With Milwaukee closing in on the division title, let’s take a look at who might pitch in the playoffs
We’ve reached a point in the season where I feel like I can say this, with confidence, without fear of something wild and terrible happening: the Brewers are going to make the playoffs. They are going to win the National League Central. Who they will play is anyone’s guess: the Diamondbacks, Padres, Mets, and Braves are all within three games of each other, vying for three Wild Card spots; the team who finishes third in that bunch (the Mets, if the season ended today) will almost certainly travel to Milwaukee for the Wild Card matchup.
For the purposes of today, I don’t care who they end up playing, but I’m going to envision what the Brewers’ hypothetical pitching strategy might look like in a best-of-three series and, to a lesser degree, further into the playoffs. This discussion is especially odd for the Brewers; there are so many names in this discussion who weren’t even on the radar in March. We knew that Corbin Burnes was gone and Brandon Woodruff was out. We did not know that Wade Miley would pitch seven total innings, then get ably replaced by Robert Gasser, who would then also have season-ending surgery. Aaron Civale and Frankie Montas weren’t on the team. Most of us had never thought about Tobias Myers. Half of the bullpen was fringe relievers who were basically afterthoughts in spring training. A lot has changed.
But now, on the eve of the postseason, let’s ponder the questions: What might Milwaukee’s rotation look like in the playoffs? What should it look like? I’ll examine those questions, I’ll project who I think will be used, and I’ll discuss who I hope isn’t used.
Who is definitely going to start?
The Brewers will play, at minimum, two games in the 2024 postseason. We obviously hope it will be more than that, but we know that they’ll be lining up their two best options for those first two games. I think it’s pretty clear who that’s going to be: Freddy Peralta and Tobias Myers.
Neither is perfect. Peralta has had a frustratingly inconsistent year, plagued by inefficiency and the nagging feeling that he should just be doing a bit better. Still, of the starting options the Brewers have, Peralta has the best stuff and the best game-to-game potential. Stuff matters in the postseason when the best hitters in the league are fully locked in for every pitch. Milwaukee has the benefit of an excellent defense, but when you’re facing the best hitters, you want some strikeouts, and despite Peralta’s faults this season, he’s still in the top 15% of the league in whiff percentage and roughly in the top quarter in strikeout percentage, even after a late-season strikeout swoon.
Myers has a sort of scary Statcast page, and not in a good way. His chase percentage and K percentage are mediocre. He’s only in the 17th percentile in whiff percentage. He’s fine at limiting walks, but not great. He gives up a lot of hard-hit balls and a lot of fly balls. All of this feels like a recipe for trouble. And yet: he has a 2.93 ERA on the season. His 144 ERA+ would be fifth among starting pitchers if he’d thrown enough innings to qualify. He’s gotten results.
The combination of his underwhelming Statcast profile and an ERA that outpaces his FIP by more than a run means that, at any moment, Myers could turn into a proverbial pumpkin. But he’s looked the part thus far, and maybe there are still a few more dances in him before the clock strikes midnight.
Who is definitely going to pitch out of the bullpen?
Devin Williams and Trevor Megill are the obvious high-leverage options. Who comes next is a harder question than I thought it would be.
Joel Payamps has looked much better of late and seems to be Pat Murphy’s number-three guy at the moment. My guess is that if the Brewers got to the seventh inning with a lead, they’d go Payamps-Megill-Williams to finish the game. Since the beginning of August, Payamps has allowed just two earned runs in 14 1/3 innings (1.26 ERA) and he’s had solid if not overwhelming strikeout numbers. He had his struggles for the first three months, but since the beginning of July, his ERA has dropped by more than a run.
