It's officially time to be worried about Bryce Miller.
When he first came back from injury back in mid-May, Miller looked like a different pitcher. His velocity was up and it was fueling a big-time breakout, and he had a 1.97 ERA and 0.72 WHIP at the end of June, a stretch that saw him put up 54 strikeouts to just five walks in 45.2 innings over eight starts. It was the kind of stretch you dream about for a late-round pitcher, let alone a likely waiver-wire pickup, and with the increased velocity underpinning it, it looked real.
There was one more great start to come at the beginning of July, but even then there were some warning signs, as his average fastball velocity dipped to 95.8 mph, the first time all season he had been below 96. He hasn't been back above 96 since and, probably not coincidentally, hasn't been nearly the same pitcher.
Both trends continued Thursday, as Miller averaged 95.7 mph with his four-seamer and was tagged for four runs on five hits and a pair of walks over five innings. Correlation isn't causation, even with something as important as velocity for a pitcher, but whatever it is that explains why things have gone wrong for Miller, they definitely have, as he has a 5.81 ERA and 1.33 WHIP over his past five starts, with just 17 strikeouts in 26.1 innings of work.
What makes this all so weird is that we've seen Miller thrive at a lower velocity before – he was a top-10 SP in 2024 while averaging 95.2 mph. Velocity is important, but other factors matter, too, and Miller should still have good enough control and his four-seamer should have good enough shape and movement characteristics to absorb a loss of velocity without dropping off this badly. But he has, and despite a deep arsenal, it's not clear he has enough here to thrive without a difference-making fastball. His breaking balls especially don't seem to be working well, with his sweeper, slider, and curveball all combining for one whiff on 24 pitches Thursday.
The Tigers are probably the toughest matchup Miller has faced in this span, too, so it's not like he's run into an especially unfair part of the schedule. He just seems to have lost what made him so effective earlier in the season, and we're not really seeing any signs of him getting it back. I'm not at the point where I'm going to suggest you drop Miller across the board, but it's hard to recommend him as a starter at this point.
It's a long fall from where Miller was just a month ago, and he's running out of time to turn things around.
Pre-game Lineup Card
Here's what you might have missed from CBSSports.com's MLB coverage in recent days:
Bullpen report. Scott White breaks down the bullpen picture after the deadline.
Prospects report. Get to know the 12 biggest prospects who changed hands at the deadline.
Deadline winners and losers. Scott White takes a look at the biggest winners and losers from Monday's wild deadline.
Offseason trade candidates. Who might be on the move this offseason? Mike Axisa highlights Francisco Lindor and CJ Abrams, among 10 notable names.
Playoff predictions. With the deadline out of the way, Matt Snyder tries to predict the 12-team MLB playoff field.
Hitting the Wire
The top waiver-wire targets from Thursday's action:
Dustin May, SP, Brewers (65%) – Whenever a smart team like the Brewers gets their hands on a pitcher, you want to see what tweaks they have in store. For May's first start with his new team, it was an emphasis on his cutter Thursday, which generated five of his 11 swinging strikes en route to two earned runs over six innings with five strikeouts. I don't think this is some kind of sea change for May, but we knew the Brewers were going to tinker with him, and the early returns were positive. He'll face the Padres next week and is a viable option moving forward, if not necessarily one I expect to have a ton of upside.
Tyler Stephenson, C, Reds (38%) – Stephenson was one of four Reds to hit a solo homer Thursday, and it continues a very strong stretch for him. He is hitting .330 with an OPS over .950 over the past 31 games, with five homers in that stretch. It's only 14 RBI, which is an underwhelming total, but the underlying data fully backs up his production in this stretch, and it puts him squarely back in the high-end No. 2 catcher stretch as long as he stays healthy.
Nate Lowe, 1B, Guardians (9%) – Lowe is very sneakily having a bounce-back season, first with the Reds and now with the Guardians, who snagged him for some much-needed 1B/DH help at the deadline. He homered Thursday as part of a two-hit game, his second in a row. He's hitting .269/.343/.488 for the season, and his .353 wOBA is backed up by a .347 xwOBA. He wasn't playing quite every day with the Reds, but he should have that chance with Cleveland, and that could make him a viable corner infield option in deeper leagues now that he's hitting cleanup.
Sammy Natera, RP, Angels (3%) – I've been operating under the assumption that Ben Joyce was going to emerge as the Angels closer, but maybe it'll be Natera. He got the final four outs for his second save Thursday and he's actually been pretty dominant this season: He has a 2.16 ERA and 0.88 WHIP while striking out 13.7 batters per nine innings. Teams are often hesitant to trust lefties with the closer job, but with Joyce potentially limited on back-to-backs given his injury history, the Angels don't exactly have a perfect alternative. Maybe it'll be Natera.
Chase Meidroth, SS, White Sox (38%) – Meidroth has never been much of a power hitter, so his two homers Thursday certainly came as a surprise. But he's been hitting pretty well lately, hitting .319 with five homers over his past 21 games. It's probably just a hot streak, but he does have 11 homers on the season, a surprisingly big number for a guy who had just five in 122 games last season. If only he were running this season – his 14 steals in 2025 would make his current line look even better. For now, he's just a decent hot-hand play for a middle infielder.
Three Up, Three Down
Three big performances that have players trending up, and three that have the arrow pointing in the opposite direction.
