Differing styles work for Boyer, Thornburg

MILWAUKEE — There are the yin and the yang, night and day, the bratwurst and the Polish and, of course, the Brewers’ Blaine Boyer and Tyler Thornburg.

As seen on Wednesday night at Miller Park, Boyer and Thornburg took their different pitching styles to the mound in relief of a 4-3 win over the Braves, and did so as they have for much of the season: successfully.

Boyer, a sinkerballer who relies heavily on soft contact, pounded the zone to retire two batters in the sixth to preserve a 4-2 lead. Then, in the ninth, the newly appointed closer, Thornburg, picked up the save that included a strikeout on a sharp curve in the dirt.

With his 12.34 strikeouts per nine innings ranking among league leaders and an average fastball of over 95 mph, Thornburg has fit the mold of a hard-throwing, late-inning arm that has become a common trend in baseball. Meanwhile, Boyer’s 3.26 ERA and 3.76 FIP that accompany a league-low 3.62 K/9 show that there, in fact, is more than one way to be an effective relief arm in baseball today.

“Each guy has to do what he’s good at,” Brewers manager Craig Counsell said. “It is going to be different for each guy. You can’t ask Blaine to be a big strikeout guy. That’s not his strength. His strength is early count contact. That’s his strength.”

Thornburg echoed his skipper’s sentiment.

“I think especially at the beginning of the year we were all amazed that Blaine had like five strikeouts in his first 20 innings or something, but he always got weak contact,” Thornburg said. “There’s so many ways and …

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