Philadelphia Phillies

Philadelphia Phillies (21-24) at Miami Marlins (13-32) Tyler Cloyd (0-0, 2.84 ERA) v. Jose Fernandez (2-2, 3.48 ERA) TIME: 7:10, Marlins Park TV: Comcast SportsNet Weather: 77, mostly cloudy Media: Twitter and Facebook BREAK UP THE POWERHOUSE MARLINS!!! Apparently this Miami Marlins team is supposed to be pretty bad. You wouldn’t know it from watching the Phillies last three contests against the Fish, in which they were outscored 21-3. It’s no wonder then that four of the Marlins 13 wins (30.7%) have come against the Phils this year. Last night’s loss may have been the most frustrating of the season, as the Phils wasted an otherwise dominant outing from Cole Hamels by once again forgetting to bring the lumber. If you’re looking for a reprieve tonight, you’ve come to the wrong place. That’s because the man on the mound for Miami has flatout owned the Phillies so far this season. For that reason, you probably already know the name Jose Fernandez. He’s an unpolished rookie with a very high ceiling, who has been an otherwise pedestrian pitcher this year, except when facing the Phils. In fact, if you remove Fernandez’s two starts against the Phils–in which he’s held them scoreless over 6 innings and 7 innings, respectively–he would have a 4.94 ERA. That’s right. Simply facing the Phils has saved Fernandez a cool run and a half on his ERA. That needs to change tonight. Starting for the Phils is Tyler Cloyd, who’s making is second start of the season in place of the injured Roy Halladay. In Cloyd’s first start, a couple weeks ago in Arizona, he pitched well enough to get a win. Though his numbers looked pretty good, for those who watched the game, it seemed apparent Cloyd had been let off the hook by Arizona. He left a few balls over the plate, and Arizona failed to capitalize. While it’s always a slippery slope to delve to deep into statistics after one outing, Cloyd’s 4.56 xFIP suggests there is going to be quite a bit of regression over the long haul, if the Phils continue to go with him. For now, he has a (supposedly) weak Marlins lineup to deal with, and he should be able to handle them. Despite speculation on this website that Howard could be headed for a DL stint, he returns to the lineup and is batting cleanup tonight. Lineup: Rollins SS, Utley 2B, M. Young 3B, Howard 1B, D. Young RF, Brown LF, Revere CF, Kratz C, Cloyd P GAMEDAY BEER: Shiner Red Ruby When you think of Florida, what’s the first fruit you think of? If you said oranges, you are 100% correct. But the second fruit you’d probably associate with the Sunshine State would be grapefruit, as Florida is one of the world’s largest exporters of the tart citrus fruit. The idea behind Shiner’s Red Ruby is to give you a hint of that grapefruit taste in your beer. Combined with the a strong malt taste, the beer has a citrus aftertaste, and a subtle bitterness. It’s definitely a summertime beer, which goes great in Florida, or on an 80 degree, humid night in Philly.  – RD

While all of you dorks were Googling “Marlins Pitcher Spitball” I was looking up “Marlins Pitcher Pitbull”. Eat a butt.

There's probably more randomness in baseball than in any other sport, and you hear that a lot to explain why teams like the Marlins or Astros win games they shouldn't. But Miami is now 4-4 against the Phillies and 9-28 against everyone else, which is a disgrace for the Phillies and something they need to take pride in correcting immediately. Avoiding an ugly series loss tonight will be tough, as the Phils go up against Jose Fernandez. Fernandez has a...

That didn’t take long. Ryan Howard received a cortisone injection into his left knee Sunday in Philadelphia, but he is back in the lineup tonight against the Marlins in Miami. A MRI exam Monday revealed inflammation and changes in his meniscus. The Phillies said yesterday they were hopeful Howard would respond positively to the shot, although they could not be certain it would. The Phillies face Marlins rookie Jose Fernandez tonight. He has thrown 13 scoreless innings in two starts against the Phillies this season. Can the Phillies finally find a way to score against him tonight? If not, the sad sack Marlins will win just their second series of the season. Here is tonight’s lineup: Jimmy Rollins, SS Chase Utley, 2B Michael Young, 3B Ryan Howard, 1B Delmon Young, RF Domonic Brown, LF Ben Revere, CF Erik Kratz, C Tyler Cloyd, P