Three Up
Dylan Cease isn't slowing down
Cease might be one of those pitchers for whom velocity just doesn't matter very much. His velocity has been down lately – including between 1.2 and 4.2 mph across his entire arsenal Thursday – and it just hasn't slowed him down at all. He struck out 10 over seven shutout innings against the Cubs, his third double-digit strikeout effort in his past five and his eighth of the season, tying Gavin Williams for the second-most in the majors on the season. Having Cease on your team in years past has been a frustrating experience, but that definitely hasn't been the case this season, as he has a 2.28 ERA and 1.04 WHIP while ranking second in the majors in strikeouts. His track record makes it hard to ever get too comfortable with Cease, but the emergence of his changeup as a legitimate third pitch has seemingly been a game-changer for Cease, and we might be drafting him as a top-10 SP in 2027.
Luis Arraez could benefit from his new home
The Phillies are finally doing something I've been asking for for years: Using Arraez as a cleanup hitter! It's an unconventional way to deploy a player without much power, but it's probably the ideal way to use Arraez, whose elite contact skills don't matter as much as conventional wisdom would make you think when paired with his extremely low walk rates and lack of speed on the bases. As a table setter, you're in a situation where he's got a pretty good chance to get to first base, but isn't going to end up on second or third very often; for him to come around to score, you need multiple singles or an extra-base hit for him to have a chance. But batting Arraez cleanup behind the likes of Trea Turner, Kyle Schwarber, and Bryce Harper means he's going to have plenty of opportunities for all those singles to produce a run, so I think his value actually gets a nice little uptick in Philadelphia as a result of this. Is it enough to make Arraez a 100-RBI guy? That might be asking a lot, but he should be a lot more productive in that category than he has been in years past, without losing much of his honestly pedestrian run numbers.
Framber Valdez back on track?
If there had been more positives to talk about from Thursday's games, I probably would have passed on highlighting Valdez's game. The line was pretty great – we'll take seven shutout innings on five hits and a pair of walks every day! – but he wasn't quite as impressive as the line would indicate. He struck out five and had just four swinging strikes, while his velocity was down at least 1.1 mph on his entire arsenal. I mean, look, even at the best of times you're not necessarily expecting a ton of strikeouts from Valdez, and given the way this season has gone, we're never going to turn down an increasingly rare positive start from him. But this probably isn't a sustainable path to success for Valdez, who typically at least puts up above-average strikeout rates; Valdez has had more strikeouts than innings just twice in his past seven starts, and one of those was a start where he was chased after recording just two outs. He's pitching better lately, but he still doesn't look much like the best version of himself.
Three Down
Braxton Ashcraft has hit the wall
Ashcraft was tagged for four runs over five innings against the Brewers Thursday, and he continued to be plagued by homer issues despite a renewed emphasis on his sinker. He now has a 6.81 ERA over his past eight starts, dating back to his final start in June, and he has given up a whopping 10 homers in that stretch. Ashcraft's velocity has mostly held steady and there hasn't been a huge change to his pitch mix – he's throwing more sinkers over the past couple of starts, likely in response to the homer issues – so it's hard to come up with a good explanation for why things have gone so sideways for Ashcraft. The best explanation I've got? Maybe he's just tired? He's already surpassed last year's career high of 118 innings by about 15, so we're truly in uncharted territory for him. I'm not willing to write Ashcraft off entirely just yet, but even with a good matchup on the way next week against the Marlins, I'm not sure I could start him with confidence.
Foster Griffin may have hit the wall, too
You can only outrun your peripherals for so long, and I think it's starting to catch up with Griffin. He allowed two homers Thursday, the second start in a row, and that led to five runs over four innings. He actually struck out six, his most in nearly a month, but it wasn't enough to overcome the homer issues. It's still only two bad starts in the past two months for Griffin, so you might not want to overreact … but it's also just 13 strikeouts in 23 innings over his past four starts and three or fewer strikeouts in four of six since July 1. I don't think Griffin is going to be useless moving forward, but there are definitely warning signs here that the good times have come to an end. It's just a question of whether he can keep the ERA below 4.00 moving forward.
Ranger Suarez doesn't look right yet
Suarez was chased after just three innings Thursday, the third start in a row since coming off the IL where he has failed to even throw five innings. It's reasonable to write that off as rust after an IL stint with a groin injury (that also featured a delayed return due to an illness), but it's also fair to ask if Suarez has earned the benefit of the doubt to overlook struggles like this, even in a small sample size. His career has been defined by strings of success broken up by seemingly minor injuries that derail his seasons, and while it's impossible to know if that's what is happening here, I certainly can't totally discount the possibility. Suarez is a good pitcher with a very slim margin for error because he relies so much more on command and execution than stuff; when those things falter, he doesn't have the ability to rare back and just blow hitters away.
Extra Innings
Ronald Acuna had an eventful day
It's not quite fair to say Acuna got "lucky" Thursday, as he had four hard-hit batted balls and capped his game with an opposite-field homer to put the Braves up big late. But he definitely got lucky with his first homer, a well-struck ball that traveled to the warning track and then bounced off the gloves of two colliding Marlins outfielders and fell into the stands. Hey, that's a homer, and it counts as much as a 500-foot no-doubter. But there's plenty of luck involved there. And hey, Acuna could still use some good luck, as he is hitting just .205 in 10 games since coming off the IL – with four homers, yes, but also with a 29% strikeout rate, as he continues to struggle to live up to the best version of himself. We'll take a little more luck, especially since Acuna hasn't attempted a steal since coming back from his second hamstring injury and doesn't figure to run much moving forward. It just puts even more pressure on the bat.