Who is this bullpen’s lefty? The Brewers appear to have lost confidence in Bryan Hudson, who was unhittable for three months but has a 3.93 ERA and 6.45 FIP since the start of July—he’s not even on the major league roster entering the final few weeks of the season. Jared Koenig has had a good year and would seem a good bet to get some postseason work, but he’s also been less sharp lately, with four runs (three earned) in his last five outings—only two of those five outings were scoreless. It’s definitely possible that the first choice here is now Aaron Ashby, who hasn’t allowed a run since returning to the majors on August 25. In that time, he has 13 strikeouts to just two walks in 11 innings. Ashby actually has reverse splits against lefties in the majors this year and he’s close to even in the minors, but the samples are so small with him as a reliever I’m not putting a lot of stock in that.
I’m confident we’ll see DL Hall, but I’ll get to him in a minute.
Who is going to be the number three starter?
Except in a worst-case scenario (another two-game sweep), the Brewers will need a third starter. Ideally, they won’t need that player until the third game of the division series. For most of the season, I’d have told you that Colin Rea was that guy. I think there’s some uncertainty here, but I no longer think that will be the case. Even ignoring the shellacking the Giants laid on Rea on Wednesday, he’d been trending in the wrong direction. While his results haven’t been terrible by any means, he had three shaky outings in August (around two excellent ones) and he was inefficient in his Sept. 4 start against St. Louis. Like Myers, Rea’s Statcast page is scary; unlike Myers, it looks like the results are starting to catch up to those bad underlying numbers.
The other factor here is that the two pitchers the Brewers acquired during trade season, Aaron Civale and Frankie Montas, are both pitching well of late. The hard-throwing Montas doesn’t seem to have a whole lot going for him other than solid velocity, but his overall numbers as a Brewer are quite good: since the trade, he has a 3.92 ERA and 3.59 FIP and he’s striking out nearly 10 batters per nine innings.* Civale has an even better 3.84 ERA as a Brewer (in a larger sample), and while his FIP (4.69) isn’t nearly as good as Montas’, he is trending upward: over his last six starts, Civale has a 2.67 ERA (and 3.95 FIP) in 33 2⁄3 innings, and he hasn’t allowed more than three runs in a start since August 3.
*Note that this was written before Montas threw six shutout innings with eight strikeouts on Thursday night. The author’s feelings about Montas have only gotten stronger.
Either is probably a better option than Rea at this point. Statcast doesn’t like any of these pitchers a whole lot, but it prefers both Montas and Civale to Rea. Whoever starts that hypothetical third game, I expect them to have an extremely short leash (and I’d apply that to Myers, as well); at the first sign of trouble, they’re probably out of there. That said, of these three pitchers, Montas has by far the best results of the three for the first time through the order:
Opponent OPS, first time through batting order:
Civale: .699
Montas: .584
Rea: .827
Given Montas’s ability to get through the order once, I’d probably default to him as a starter, let him go until things look just a little bit shaky, and hope he doesn’t allow any homers. At the first sign of trouble, switch it up. To who?
What is the long relief hierarchy?
Relievers that can go multiple innings can be a major asset in the postseason when starts typically shorten even more. The ideal of this type of modern postseason reliever is the Andrew Miller model; if you recall, Miller went on a fantastic run during the 2016 postseason, when he threw four scoreless innings over two outings in the ALDS and then 7 2/3 scoreless innings across four appearances in the ALCS for Cleveland.
I wouldn’t necessarily say that the Brewers have a Miller or Wade Davis in their pocket this season, but the answer to the question of “who might pitch multiple innings out of the Brewer bullpen” seems certain to be DL Hall. He’s looked good in general since rejoining the team on August 11 (including one excellent start), but his last two outings—which were both very good—have been out of the bullpen. My strong suspicion is that in game two of the playoffs, no matter the outcome of game one, Hall will be ready to piggyback on the starter (probably Myers). If Myers is able to go deep into the game, then you can sit on Hall and keep him ready to enter immediately in game three, if necessary.
