I think the Brewers are now officially close enough to clinching a postseason berth — they can do so as soon as this weekend — that we can start talking about plans for the postseason without jinxing anything.
So, who is going to pitch? What is going to be the plan? I’m going to take a look first at the starting rotation, then the bullpen.
First: a quick reminder on postseason roster rules. Anyone who was either on the Brewers’ 40-man roster or their 60-day injured list as of September 1 (at 12 p.m.
ET, technically) is eligible for the postseason roster. Players who were in the minor league system but not on the 40-man roster on August 31 need to be injury replacements, and they need approval from the league, but are likely also postseason eligible (for example: the Dodgers are calling up Josue De Paula from Double-A today, and presumably the league would approve him for postseason eligibility because he’s replacing Shohei Ohtani on the active roster). The Brewers haven’t added anyone since September 1 (aside from minor leaguer Ben Moore, who will not be eligible), so they don’t have to worry about this. Rosters in the postseason are 26 players, and teams can replace players who are injured within a round with approval from the commissioner’s office (though the injured player then cannot return during that round).
The Starters
The Brewers would need four starters (with caveats about bullpen games) in both the NLDS and the NLCS; the schedule is such that in both series, the first four games happen within five days. There are two guys who we will unquestionably see start games this postseason: Jacob Misiorowski and Logan Henderson. After that, things get murky.
If we’re assuming that Brandon Sproat’s adventure on Wednesday night eliminated him from any real consideration for the rest of the season (he was optioned on Thursday morning), that means that there are four healthy players currently on the Brewers who could conceivably pitch in a postseason starting rotation. Here are those players’ numbers since the trade deadline on August 3:
- Dustin May: 6 games (all starts), 23 1/3 innings, 6.17 ERA, 5.20 FIP, 21 strikeouts, 10 walks
- Robert Gasser: 6 games (all starts except one injury replacement outing when he pitched 5 1/3 innings), 29 innings, 4.34 ERA, 4.20 FIP, 29 strikeouts, 13 walks
- Shane Drohan: 6 games (five starts), 26 1/3 innings, 6.15 ERA, 5.53 FIP, 26 strikeouts, 15 walks
- Kyle Harrison: 6 games (all starts), 27 innings, 5.67 ERA, 6.91 FIP, 33 strikeouts, 13 walks
When three of the four options for your number three starter have an ERA above 5.60, that’s not ideal. Harrison in particular doesn’t look like an option right at this moment — after he returned from about a month on the injured list in early August, he allowed just four earned runs in his first four starts back. In his last two, he’s been crushed: nine earned runs in 3 2/3 innings against the Cubs on August 31 and six runs (four earned) in 3 2/3 innings against the Reds on September 6. Even in his good outings earlier in August, he was routinely struggling with velocity and command.
The Brewers might like Drohan more as a multi-inning bullpen guy. As a starter this season, Drohan has allowed a .777 opponent OPS. His command is better. His WHIP is way better — 1.414 as a starter versus 0.975 as a reliever. He has a 4.83 ERA in 87 2/3 innings as a starter and a 1.69 ERA in 26 2/3 innings out of the bullpen. Drohan has been valuable as an innings-eating starter this season, but he’s pretty clearly more effective as a reliever.
May has been an enigma as a Brewer. His first two starts were excellent: he combined for 13 innings and three runs allowed. Then he gave up seven runs in two innings against the Mariners, took a line drive off his back on the first pitch in his next outing and left early, then had two shaky outings in which he couldn’t complete five innings against the Rangers and Reds, combining for eight innings and six runs allowed between them.
At times this season, May has looked like a guy who could start in the postseason, but right now, it doesn’t look that way. He has very little experience out of the bullpen, though: he’s only got 14 appearances out of the bullpen in his entire career, and 12 of those came in 2019 and 2020, when he was a brand-new major leaguer.
The last guy here is Gasser. His overall numbers this season are mediocre; he owns a 92 ERA+ and a FIP and ERA that are exactly the same (a pedestrian 4.43). But while his numbers since the trade deadline are overall not great (even if they’re better than any of these other options), he’s trending in the right direction. Over his last three outings, Gasser has a 2.51 ERA and 3.38 FIP in 14 1/3 innings, and as we reach the end of the season, his velocity is actually going up.
Based on the data we have here, Gasser is the one who has looked the best lately. Of course, we could see some shifts in how we feel about any of these guys between now and the end of the regular season. Right now, I’d expect Misiorowski and Henderson to be the one and two guys and Gasser and May as three and four, though with extremely short leashes on the latter two.
The Relievers
A big part of the reason why the Brewers can afford to be aggressive with their somewhat shaky back end of the rotation in the postseason is that they’ve got a lot of options, particularly amongst pitchers who could go more than an inning. As we saw during last year’s postseason, this type of reliever is critical in the way the game is played these days.
