Miz guts it out vs. Blue Jays, pitches into 6th despite stomach illness

MILWAUKEE -- When Brewers athletic trainer Brad Epstein, pitching coach Chris Hook and manager Pat Murphy all approached Jacob Misiorowski on the mound in the fifth inning on Tuesday night, it wasn’t to check on an injury.

It was to see how Misiorowski was faring in terms of keeping his dinner down.

“He was sick,” Murphy said. “I thought he threw the ball great because there were times in the fifth and the sixth when he was throwing 95 mph, when he [normally] throws 101. But he was making pitches. He was really poised.”

So if anyone was wondering whether things could get worse for the Brewers -- who have lost six in a row after Tuesday’s particularly wrenching, 9-7 loss to the Blue Jays in 10 innings, with three of the top four hitters in Milwaukee’s projected starting lineup on the injured list and an All-Star closer clinging to his job -- the answer was yes, it could get worse.

“To be blunt, I thought I was going to throw up the whole game,” Misiorowski said. “I didn’t feel great.”

Was it in question whether he would be able to take the mound in the first place?

“I didn’t feel it until basically game time. It was full-go and we were doing it. We were going to make it work,” Misiorowski said. “It felt like a bullpen, almost. It felt like it was coming out nice and easy, and I could hit my spot. That was all working, thank God. It was, ‘Figure it out. Make it work,’ and help the team get in a good situation.”

The curveball was the worst, Misiorowski explained, because of the way it requires a pitcher to tuck and flex his abdominals during his delivery. Every time he did that, Misiorowski felt like he was about to get sick.

And yet he delivered 5 1/3 efficient innings on 76 pitches, burned only by solo home runs to Andrés Giménez in the fifth inning and former University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee star Daulton Varsho in the sixth. When Misiorowski yielded to DL Hall with one out in the sixth, and Hall stranded a runner, the Brewers had a 3-2 lead.

“He got through it,” Murphy said. “He was feeling awful. But he said, ‘I’ll stick in there.’”

Misiorowski said his stomach had somewhat settled by the end of the game, even if the result didn’t make anyone in the Milwaukee clubhouse feel good. The Brewers lost the lead behind Trevor Megill in a three-run top of the ninth, tied the game in the bottom of the inning and then lost the game when the Blue Jays scored three more times off Grant Anderson in the 10th.

“It’s a tough one to handle,” Murphy said. “That’s a pretty good team over there, too. They have a couple of injuries but not as extensive as we have. You just have to get through it, and you have to be strong, and you have to show them, ‘Look, we have 140-some games to go and we’re hurting right now, but the way we battled, that revealed our character.’”