HOUSTON – Ho-hum.
That’s basically the vibe Jacob Misiorowski was giving off to reporters as he contemplated his latest start – one in which he shut out the Houston Astros over seven innings, with a fourth-inning home run by Jake Bauers providing the winning margin in a 2-0 victory at Daikin Park on Sunday afternoon, May 31.
Misiorowski hit triple digits 38 times with his fastball, dotting in a couple 103s and eight 102s along the way. He allowed only three hits, didn’t issue a walk and struck out eight.
But it seemed rather, well, workmanlike with only 54 of his 88 pitches going for strikes as Misiorowski battled with the mound conditions and a game plan that was revamped mid-game once the Astros began having more consistent success against his hard stuff.
“All right,” was Misiorowski’s initial summation. “I don’t think it was my best stuff.
“But it’ll work.”
Misiorowski wasn’t messing around early as every one of his first 24 pitches were 100 mph or faster, with his first-inning matchup with hulking Yordan Alvarez must-see TV. Misiorowski won that battle easily with a three-pitch strikeout, including his first offering going for a game-high 103.1.
Isaac Paredes was the lone Houston hitter to make solid contact over that stretch when he squared up a 100.7-mph fastball to left-center on which Bauers came out of nowhere to stab with a diving grab.
“I honestly thought he teleported to that ball in left field,” said Misiorowski. “I thought it was going to get down and he caught it.
“It was an insane catch.”
The third inning was where things got a little dicey for the Brewers’ wunderkind as Jake Meyers greeted Misiorowski with a single. Two outs later Jeremy Peña singled, then Misiorowski clipped Alvarez in the back foot with a curveball to load the bases.
That brought the dangerous Christian Walker to the plate, but some 102.7-mph heat on Misiorowski’s second pitch induced a groundout, snuffing out the only threat Houston would ultimately pose on the day.
After Andrew Vaughn singled and Bauers homered to left off Tatsuya Imai in the fourth, Misiorowski flipped on the cruise control with a Paredes double in the fourth – the first extra-base hit allowed by the right-hander since April 19, a span of seven starts – representing the final Astros baserunner against him.
From innings three through six Misiorowski hit 100 mph only eight times before emptying the tank in the seventh when he did it six more times.
There were reasons for that, as Misiorowski explained.
“I was sliding around on that mound a little bit,” he said. “You saw a couple slips with that lead leg and also on the backside so I was trying to play on that and figure it out, and didn’t really feel comfortable out there.”
And then there was the in-game adjustment that saw Misiorowski and catcher Gary Sánchez flip the script a bit and turn to more cutters, curveballs and sliders to keep the Astros from continually sitting on the heater as the velocity began dropping.
“The game plan going in was heaters, and see if they can hit it,” said Misiorowski. “They proved that they can hit it and we figured out a way to get around it.
“Gary was a huge help with that, and we figured it out.”
After the plunking of Alvarez in the third, Misiorowski finished by retiring 11 straight and 13 of the the final 14 batters he faced before handing the ball off to Abner Uribe. He followed suit as did Trevor Megill, leaving the Astros with three hits and four total baserunners on the day.
“I think he was very good,” said manager Pat Murphy. “Did he have his best, most crisp stuff? No, but he gave us seven innings, and probably could have given us a little bit more. But we want to be smart about everything we do there. His delivery was a little clunky.
“But he was still pumping pretty good in the seventh.”
Added Bauers: “With stuff like his, him not having his best stuff is better than most guys in the league still, so I think days like today where he can still go out and throw strikes, he’s still going to put himself in position to win us the game.”
The outing wrapped up what was pretty much a historic month for Misiorowski, one in which he went 5-0 with a 0.23 ERA, allowed 14 hits and six walks with 57 strikeouts – most by any Milwaukee pitcher in any month ever – over 28 ⅓ innings.
“It was pretty good,” said Misiorowski about his May. For the season his ERA is 1.65, his WHIP is 0.79 and his 108 strikeouts lead the majors. “I haven’t looked at all the numbers and stuff so I couldn’t tell you exactly what I did, but it felt good.
“Felt like a pretty decent month.”
Pretty decent? Really?
“I can’t look at it, can’t really focus on it because as soon as you do it goes haywire,” he explained. “You’re trying to go a whole 162 games, or 30 starts, so a span of six or whatever in a month – I don’t really look at it like that.
“It’s the whole season and trying to figure out it out.”
Misiorowski would be a no-brainer to win the National League Pitcher of the Month Award if not for left-hander Cristopher Sánchez, who was unscored upon in 39 innings over five starts for the Philadelphia Phillies.
“Crazy,” said Megill. “(Stuff) happens, man. That’s baseball and that’s life and sometimes somebody’s a little bit better than you, even though you’re the best one out there right now.”
With Misiorowski leading the way, the Brewers went an impressive 19-7 in May. They were in last place in the Central Division standings on May 4 and now sport a 4 1/2-game lead over the second-place Chicago Cubs at 35-21 heading into Sunday night.
“I don’t think we’re playing particularly well,” said Murphy. “I really don’t. But again, I trust these guys and they’re doing a lot of good things.
“Happy to get out of here not playing our best, but certainly doing the things we need to do.”
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Jacob Misiorowski puts the wraps on a historic month of May
Reporting by Todd Rosiak, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel / Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
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