PHILADELPHIA — Bobby Miller has been so impressive in his first three career starts that he didn’t have much to worry about wriggling out of big league jams.
Miller danced out some initial troubles on Saturday afternoon before settling into continuing his historically dominant run and starting his career. The 24-year-old right-hander pitched six scoreless innings to drop his ERA to .78 – and led the Dodgers to a 9-0 win over the Phillies at Citizens Bank Park.
Miller is the only pitcher in AL/NL history to go 3-0 with an ERA under 1.00 while catching at least 23 strikeouts and conceding fewer than 15 hits in his first four games. Sure, that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but to put it more simply, no pitcher ever started his career like Miller.
“It’s definitely a little bit confidence-inspiring,” Miller said. “It’s a really good lineup so today I really had to focus on getting all my shots.”
After allowing only three baserunners in his six innings of one-hit ball in his last game against another really good Yankees lineup, he found himself in a bases-traffic jam in the second inning against the Phils. He escaped unscathed by putting Edmundo Sosa in second place, but the inning was certainly a difficult affair.
Miller threw 34 pitches that frame and met three batters with multiple runners on base — something he’d only managed three times in his first three appearances combined. But after needing 49 pitches in the first two innings, Miller threw just 55 in the next four innings. He retired 11 of the last 13 batsmen he faced.
In four starts, Miller keeps opposing batsmen to just 1 for 13 (.077) and five strikeouts with runners in goal position.
“When you start to get a little stressed — do you have an opportunity to slow down the game?” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said what he expects from a young pitcher. “[Throwing] Harder isn’t always better and I think with young players they just want to throw harder to stall the moment by overpowering the guys. But Bobby has shown the ability to tone that down a bit.”
Overall, Miller had about three hits and three walks in his six flawless innings while scoring seven. He improved to 3-0 with a .78 ERA, 23 strikeouts and just 12 hits allowed in 23 innings.
Miller became only the fourth pitcher in AL/NL history to pitch at least five innings and not concede more than one run in his first four career starts. The last to do so was Kenta Maeda in 2016 (also with the Dodgers), while Cody Anderson also did so in 2015 with Cleveland, as did Cliff Markle for the 1915-1916 Yankees.
And while there may not be a direct statistical comparison, Miller reminds Roberts of one specific person.
“What we’ve seen so far is a lot of Walker [Buehler] did,” Roberts said. “This competitiveness of making a pitch when he needs it and then layering the stuff on top of it is very similar to Walker.”
Miller’s “stuff” might be the biggest surprise yet.
It was no secret that he had a great fastball — he topped 100.4 mph in his four-seater on Saturday and averaged 98.5 mph in his sinker — but it’s the other throws who made Miller a success. In addition to four whiffs and nine call strikes with his powerful sinker, Miller forced five swings and misses with his slider, four with his curveball, and two with his changeup.
“His slider has come a long way; He’s made a few adjustments since he arrived and it’s been great,” said catcher Will Smith. “Changeup is also a great wipeout pitch. And the curveball, that’s how you slow down boys. He’s put people away with it, he can land it for strikes. He just shuffles all four.”
Miller’s promotion came at perfect timing for a Dodgers team that only has four healthy starters. But if he keeps pitching like this, he could find a long-term home in this rotation regardless of who’s available for Los Angeles or not.
“Playing for this club is not about development for us – we have to win,” said Roberts. “Age and length of service doesn’t matter – if you get out there and perform, you deserve those opportunities.”