Brewers: Wade Miley Learned New Pitch Grip By Watching LSU's Paul Skenes on TV

Wade Miley is back with the Milwaukee Brewers this year and is enjoying a successful season. A short trip on the injured list did sideline him for a bit, but the 36 year old veteran currently has a 2.91 ERA through his first 10 starts.

Back in 2018, Miley's first tenure with the Brewers, he rejuvenated his career by adding in a cut fastball. This has been his most used pitch since that year in which he often times does an excellent job at causing batters to miss barrels and avoids hard contact. This year he is again calling upon that cut fastball the most (42% usage rate) but he also reliably has a four seam fastball, changeup, and slider as well.

In his most recent start, he toyed around with a new grip on his sinker. This is a pitch that he seldom throws, but the early returns on this new grip look promising. What's even more interesting is that he started throwing with this new grip three days before his most recent start after he saw the way LSU superstar Paul Skenes gripped his during the College World Series.

Milwaukee Brewers starting pitcher Wade Miley learned a new grip on his sinker by watching LSU superstar Paul Skenes in the College World Series.

Paul Skenes, a right-handed hurler for LSU and projected top five pick in the MLB draft, is one of the nastiest pitchers in college baseball. He generates a ton of swings and misses and pumps triple digit heat deep into games with pitch counts well over 100.

That is not the profile of Wade Miley, but Skenes sinker grip did catch his attention. According to Baseball Savant he only threw it four times in his start against Cleveland, but the one swing and miss he got on the pitch was nasty enough to catch the eyes of Rob Friedman, the Pitching Ninja, who on Twitter called it a wrecking ball.

It will be interesting to see if Wade Miley starts to use his sinker more frequently or not. His four seam fastball has been extremely effective this year as opposing batters have just a .171 batting average against it, but if he can make his sinker look similar and then drop off the table opposing batters won't stand a chance.

Wade Miley's next projected start is Wednesday June 28 against the New York Mets. It will be worth monitoring if he starts using a sinker more often or not.