Milwaukee Brewers Prospect Faces Bright Future as Starter or Reliever
Milwaukee Brewers pitcher Josh Hader could be a young Chris Sale or Andrew Miller, depending on how the Brew Crew decides to use him.
That was Colorado Springs Sky Sox pitcher Josh Hader’s 11th strikeout from the Sky Sox’s 6-0 win Sunday over the Round Rock Express. That is a season-high for the Milwaukee Brewers prospect and the latest in a string of positive performances.
The Brewers promoted Hader to Triple-A Colorado Springs in June after he posted a 0.95 earned run average through 11 starts at Double-A Biloxi. In his first six starts he allowed 22 earned runs, 18 bases on balls and three home runs in 27 2/3 innings. It was the worst stretch of pitching in Hader’s minor league career, especially for a pitcher who had a 2.54 ERA and 3.42 fielding independent pitching prior to the promotion.
Hader got back on track in a July 23 start against the same Round Rock team he stymied Sunday. He tossed six innings and allowed two runs and struck out six in that outing and has a 2.80 ERA since.
Strong outings like Hader’s Sunday strikeout-fest provide hope for the Brewers’ future. The franchise has had a winning record in two seasons since it lost in the National League Championship Series to the St. Louis Cardinals in 2011, and in both of those seasons – 2012 and 2014 – the team failed to make the playoffs. But with an avalanche of talent coming into the farm system, the Brewers of the future will be loaded.
Hader’s role, while he is one of the team’s top 10 prospects according to Baseball Prospectus, is up in the air. Some view him as a young Chris Sale. Others say he is a high leverage reliever like the Cleveland Indians’ Andrew Miller. His delivery certainly looks similar to both:
Drawing a conclusion on which pitcher he resembles more from a statistical perspective isn’t easy. As you will see in a bit, all three strike out a lot of hitters and all three have had control problems in the past – Hader still struggles. But the biggest source of difficulty is the inverse career paths taken by Sale and Miller.
Let’s start with Sale. He pitched at Florida Gulf Coast University, was drafted in 2010 and made his major league debut that same season. At FGCU he struck out 11.52 batters per nine innings and walked 2.00. Upon reaching the majors, he was used as a reliever for the 2010 and 2011 seasons, in which he struck out 10.59/9 IP and walked 3.53. Then he became a starter and saw those numbers swing to 10.0 and 2.0, respectively. (He’s purposefully cut back on strikeouts this season.)
In college Miller pitched for the North Carolina Tar Heels, where he walked 4.08/9 IP and struck out 9.47. (Other than pitching in college, this is where the similarities with Sale end.) He was drafted in 2006 by the Detroit Tigers, made his MLB debut that August and started 66 games over the next five seasons for the Tigers, Marlins and Red Sox. His walk rate (5.3/9 IP) and K-rate (7.3/9 IP) were not conducive to winning.
When Miller switched to a reliever role in 2012, he became a new pitcher. By 2013 he was striking out more than 14 hitters per nine innings and he cut his walk rate to under 3.0 in 2014; it has since gone down even further.
Hader falls somewhere in the middle. He never pitched in college, so there isn’t a comparison to be made there. But he has pitched more than 480 innings in his minor league career, and entering the promotion to Triple-A he had struck out 10.11/9 IP and walked 3.62, putting him somewhere in the middle between Sale and Miller.
This presents a minor conundrum: do the Brewers think Hader can fix his control problems and become more like Sale? He has a 4.21 BB/9 in Triple-A but he’s walked just one batter in each of his last two starts. Will that process happen more quickly if he follows the path of Miller and becomes a reliever? The only way to find out would be to let him pitch out of the pen, perhaps this September when rosters expand.
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These are important questions to ask, and with rosters set to expand next week, Hader may get the chance to test his mettle against major league hitters. Then Brewers fans will get to see the next Chris Sale. Or Andrew Miller.