BALTIMORE – No, there was nothing wrong with National League Cy Young Award frontrunner Jacob Misiorowski when he departed Sunday’s start against the Orioles after three innings.
It was all part of the Brewers’ plan to bring their 24-year–old ace in for a safe landing at the end of the club’s record-setting regular season.
Jackson Chourio became the first player in Major League history to secure a third 20-20 season before his 23rd birthday and rookie shortstop Cooper Pratt hit a pair of run-scoring singles in the Brewers’ 3-0 win at Camden Yards, completing a three-game sweep and giving Milwaukee (98-58) a new franchise record for victories with six games still to go.
There are still big games ahead. With one more victory or a Braves loss, the Brewers would clinch a first-round bye in the postseason. With two more victories, the Brewers would secure the first 100-win season for an NL Central team since the 2016 Cubs.
It started with Misiorowski, whose 44-pitch outing was designed to be short, manager Pat Murphy said before the game, as a way to provide the right-hander a bit of a breather before what is expected to be a more normal outing in his regular-season finale against the Cardinals next weekend. The Brewers have employed a similar strategy in Spring Training, tapering starts late in camp before ramping back up once the regular season begins.
“They understand. They’re in on it,” Murphy said. “You don’t give them a finite number, you just tell them, ‘Hey, it’s going to be shorter.’”
For Misiorowski, this regular season has been a memorable one. He leads the Majors in ERA (1.86), strikeouts (247), WHIP (0.80) and opponents’ average (.159) after throwing 44 pitches in his three scoreless innings against the Orioles, allowing one hit and no walks with four strikeouts.
With his first strikeout on Sunday night, Misiorowski pushed past Corbin Burns in 2021 for second place on the Brewers’ single-season leaderboard. The club record belongs to Ben Sheets, who struck out 264 batters in 2004.
Misiorowski has thrown 169 1/3 innings this season, 28 more than he threw last season between Triple-A Nashville and the Brewers in the regular season and the postseason. The Brewers have been mindful of his workload all the way back to May and June, when he separated himself from the NL’s pack with a series of electric starts in which Misiorowski set standards for velocity for a starting pitcher.
The Brewers went into Sunday night needing two victories or Braves losses to clinch a first-round bye, which would line up Misiorowski’s first postseason start for Game 1 of the National League Division Series on Saturday, Oct. 3 at American Family Field.