single to spoil the fun, before limping out of the inning with a ground ball for the third out. There were a couple of close calls—including another pitch that prompted a review, this time resulting in a ball, whenm he threw another upper-90s heater that held its plane and skimmed just over the top of the robo-zone. Overall, though, he looked as he too often has, even during his thrilling ascent through the Brewers system: like a guy who's just not going to throw enough strikes to start.

He couldn't land his breaking ball in the zone, except as a ball-to-strike offering that needs to be held in reserve as a surprise pitch. He couldn't consistently hit his targets on the third-base edge of the plate, where most right-handed pitchers are more comfortable throwing their heaters; his unique combination of arm slot and release angle stumps even him sometimes.

There's still time for Misiorowski to mature and hone his arsenal, but the lack of a third true plus pitch and the markedly subpar control are starting to scream "reliever". On the surface, the Brewers have little reason to get antsy and call him up imminently to serve in that role, but his stuff is so electric that wasting any more of his bullets in the minors (where he proved even last year that opposing batters are overmatched, even as he also walked a busload of them) seems ill-advised. By midseason, it just feels like the right move will be to have Misiorowski slide to the bullpen and make his mark on the Brewers' playoff push from there.

That his fastball, on its own, can have batters, umpires and computers scratching their heads all within a single inning is a testament to the intensity of Misiorowski's stuff. The walks just don't look like they'll abate any time soon, though. You'll often see his 14.4% walk rate from last season cited as evidence of that, but alas: that undersells the problem. Misiorowski also hit 13 batters, all in under 100 innings, so his plunks-adjusted free pass rate for the season was an untenable 17.5%. He was guilty of 15 wild pitches, too, and even if a better, MLB-caliber catcher might spare him one or two, that rate is also much too high.

In other words, Misiorowski has a long way to go in refining his control, yet. Not even a reliever can live the way he did last year, against the best hitters on Earth. He learned that the hard way, although in a nice, soft setting, Tuesday. When he matriculates to the majors, it's probably going to be as a reliever. Before even that can happen, though, he has to find a way to corral all that extraordinary talent and get the ball over the plate more often—preferably, where the umpires can see it but the hitters can't.