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The Milwaukee Brewers will give Taylor Jungmann the start on Saturday against Cincinnati at Miller Park, as first reported by Adam McCalvy on Twitter. McCalvy also noted that no one appears to getting booted out of the rotation to make room for Jungmann, which could perhaps allude to Milwaukee going with a six man rotation for the last handful of games to finish out the season.
Jungmann began the year in the starting rotation, of course, hoping to build off a solid rookie campaign in which he posted a 3.77 ERA and 3.92 FIP across 119.1 big league innings covering 21 starts. He stuck out 8.07 batters per nine to go along with a 3.54 BB/9 rate and 46.3% ground ball rate and was valued at a solid 1.6 RA-9 WAR. The hope around Milwaukee was that Jungmann had finally overcame the struggles he endured in the minor leagues after being drafted in the first round in 2011, and could be a fixture in the middle to back end of the rotation going forward.
Unfortunately Jungmann fell flat out of the gates this season, allowing 21 earned runs in 20.2 innings across his first five starts of the season. He struck out as many batters (13) as he walked and was missing some two miles per hour off of his fastball from last season. He was optioned to AAA on April 29th, where he allowed 34 earned runs in 31.0 innings before getting shut down and sent to Maryvale to try and sort things out.
After about a three week hiatus, Jungmann reported to AA Biloxi on June 30th and proceeded to earn his way back to the big leagues. Jungmann wound up making 13 starts for the Shuckers, posting a 2.51 ERA and 2.91 FIP to go along with marks of 9.68 K/9 and 4.18 BB/9 in 75.1 innings pitched.
Jungmann was among the several players who were called up after the minor league seasons were completed and he’s tossed two perfect innings with two strikeouts out of the bullpen. He will have one, perhaps two chances this season to re-enter him name in the starting rotation conversation for next season, otherwise the soon-to-be 27 year old could theoretically find his roster spot in danger this winter with what looks to be a crunch on the 40 man.
Statistics courtesy of Fangraphs