Jacob Misiorowski threw 103.7 miles per hour on Saturday night at Coors Field. That is, per pitch tracking data dating back to 2008, the fastest pitch ever thrown by a starting pitcher. The Colorado Rockies went 1-for-9 with runners in scoring position against him and lost 7-1 to the Milwaukee Brewers, dropping to 24-41 and falling 17 games below .500 for the second time this season.
On a night when the most interesting baseball story had nothing to do with the Rockies, it is worth pausing on what Misiorowski is doing. The right-hander went seven innings, allowed one run that was unearned, struck out eight, and walked three. His ERA now stands at 1.50 through 13 starts – the lowest by any Brewers starter through that many outings to begin a season in franchise history, and the lowest over a seven-start stretch (0.20) by any pitcher since Bob Gibson in 1968. The Rockies had just one extra-base hit off him – a Kyle Karros double in the fifth that scored Edouard Julien and accounted for Colorado’s only run of the game.
“He’s going to throw a bunch of them,” Warren Schaeffer said of Misiorowski’s heater, “and you don’t wait a guy like that out. You attack.”
The attack produced one run.
There was a frightening moment in the sixth when Tyler Freeman was struck by a Misiorowski fastball in the helmet. Freeman was tended to on the field and ultimately removed from the game, replaced by Sterlin Thompson as a pinch runner. Schaeffer, asked about Freeman’s condition postgame, was measured.
“He took it about as good as I think anybody can take 101 off the helmet,” he said. “Obviously, it didn’t feel good, but he seems fine.
Misiorowski was visibly shaken on the mound. Karros echoed what the whole dugout felt.
“You just hate to see it,” he said. “Feel horrible for Free, and also horrible for Miz. I saw that he was beating himself up over that.”
The Rockies’ pitching told a different story. Zach Agnos started and allowed two home runs in three innings – Brice Turang in the first, David Hamilton in the second – before giving way to a bullpen that allowed 10 more hits and five more runs across six innings. William Contreras went deep in the seventh. Turang hit his second of the night in the eighth. Jake Bauers added a solo shot in the same inning. Five home runs in total, tying a season high. A TJ Rumfield error in the seventh allowed two additional runs to score. The Brewers, who entered having won nine of their last 11 road games, looked every bit as comfortable away from home as those numbers suggest.
The one bright light was Karros, who has been one of the few consistent offensive presences in this lineup over the past two weeks. He finished 2-for-3 with two doubles, an RBI, and a walk, and is now batting .353 over his last 12 games since May 24 with four doubles, two home runs, and six RBI. The process that Schaeffer and the coaching staff have been talking about with him for months – the patient at-bats, the willingness to work counts, the improvement in finishing when he gets his pitch – is showing up in the numbers.
“I’m trying to be a little looser with my hands,” Karros said. “Just kind of getting back to basics and trying to let my hands work as much as possible.”
Against a pitcher throwing 103, that is easier said than done. He did it anyway.
The Rockies have lost three straight after winning four of six. The series finale is Sunday.
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