by Trevor Dugan
After missing the entire 2025 season rehabbing from Tommy John surgery, Long Island’s own Josh Knoth has bounced back and been called up to Double-A Biloxi by the Milwaukee Brewers.
The newest Biloxi Shucker Knoth, a 21-year old right-handed pitcher, was drafted by the Brewers 33rd overall in the 2023 MLB Draft out of Patchogue-Medford High School, the same school that produced long-time MLB starting pitcher Marcus Stroman.
Knoth has been a star on Long Island since his time with Pat-Med and the East Coast Lumberjacks. He pitched two perfect games during his high school career, and was named as the 2023 Axcess Baseball Cy Young award winner after setting a Pat-Med record with 107 strikeouts in 47.2 innings pitched during his senior season.
Across 14 starts with the High-A Wisconsin Timber Rattlers in 2026, Knoth pitched to a 4.33 ERA with 66 strikeouts in 68.2 innings pitched. On August 1, he turned in the finest outing of his career thus far, pitching 6.0 shutout innings while striking out seven batters in a 9-0 win over the Lansing Lugnuts.
The Medford native was named as the Brewers’ minor league Pitcher of the Month in June after going 2-0 with a 3.74 ERA and 20 strikeouts in five starts for Wisconsin.
Knoth is currently the ninth-ranked prospect in the Milwaukee Brewers system, the top-ranked farm system in MLB. He will be joining a Biloxi Shuckers team featuring three top 100 prospects, including shortstop Jesus Made, the number one prospect in baseball, per MLB.com.
The right-hander has a strong support system on Long Island. Family members and coaches have been thrilled to witness his return to the field and subsequent success. East Coast Lumberjacks GM Ryan Pembroke beamed with pride while discussing his former player.
“We knew from his first bullpen with us that he was different, his breaking ball velocity almost matched his fastball, and the spin was unbelievable,” Pembroke said.
“Combined with his work ethic and drive, from the time he was 14, 15 years old, it had us saying ‘this isn’t just a college player, this is a potential major leaguer’. So his promotion comes as no surprise, and we couldn’t be happier for him.”
Baseball Savant assigned Knoth a 60-grade curveball and slider on his prospect report card, also making note of his exceptional spin rate that regularly sits above 3000 RPM. Earlier this season, Knoth spun a breaking ball above 3500 RPM in game, an astonishingly high number marking his personal best spin rate. Knoth’s ETA for his major league debut is listed as 2028 on MLB.com. His former coach Pembroke spoke about his development and the kind of pitcher he believes Knoth can be in the majors.
“I think he’ll be a strikeout guy, he’s got power stuff, and he has a chance to be a legit front of the rotation guy,” Pembroke said. “ We know who the ace is for the Brewers right now, so it’s not like he’ll instantly be the number one. That’s a good thing. That just tells you how good their organization is. And it also is a credit to the Brewers and how good they are at developing pitchers. They do an outstanding job.”
Knoth is one of several high profile players to be drafted out of Long Island in recent years, and is currently the closest to the MLB out of all of them. This past June, the Stony Brook School’s Aiden Ruiz was drafted 44th overall by the Pittsburgh Pirates, just a year after Michael Oliveto was drafted 34th overall out of Hauppauge High School by the Detroit Tigers.
Players like Knoth are proof that Long Island baseball is constantly trending upward, demonstrating why players from the island are receiving more draft buzz than ever before.