CLEARWATER, Fla. \u2014 Jonathan Bowlan’s father set the standard the perfect way.<\/p>\n
In 1987, Mark Bowlan, a right-hander at the University of Memphis, threw a perfect game against Louisville. It was the first in school history, and it still stands. Since 1957, it’s one of 21 nine-inning perfect games in Division I NCAA baseball.<\/p>\n
“He’s very humble,” Bowlan said. “He’s not very vocal about it.”<\/p>\n
Bowlan, 29, grew up 25 minutes from his father’s alma mater, which made it especially hard to turn down the chance to play for the team he grew up rooting for.<\/p>\n
“We just grew up a Memphis Tiger fan\u2026 family. We bled blue,” Bowlan said. “Just being able to spend that time in Memphis where my family’s able to kind of watch and enjoy it.”<\/p>\n
In 2018, Bowlan set his own standard. The towering right-hander delivered an 18-strikeout performance against then-20th-ranked South Florida.<\/p>\n
“I didn’t even know I had that many until after the game,” Bowlan said. “I remember, we were pretty deep into it. They were like, ‘Hey, you still good going into the ninth?’ I was like, ‘Yeah, I’m good. Let’s do it.'”<\/p>\n
128 pitches. Zero walks. A single-game school record in punchouts. All of them swinging strike-threes.<\/p>\n
“The fact that we’re both in the record books is a pretty special thing,” Bowlan said.<\/p>\n
Now the 6-foot-6, 240-pound right-hander finds himself in Philadelphia. The club acquired the Arlington native last December from Kansas City in exchange for lefty Matt Strahm, drawn in by the same swing-and-miss ability that dated back to Memphis.<\/p>\n
The advanced metrics back it up. Among 357 pitchers who threw at least 200 four-seamers in 2025, Bowlan generated the highest swing-and-miss rate on the pitch at 43.5 percent. He traces it back to one thing.<\/p>\n
“I think it’s been the fact that I’m able to fill up the zone more with my offspeed,” Bowlan said. “Throwing all speeds\u2026 it helps set up the four-seam.”<\/p>\n
His sinker, used just 17 percent of the time last season, could be utilized more. The pitch ranked third in opponents’ hard-hit rate at 10.7 percent \u2014 what Bowlan calls his “quick out” pitch. <\/p>\n
And his slider ties the whole five-pitch mix together, primarily used against right-handers while the fastball works against lefties. He got comfortable with it last spring, and it showed: a 40.2 percent whiff rate that made it his main putaway pitch.<\/p>\n
Even two seasons into a relief role, Bowlan has a clear picture of what makes a bullpen arm effective.<\/p>\n
“It’s just going after everybody, competing, no matter what,” Bowlan said. “It doesn’t matter exactly where you throw the ball, as long as you’re giving it a chance to go over the plate. You’re there for a reason\u2026 top competitors go out there and they don’t care who you are or where you came from. It’s one on one, basically.”<\/p>\n
The path to the bullpen wasn’t straightforward. COVID wiped out the 2020 minor league season, and after four strong starts to begin 2021, Bowlan tore his UCL. His comeback in 2022 and first full return in 2023 produced consecutive ERAs north of 5.90 as a starter.<\/p>\n
“It was a lot mentally,” he said of the injury. “But it was a blessing at the end of the day because it helped me grow my mindset and my faith. If I can handle that, I feel like I can handle anything that comes my way.”<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThe Phillies announced that they’ve traded Matt Strahm to the Kansas City Royals in exchange for RHP Jonathan Bowlan. The Unfiltered crew has the latest.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
In 2024, a mid-season move to the bullpen at Triple-A Omaha changed everything, but adjusting to that life wasn’t easy either.<\/p>\n
“When I first went up, it was kind of just like, I don’t know what to do,” he said.<\/p>\n
So he watched. And he asked.<\/p>\n
“I would just kind of watch them and always ask questions,” Bowlan said. “I was talking to a bunch of guys in the bullpen \u2014 like, how do you prepare for this?”<\/p>\n
Last year, leaned on former Phillies All-Star reliever Carlos Est\u00e9vez, another 6-foot-6, and found his footing. He registered a 3.86 ERA with 46 strikeouts in 34 appearances in the bigs and a 2.25 ERA for Omaha across 36 innings.<\/p>\n
Still, the jump from a small market in Kansas City to Philadelphia has crossed his mind.<\/p>\n
“I played in Philly last year,” Bowlan said. “It’s a lot. There’s a lot of people, but that just shows how much they care. I don’t really know what it’s gonna be like, but I’m definitely looking forward to it.”<\/p>\n
Bowlan is firmly in the mix for one of the final spots in the Phillies’ bullpen. He doesn’t have any minor league options left, and knows how strong the group is.<\/p>\n
“We have great arms, great pitchers,” he said. “I’m looking forward to being around these guys and really seeing how they approach the game as well.”<\/p>\n
Bowlan admits he can be hard on himself \u2014 the bar has always been high. The Phillies are looking at the traits, not for him to be perfect in spring training.<\/p>\n
That word still follows him, though, through family history and through his own near-miss in pro ball. In 2019, Bowlan threw a no-hitter that was one error away from a perfect game.<\/p>\n
“Dang, it was so close,” he said.<\/p>\n
His father may be humble about it, but the record speaks for itself.<\/p>\n
“My dad’s still got me,” Bowlan said, laughing. “He’s got the perfect game.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CLEARWATER, Fla. \u2014 Jonathan Bowlan’s father set the standard the perfect way. In 1987, Mark Bowlan, a right-hander…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":615275,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2387],"tags":[5,936,2123,55,2596,2595,4,16702,252],"class_list":{"0":"post-615866","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-kansas-city-royals","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-kansas","10":"tag-kansas-city","11":"tag-kansas-city-royals","12":"tag-kansascity","13":"tag-kansascityroyals","14":"tag-mlb","15":"tag-phillies-news","16":"tag-royals"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116202198008911406","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/615866","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=615866"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/615866\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/615275"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=615866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=615866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=615866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}