It’s been six days since Mason Miller let anyone hit the baseball. Really, that’s not fairly true. Till the right-hander caught Michael Busch with a literal back-foot slider within the eighth-inning of yesterday’s Wild Card matchup between the Padres and the Cubs, it had certainly been 5 days, three aid appearances, and 11 batters since anyone got here to the plate in opposition to Miller and did one thing aside from strike out. Nevertheless, six of these 11 victims managed to get their bats on the ball. Three of them did it twice. It’s simply that over the previous week, no person has been ready to determine easy methods to sq. up one in all Miller’s disappearing sliders or 102 mph fastballs – sure, his four-seamer has averaged 102 mph during the last three outings – properly sufficient to realize a lot as a tapper again to the mound. Busch’s unlucky foot snapped the streak at 11, but it surely did nothing to look Miller look extra hittable.
In a enjoyable twist, the all-time file for consecutive strikeouts (or a minimum of since 1961, when full play-by-play information turned out there) belongs to Miller’s teammate Jeremiah Estrada. Estrada struck out a 13 straight batters throughout three appearances simply final Could. Actually, he struck all 13 of them out swinging.
That’s a pleasurably tidy play log. Estrada’s streak solely ended as a result of, when he entered the sport on Could 31 in opposition to the Royals, supervisor Mike Schildt deliberately walked the primary batter he confronted.
Anytime Miller is on the mound, the overall feeling amongst spectators is astonishment that anybody ever manages to place the ball in play. He simply threw an immaculate inning. Since his debut in 2023, Miller has allowed simply 0.55 hits per inning, the bottom charge amongst all 473 pitchers who’ve thrown a minimum of 100 innings. And now, following a 2025 season wherein his 45.2% whiff charge ranked second amongst all pitchers, Miller has ascended to a better airplane. His whiff charge over the previous three video games has rocketed as much as an absurd 61.9%.
Now that the streak has run its course, it’s time to have fun the six marvels who managed to attach with one in all his pitches, regardless of how inconsequential the contact. We’ll rely down, from the weakest contact to the strongest, beginning with Moisés Ballesteros getting the smallest quantity of baseball potential it’s potential to get. You may simply hear the sound of the foul tip earlier than the ball hits the glove.
Actually, it’s spectacular that Ballesteros acquired sufficient of this pitch to make a sound in any respect. This can be a 102.6 mph fastball properly above the strike zone. It got here in at a top of three.76 toes, and this season, Miller ran a whiff charge of 55.9% on fastballs 3.7 toes or increased. Even pitchers who don’t throw 102 lean on four-seamers above the zone as a result of it’s so exhausting for batters each to put off it and to hit it. This pitch is why we care about vertical method angle. This pitch is why we’ll always remember the climax of A League of their Personal. The pitch to Ballesteros technically went down as a whiff as a result of Statcast counts foul ideas for strike three as whiffs quite than fouls, however we don’t must take that away from him. He gently brushed the baseball, and for that we honor him.
Subsequent up is Dansby Swanson, who acquired a tiny bit extra of the pitch and a complete lot extra of catcher Freddy Fermin.
Chances are you’ll suppose Miller fooled Swanson with a 2-2 slider away, and he might properly have executed so. It’s additionally equally potential that Swanson actually was attempting to maintain a watch out for the slider. It’s simply that when you realize you may see 104 up above the strike zone, attempting to search for the slider and truly staying again lengthy sufficient to be on time for it are two very totally different propositions. The shortstop was simply capable of decelerate sufficient to throw the bat head on the ball. It was an awesome accomplishment, and due to it, Fermin will certainly maintain a lifelong grudge.
Right here’s one other two-strike slider that simply barely averted ending up as strike three. Forward 1-2, Miller missed excessive and inside to Seiya Suzuki, and this exhibits you why pitchers are inclined to suppose exhausting in, gentle away.
Batters must catch the ball a lot additional in entrance of the plate when it’s on the within, so the truth that Suzuki was means out in entrance of this pitch didn’t harm him an excessive amount of. He nonetheless caught the smallest piece of it – so small that he barely saved it from sticking within the catcher’s mitt – however a minimum of he caught that piece with the barrel of his bat. Did he barrel this pitch up? Completely not. Did he strike out anyway on the very subsequent pitch? You guess he did.
We’re executed with the foul ideas now. Up subsequent, we’ve got a gaggle of 4 regular-looking foul balls. These ones stretch again to Miller’s final common season look in opposition to the Diamondbacks on September 27, they usually’re all simply fastballs that no person may catch as much as.
Because of this pitching coaches inform pitchers purpose for the center of the zone and dare batters to hit it, and that is the advantage of throwing tougher than simply about anybody who has ever lived. Miller didn’t essentially idiot anyone right here. They have been equipped for the fastball they usually acquired it. It was simply an excessive amount of to deal with. Swanson, Connor Kaiser, Carson Kelly, and even contact maven Geraldo Perdomo are doing all they’ll simply to slap this ball into the seats on the alternative aspect and dwell to see one other pitch. Swanson took a sturdy hack and regarded out to the mound as if to say, “I’m on to you, Mason Miller.”
He was not, in truth, onto Miller, however you possibly can see why this foul felt like a victory.
Now we’re into the actually spectacular fouls. Right here’s Kelly once more, very almost conserving the ball within the area of play!
Kelly is out forward of a slider on the within nook right here, and he sends a weak popup to the correct aspect that simply drifts out of play regardless of Luis Arraez’s heroic efforts to reel it in. Severely, Arraez tossed himself over a thick concrete barrier. He should have ended up with a critical bruise, and he took his frustration out on the netting. I wrote about this precise sort of batted ball again in Could. Usually once you’re forward of a pitch, you hit it to the pull aspect, however generally you’re to date forward that you need to drop your bat head to decelerate. At that time, you possibly can’t assist however pop it up the opposite means. If Kelly had been above the ball, he would have hit a weak grounder to the left aspect – or, extra doubtless, fouled it straight down and off his personal foot – however since he was beneath it, he got here just some toes (or one gust of wind) from reaching the not possible dream of dealing with Mason Miller and coming away with a weak popout.
Final up is Geraldo Perdomo, lengthy the most effective hitters in baseball in relation to making contact, and extra just lately, in some way the most effective hitters in baseball, interval. Right here’s Perdomo genuinely rifling a slider to the pull aspect.
This ball got here off the bat at 100 mph. Perdomo was nonetheless means out in entrance of it. It was most likely foul by a superb 25 toes in the meanwhile it handed first base. Nonetheless, that’s the very best contact anybody has made in opposition to Miller in almost every week. Perdomo would go on to strike out like all of the others, however he can take delight in realizing that he’s the final participant ever to really hit the ball exhausting off Miller.