If we assume that Miz, Henderson, Gasser, and May all make the postseason roster, that leaves nine more openings for pitchers. Here’s who we’ve got as options:
- Trevor Megill and Abner Uribe are obvious no-brainers at the back of the bullpen.
- Aaron Ashby is also a no-brainer, and DL Hall has pitched well enough lately that he’s also moved into the “no-brainer” category. Both players could pitch two innings if you needed them to.
- Antonio Senzatela’s numbers haven’t been great since he came to the Brewers, but he seems certain to have a role in this bullpen in the postseason; if nothing else, he’s an extreme groundball pitcher who could be used in a spot where you really need a double play.
- JoJo Romero has only pitched five times for the Brewers, but he’s a veteran, and he’s been fine. I wouldn’t categorize him as “high-leverage,” but I think he’s got a spot.
- Chad Patrick was excellent out of the bullpen last postseason. He hasn’t been great this season, but he’s been fine, and I think he’s certain to be included.
That’s seven, and then we have to address the two guys who were chopped from the rotation. Drohan is almost certainly going to be in the bullpen if he’s not in the rotation. That leaves a question mark for Harrison. He could probably play a role out of the bullpen, but I think we need to see what happens with him between now and the end of the season — I could see him pitching well in a couple more starts and getting him back into the rotation conversation, or I could see him ending up on the injured list. Those two things seem about equally likely to me.
If it’s not Harrison, then we’ll have some question marks. Bryse Wilson is on the injured list, but even if he were healthy, ideally you don’t want to have a mop-up guy on your postseason roster. Grant Anderson has been part of the squad all year, but he’s on the injured list currently and hasn’t looked good lately. We’re likely to see a few options from Triple-A Nashville get cycled through between now and the end of the season, particularly in the wake of Sproat’s demotion on Thursday. Potential options could be a starter type, like Coleman Crow, Garrett Stallings, or Colton Gordon, who are all already on the 40-man roster, or a reliever. Potential options there:
- Why not Jared Koenig? Koenig is also on the 40-man roster already, and he’s been good for the Sounds, to the tune of a 2.50 ERA in 18 innings. But his velocity is still way down — his fastball has averaged just 92.8 mph in the minors this season, compared to 95.9 mph last season. Not a lot of faith that this would go well.
- Blake Holub, who has a 2.13 ERA in 50 2/3 innings out of the Nashville bullpen this season. He throws in the mid-90s and has some Brewers-y traits.
- Cameron Wagoner started the season at Double-A Biloxi and earned a promotion after he had a 2.03 ERA and 39 strikeouts in 26 2/3 innings. He’s been good at Triple-A, too: just one run allowed in 10 outings that cover 11 1/3 innings, though his peripherals have taken a bit of a step back. Wagoner can reach the upper 90s, and he’s good at limiting walks, which is certainly a plus.
- There could be a surprise, like Rob Zastryzny, who has been hurt all year but is currently on a rehab assignment with the Sounds.
If Holub or Wagoner were to be the option, the Brewers would have to get permission from the league (at least as far as I understand the rule) to include them on the postseason roster, since they weren’t on the 40-man on September 1. Zastryzny would require a 40-man slot — and I believe they could just leave him on the 60-day IL until the end of the season if they choose not to activate him, because he didn’t start his rehab assignment until there were fewer than 30 days (the maximum allowed for a rehab assignment) remaining in the season.
Guesses
This will probably change before the end of the season, whether that’s because some pitcher who has been poor shows us something or because someone gets hurt. But here’s my best mid-September guess at what the postseason pitching staff will look like:
Starters (4): Jacob Misiorowski, Logan Henderson, Robert Gasser, Dustin May
High-Leverage Relievers (4): Trevor Megill, Abner Uribe, Aaron Ashby, DL Hall
Middle Relievers (2): Antonio Senzatela, JoJo Romero
Long Relievers (3): Shane Drohan, Chad Patrick, Kyle Harrison
I’d also expect the hooks to be exceptionally quick for Gasser and May, with those games looking almost like bullpen games, just with a starting pitcher at the beginning. I’m thinking three-ish innings for each.
I’m least confident about the Gasser/May/Harrison situation. Harrison and May in their last couple of outings have looked essentially unusable in a postseason situation, but it seems likely that at least one of them will need to make a start or two for the Brewers this postseason. That’s the biggest spot to keep an eye on for me.
If one or both looks unplayable, then my attention turns to the likely revolving door of relievers (in the Sproat roster spot) that we’re likely to see over the next couple of weeks. Might one of those guys be able to make a big postseason impact?
What do you think?