But let’s say Hall gets used in game two and the Brewers are in a 1-1 series after two games. Who is the “piggyback” option in game three? Whichever pitchers mentioned in the previous section don’t start that game are certainly candidates, and in this case I’d prefer Civale given Rea’s pretty rough numbers the first time through (which, I understand, are inflated from Wednesday’s rough outing). But there could be another option.
Joe Ross began the season starting, and he was okay, but he wasn’t great. He missed a bunch of time, came back, and started a couple of games, but as the team got healthy he was shifted to a bullpen role. Since joining the bullpen on a full-time basis on August 6, Ross has been excellent: he’s allowed just one run in 18 innings (a 0.50 ERA) and has a FIP of 2.06. He’s pitched multiple innings in seven of his nine outings in that span. Comparing Ross to the trio of potential game-three starters above, he’s allowed just a .600 OPS on his first time through the batting order, better than Civale and Rea. If the Brewers need a long reliever and Hall isn’t available, I think Ross would be my guy. I know he hasn’t been pitching in the most pressurized situations, but his stuff seems well-suited to this role.
I get the feeling that Hall could be the barometer of this team’s postseason success. If he has a big postseason, I think the Brewers will find success. If he’s bad, I think they’re in trouble.
Are there any surprises in store?
It doesn’t seem like the Brewers have any intention of promoting either of the very intriguing relief options currently at Triple-A Nashville: Jacob Misiorowski and Craig Yoho. With Hoby Milner and Elvis Peguero struggling (Peguero was optioned Thursday, but not for either of these guys; he was replaced on the roster by Enoli Paredes), you would think it would be a golden opportunity to get these guys some big-league reps. They haven’t been given that chance, and I don’t see a scenario where either is allowed to pitch against major league hitters in the playoffs without ever having done it before.
It’s a shame. Misiorowski can have control problems, but he’s got electric stuff, and since moving into a relief role for the Sounds he’s got a 2.31 ERA and .380 opponent OPS with 14 strikeouts in 11 2⁄3 innings. Yoho has been unhittable all season, using a dominant changeup to post an ERA of 1.50 or lower at three different levels of the minor leagues (0.44 with 37 strikeouts in 20 1⁄3 innings at High-A, 1.17 with 46 strikeouts in 23 innings and Double-A, and 1.50 with 16 strikeouts in 12 innings at Triple-A).
It certainly feels like the upside of having one (or both) of these pitchers on the postseason roster is far better than the upside of carrying Milner, Peguero, Paredes, or that fifth starter, who, barring extra innings, probably wouldn’t pitch in the opening series even if they’re on the roster. But time is running out to get either Miz or Yoho reps at the major-league level, and with each day that passes, I’m more pessimistic that either will get a look.
Where does that leave us?
In last year’s Wild Card round, the Brewers carried 15 position players and 11 pitchers. Subsequent rounds would no doubt have a different ratio, but if you’re going to take 11 pitchers into round one, here’s what I would do:
Starters: Peralta, Myers, and Montas
Long relievers (ready to piggyback): Hall and Ross
Lefties: Koenig and Ashby
7th inning: Payamps
8th inning: Megill
9th inning: Williams
That’s 10, so you assume that leaves one spot remaining for one of Civale, Rea, Paredes, Milner, and Nick Mears (who is injured right now). Of that group, I’d probably choose Civale, though I really would prefer one of the Triple-A guys in that spot, probably Yoho. And if one of those guys looked good, I’d be open to the idea of either taking some of Payamps’ opportunities. But I don’t think we’re going to find out if they can do it.
Conclusion
I feel okay about that group. None of the starters gives you a ton of confidence, but the bullpen is in decent shape, and it feels like there are a lot of ways you could Frankenstein a night together with four or five pitchers. That becomes more difficult the deeper into the playoffs you go, but it’s certainly doable.
And hey, having starters you don’t trust could ultimately be a good thing, as I don’t think there’s anyone on this staff that’s going to create a Grady Little/Pedro Martínez situation. Quick hooks, lots of guys, keep the opposing team off balance. It! Could! Work!