Jacob Misiorowski has spent the first half of the season pitching like the best arm in baseball, and now he’s in position to chase one of the Milwaukee Brewers’ oldest marks.
Bleacher Report recently made a bold call for every MLB team, and for Milwaukee the prediction was simple: Misiorowski will break Ben Sheets’ single-season strikeout record of 264, set back in 2004.
That forecast doesn’t come out of nowhere. Through the first part of the season, Misiorowski is 10-4 with a 1.62 ERA, a 0.76 WHIP and 167 strikeouts. Those numbers lead Major League Baseball in ERA, WHIP and strikeouts, and they’ve turned the young right-hander into the centerpiece of the Brewers’ rotation.
His next chance to keep piling up punchouts comes Monday, when he makes his first start of the second half after the All-Star break. He was scratched from his final start before the break and did not pitch in the All-Star Game, with fatigue cited by both Misiorowski and the Brewers as the reason for the extended rest. The key point for Milwaukee: he’s not injured, and he didn’t need an injured list stint.
Bleacher Report’s reasoning is straightforward. Misiorowski has already logged 111 innings with that 167-strikeout total, and with 12 or 13 more starts still possible, the path to the Brewers record is wide open if he keeps producing at the same rate and stays healthy.
Milwaukee’s strikeout history gives the prediction some weight. Only four Brewers pitchers have ever topped 220 strikeouts in a season.
Sheets owns the record at 264, while Corbin Burnes reached 234 in 2021 and 243 in 2022. The only other Brewer besides Sheets and Burnes to clear 220 was Teddy Higuera, who struck out 240 in 1987.
If Misiorowski keeps rolling, the record should fall with room to spare. He could even put himself in position to become the first 300-strikeout pitcher in Brewers history.
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