Brewers Explain Demotion of Dominant Pitching Prospect in Latest Roster Move

The move may seem puzzling at first, but Brewers manager Pat Murphy explained the rationale behind the move.

“We’re going to need starters. Look at what we’ve done already. It’s silly to think someone else isn’t going to go down. So you have to kind of keep guys on schedule. We got Woody coming back, we got Quintana coming back. And we need pitching, and we need to be able to preserve as many of these guys as we can. We don't want to throw anybody away. So to preserve them, the best thing is to keep these guys built up. And if they're not going to be in the Major League rotation, then make sure they go down and get their pitches in and work on their thing. And quite frankly, for some of these young guys, get a blow, get a rest, because they're just not machines. You know, it's gonna, it's gonna run out. We did it with Tobias last year.” Murphy said.

With the number of pitchers the Brewers have had to place on the IL in the early stages of the season, others have had to step up into roles in that rotation. A number of them have pitched very well in those roles, Henderson included. That makes it tougher to decide to option them down, but ultimately someone is going to have to be moved out to make room and the players with options are the movable ones.

It's also important to keep all these starting pitchers on a regular schedule and get pitchers like Henderson some rest to be ready for the rest of the season as well, especially when Henderson is dealing with an innings limit this season.

There is (an innings limit). He’s not 6-4, 215 and there's concern he's had injury history. But it's it's solid thinking, and if you look at the whole aspect of who we might lose and what it sets up for. It's a longer conversation, but you can see it." Murphy said. 

It's a big picture look at how the Brewers are putting together their pitching picture. Yet Murphy's mantra has been "win tonight" and with the Brewers winning each of the four games Henderson has pitched, wouldn't keeping him on the roster help with winning now, especially with the team's struggles this year?

"I think, I think it's more about the timing of it all, too, because we need to get DL Hall a spot on our roster. He's part of our now and our future. We need to have spots opening up for Quintana and Woody. So I think more of it is about the guys with options – and more than one option, because if you only have one option left, what does that mean going into your future year you have no options left, so you got to make the team or you lose the player. So this is very fragile times where you have to make good decisions that's based on winning and based on preserving starting pitcher depth." Murphy said.

Despite the tough news of the demotion, Henderson took it in stride and the Brewers are not down on him at all.

"The kid has been so good. He wasn't quite as sharp yesterday, but he's been so good, and he's handled it so well – the conversation about going down, he's just, ‘I totally get it. I totally understand. I know how this works. I'm expecting it. Just know I'm going to go down there and work my tail off, and I'm going to improve this and that, and talk about a few things.’ I mean, the the kid’s delight to have around." Murphy added.

Henderson will be back at some point. Perhaps one of these times, he'll be up for good.