Woodhaven High School Senior Michael Miller recently got his first start of the year against Lincoln Park and did not disappoint. In the 5 inning contest the Warriors won 11-0.
Miller was perfect, throwing 49 pitches and not giving up a single hit or walk. 35 out of Millers’ 49 pitches were strikes. This was the first perfect game in over 10 years for the Warriors.
Miller is currently 9th in the state and 2nd in the league for earned run average according to MaxPreps.
Miller has made a big impact on the Warriors so far this season. Losing some big pieces to their bullpen from last year, they needed players to step up and compete. Miller rose to the occasion.
When asked about his mentality going into the game Miller responded,” The mentality stays the same. Even though Lincoln Park may not be the strongest opponent, it’s baseball any team can win any day so I went into the game with the same mindset that I would against the really strong teams like AP or Northville”.
Miller was dialed in from start to finish. He was not focused on the perfect game and stated that he did not even know that he was about to make history until the guys started to jump around and celebrate with him.
The Warriors have been lights out on defense, fielding 95% as a team after a rough start. As a high school team, this is a good statistic. As of late, the Warriors have been nearly perfect in the field.
Miller said, “It was all due to the defense, I did my job by letting up weak contact and locating my pitches and they made the plays. It makes it so much easier to go out onto the mound and compete when you know the defense behind you is shut down and you can trust them to make the plays.”
According to Miller, this was the best he had felt on the mound in a long time, “Everything was working, I felt confident in all of my pitches, I could throw any pitch during any count and I trusted that I could throw it for a strike when needed.”
Miller surely has shown that he is a guy that the Warriors can rely on to come in and shut the other team down on the mound going further into the season. We can expect Miller to get more stars on the mound after his dominating performance.
