\n\tGiven that history, the length of Milwaukee\u2019s depth chart entering 2026 is no coincidence. The Brewers are poised to open the regular season with up to 14 capable starting candidates on their 40-man roster. Non-roster arms like Tate Kuehner<\/a>, Drew Rom<\/a>, and (eventually) a healthy Gerson Garabito<\/a> bring the count to 17.\n<\/p>\n \n\tOver the winter, the club traded away Freddy Peralta<\/a> and Tobias Myers<\/a> and lost Jose Quintana<\/a> to free agency, but it added nearly twice as many starters. Brandon Sproat<\/a> came over in that Peralta trade, and the club traded its entire big-league depth chart at third base to the Boston Red Sox for southpaws Kyle Harrison<\/a> and Shane Drohan<\/a>. Meanwhile, Logan Henderson<\/a> and Robert Gasser<\/a> worked their way back to full health, and Rom and Gerabito joined waiver claim Sammy Peralta<\/a> as upper-minors depth.\n<\/p>\n \n\tAs spring training got underway, it seemed that the organization would have more starters than starts, both in the big leagues and in Triple-A. Matt Arnold<\/a> welcomed that potential logjam, but did not expect it to arise.\n<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cWe know we\u2019re going to have injuries,\u201d Arnold said after the Brewers acquired Harrison and Drohan. \u201cYou guys saw what we were dealing with at the start of last year, when not everybody\u2019s 100%. That\u2019s going to happen again, and we know that.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\tIt\u2019s not a Brewers-specific trend brought on by an unusual number of injuries. The modern starter works fewer innings, meaning teams need more starters to cover a season. In 2010, 273 pitchers started an MLB game, 74 made at least 30 starts, and 45 pitched at least 200 innings. Last season, there were 369 different starters; 53 made at least 30 starts, and three logged at least 200 innings.\n<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cThe game today, it takes a lot,\u201d Pat Murphy<\/a> said last month. \u201c200 innings? Unheard of. It takes a lot. 150 is a lot. So you need depth.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\tThat means clubs must construct rotation mixes of more than six or seven pitchers. Seventeen starters may have seemed like aberrations in back-to-back seasons, but it\u2019s more likely to become the new normal. The Brewers are planning accordingly.\n<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cIt\u2019s no longer a five-man rotation, all five guys are getting 30 starts,\u201d Murphy said. \u201cThat didn\u2019t happen anywhere [in 2025], I don\u2019t think \u2026 I don\u2019t think it\u2019s being built to be that way. I think it\u2019s more about, ‘Hey, we\u2019re going to use 20 pitchers, and all 20 are going to contribute.’ That\u2019s kind of how staffs are being built.\u201d\n<\/p>\n \n\tMurphy has also made a spring mantra of reminding media that pitching injuries are seasonal, on which the data back him up. Here’s a month-by-month three-year survey of injured list placements, for position players and pitchers, via Baseball Prospectus<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n \n\t \n\tThe need for that many arms is already playing out as the Brewers anticipated, partially because they’re being so cautious to combat the springtime pitching injury risk. Brandon Woodruff<\/a> purposely slow buildup has him questionable for Opening Day, and Quinn Priester<\/a> appears likely to begin the year on the injured list due to a nagging wrist injury that has muddied his outlook in camp. That means there could be at least two rotation spots up for grabs.\n<\/p>\n \n\tSeveral of the Brewers\u2019 younger and newer arms have initiated solid bids early in camp. Logan Henderson\u2019s new curveball has looked like a legitimate breaking ball that could add needed balance to his arsenal. Sproat has flashed an extra tick of velocity and turned his short slider into a mid-90s cutter that he can throw in the strike zone as a secondary pitch. A new grip has given Harrison\u2019s kick changeup outlier depth. Drohan induced whiffs on 38.3% of swings in his Cactus League debut.\n<\/p>\n \n\tThe Brewers didn\u2019t just prepare an emergency plan for hits to their rotation depth; they expected those hits to come. They could quickly be rewarded for that planning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"You can never have too much starting pitching. The Brewers have experienced that adage firsthand in each of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":613945,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2401],"tags":[5,6303,127,136,2168,843,59,4280,4,2248,44914],"class_list":{"0":"post-613944","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-milwaukee-brewers","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-brandon-sproat","10":"tag-brandon-woodruff","11":"tag-brewers","12":"tag-kyle-harrison","13":"tag-milwaukee","14":"tag-milwaukee-brewers","15":"tag-milwaukeebrewers","16":"tag-mlb","17":"tag-quinn-priester","18":"tag-shane-drohan"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116195962537229102","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/613944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=613944"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/613944\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/613945"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=613944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=613944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=613944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"image.png\"](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/image.png.ea06dfb9151fcf90368048d0648b1d3d.png\"\/)
\n<\/p>\n