So you think Jacob Misiorowski is a big deal, do you? The next big thing in ball, you say? The scourge of hitters now and for years to come? Yeah, well, let's see you do it in Vegas. Throw a hundred on a hot, dry, hundred-degree night in a Triple-A park. Then we'll talk, big shot.
He won't get the chance, sadly, so we won't know for at least a year and maybe several. The new face of Milwaukee Brewers baseball doesn't pitch again until Friday at home against Philadelphia, which means he will miss the brand new and objectively hilarious experience of pitching in a big league game in Nevada in 2026. Yes, one game is a small sample size, but this was one hell of a loud sample. Ask Jeff Levering, one of the Brewers' TV broadcasters, who described A's Jonah Heim's game-ending fly ball with relief as "a popup." Or Brewers catcher William Contreras, who tapped his glove in triumph on that play. Or pitcher Aaron Ashby, who dropped his head and prepared to accept congratulations on his 10th relief win of the season. They were all wrong.
They were wrong because Heim hadn't actually ended the game at all; that popup just kept on carrying in the desert air, and became a homer that tied the game up at 14-14 in the 10th. It was a homer that could not have happened in any big-league park, but because the A's were house-sitting for the Triple-A Aviators, it happened. And, once again, it tied the game at 14-14. 14-14!
The first major league game in the minor league park in Vegas was the gloriously bizarre piefight it deserved to be, a 12-inning, 15-14 Milwaukee win that lasted 4:14 and included 14 pitchers, 34 hits, six crooked number innings, and 16 ABS challenges, 11 of which were overturned, probably because home plate umpire Clint Vondrak had a bad case of whiplash. Indeed, next to this delightful story about why catchers are getting hit in the lockbox more often, Vegas baseball is the most interesting thing about this season, and that's after one game. Since there are only five others this year, tonight, tomorrow and the weekend against Colorado, your window for enjoying this stupid, fleeting, wonderful thing is small.
In fairness, though, the Brewers had been warned, and by their newest member, the former Elephant reliever Joel Kuhnel, whom the Brewers acquired for cash considerations over the weekend. Kuhnel had done his time in Vegas and warned his mates, “Be cautious. The ball flies.”
If that wasn't sufficient warning, Shea Langeliers' first inning homer surely was, given that it traveled a season-high 485 feet. That blast came at the expense of Milwaukee's second-best starter, Kyle Harrison, who had done the Pacific Coast League grind during his time in the San Francisco system and so knew exactly what he was getting into. "Playing at ballparks like this in the whole PCL, I’ve got a lot of experience at this," Harrison said after the game. "Knowing how these games usually go, I haven’t seen anything like this."
Or for that matter, Brewers outfielder Jake Bauers, who also hit one of the 11 homers in this game. "That was pretty nuts to be a part of," Bauers said. "I’ve never seen anything like that in major league baseball, but the guys up here that work in the clubhouse were telling me that they have games like that on a nightly basis in this yard."
In fairness, Vegas' ballpark is at altitude (2,800 feet, more or less, at the ballpark), the desert air is thin, the temperature at gametime was kiln-level 87 degrees, and the A's pitching is exceptionally meh. But Milwaukee's pitching, including Harrison, a deep bullpen, and the luckily absent and aforementioned Miz, is very good, and they got eaten, too. In other words, the elements kicked ass last night, and if the A's manage to complete their transition from Yolo (You Only Lose Once) County, they will have the one thing they have always wanted—their own Coors Field.
Speaking of which, the Rockies come in Friday with the worst pitching staff in baseball—again. Their starters are 13-28 with a 5.92 ERA, and the hitters they face have a collective batting average just below that of Shohei Ohtani. For them, "exceptionally meh" would be a sea change toward Cy Young. That weekend series could make 15-14 look like a pitcher's duel, and who doesn't want that, especially with the start of the World Cup and electrifying final series in both the NBA and NHL happening simultaneously? Plus, and this is an important side point, no sitting president will be attending any of those games. It's probably for the best; between the noise generated by all that loud contact and a paying crowd of 8,519 on Monday night, our narcoleptic chief executive might find it hard to get any sleep.
The only thing we won't get in this series is Misiorowski At Altitude, and the scientific test of whether any pitcher can master pitching in this high octane garden shed. That was just an accident of scheduling, we suspect, although Milwaukee manager Pat Murphy knows from desert baseball and wouldn't be above adjusting the rotation to save a mighty but impressionable young'un from popup homers.
The rest of the Brewer staff, including starters Robert Gasser and Brandon Sproat, will not be so lucky. Neither Gasser nor Sproat have enough seniority to skip suicide missions like this, and so will pay for the crimes of others, with neck pain, exploding statistics, and a new advanced metric acronym—PTSD. If nothing else, Misiorowski should bring snacks and liquid refreshments to the bullpen tonight and tomorrow just out of a sense of human decency. He owes it to the future victims.
