PHILADELPHIA — If the Brewers find themselves matched up with the Phillies this October, it wouldn’t be shocking to see Jared Koenig get the Game 1 start.
And perhaps the Game 2 start, as well.
Koenig joined an exclusive club Tuesday night, becoming only the fourth pitcher since 1969 and the second since 1978 to start consecutive games more than once in a single season, throwing 1 1/3 scoreless innings in the opener role against the top of Philadelphia’s powerful lineup. He joins Wilbur Wood (CWS, 1973), Dave Goltz (MIN, ’78) and Ryne Stanek (TB, 2019) in achieving that notoriety.
That followed his “start” Monday, in which the left-hander needed only five pitches to retire the side. A 30-year-old who came to Spring Training on a Minor League deal and didn’t join the Brewers until mid-April has suddenly emerged as one of Milwaukee’s most versatile — and important — arms in a season that has seen pitching injuries crop up at an almost unbelievable rate.
“Koenig is maybe the biggest surprise in terms of how good he’s been,” manager Pat Murphy said prior to the Brewers’ 2-1 loss in 10 innings at Citizens Bank Park. “The toughness in any role, anytime, it’s a great thing to have hungry players. We might not be great, but we’re hungry.”
In his 20 appearances this season, Koenig has thrown two innings or more seven times and recorded four or five outs four times. Tuesday marked the fourth time he’s worked as an opener, giving Murphy an option against lineups featuring dangerous lefties up top — such as Kyle Schwarber and Bryce Harper, for example.
“It’s a strategy — and it’s a strategy because of some of the necessity,” Murphy said. “You don’t want certain guys to face certain guys three times or whatever it might be. You have to have the right ingredients, and I think we do. This might not be the last time you see it.”
Murphy remembers being intrigued when the Rays began employing the opener strategy in 2018, digging into the concept to look at the pros and cons.
“Anything that’s an outlier in the game, I like to look into it. It interests me,” Murphy said. “I’m not one of these guys, ‘Well, you don’t do it that way; back when I played…’ I’m just not like that. I didn’t get bred in the game that way, so I was very curious.”