On May 13th the Phillies signed Julsan Kamara out of Germany, not much was know at the time but some more has come out since. Before proceeding read Crashburn Alley’s Eric Longenhagen’s article that includes a quote from Phillies Director of International Scouting, Sal Agostinelli http://crashburnalley.com/2013/05/21/lass-uns-verstecken-spielen-brief-findings-on-julsan-kamara/ What we don’t know: - Can Kamara handle premium pitches and velocity - Future physical projection - Game abilities - Whether the Phillies have any real ties to continued Euro scouting What we do know: - Kamara won’t be here until Spring 2014 at the earliest - He signed for $40,000 - Sal Agostinelli  is one of the best in the game at what he does - $40,000 is not a lot of money to spend on talent - Sal Agostinelli  has free reign to pursue low cost guys he wants and the Phillies are not tied to only talent from certain regions On the whole Kamara is likely not going to be much but it is an encouraging sign to people who doubt the Phillies scouting staff’s ability to bring in talent.  Sal has signed plenty of similar players out of Latin America, maybe he has found on in Germany.

The Venezuelan Summer League just kicked off and, honestly, I just don't know enough about most of the kids there to include much info here. So, unless someone goes nuts and puts up a crazy line I'll deal with that league more in monthly recaps. The hotness: Maikel Franco - Holy cow, what a week! A somewhat pedestrian .280 BA and uncharacteristic 5 K in 28 PA is more than offset by a .357 OBP, 1 double, 2 HR, 2 BB and 1 HBP. The FSL is the most Pitcher Friendly league in the Minors, and while the Threshers play in the most Offense friendly park, it's not exactly a launching pad either (both HR were home park jacks). Franco's numbers are, honestly, everything one could hope for so far this Spring. If he stays this hot, plan on seeing him in Reading in a month. Kelly Dugan - Numbers pretty similar to Franco's this week. Dugan sported a .280/.357/.520 line with 1 double, 1 triple, 1 HR, 3 BB and the huge downside of 8 K's. Larry "Fudgie" Greene - Fudgie still has a really weird line, but at least the balls are going where the fielders aren't for a change. His line this week was .308/.438/.462 with 2 doubles, 3 BB and 3 K. Suprisingly it also included 1 SB, though speed is not a particularly big part of Greene's game. I'm about 2 weeks from doing a monthly recap, but as of now, Fudgie's line is a crazy .228/.390/.291 with a 34% K rate and 21% BB rate. He'll need to heat up his power, and cut down that K rate by, at least, 10% over the next month or so. It's also worth noting that Greene is piling up an Anthony Hewitt-esque pile of Errors, nearly equalling the total of the rest of the Lakewood OF, with less games than most of them. Cameron Perkins - I swear I am not making this up. Cameron Perkins who seems immune to taking Walks, took 5 this week. His hitting sucked, for a change, but I'm putting him in the hot list because he had only taken 5 walks all season to this point. Now, if he can just do that and maintain a .200 ISO... Roman "Candle" Quinn - I hope Wet Luzinski has Depends on for this line. The candle was on fire this week with a .346/.433/.577 with 1 double, 1 triple, 1 HR, 4 BB, 2 K, 4 SB, 1 CS (along with his standard handfull of Errors). A few more weeks of that and his numbers, cumulatively for the season, will be as good or better than Last Summer's in a similar number of games. Humberto Quintero - Conveniently he heats up right as Chooch pulls a Hammy. This past week he was .375/.400/.875 with a double, 1 HR, 1 BB, 2 K. Tommy Joseph is currently sidelined, so I gues if you're going to any Iron Pigs games, get ready for lots of Lerud. Sebastian Valle - Valle hasn't been getting a ton of playing time, but with TJ sidelined in LHV and Chooch out at the MLB level, some PT may trickle down to Valle. If it does, he does appear to be warming up considerably in May. Too few at bats to worry about his line this week, but for the month he has gotten his average up into the .280 range and has improved his walk rate significantly (though it's still awful at 5.9%, that's twice his BB rate the last 2 years). Mitch Walding - Mitch has ben mostly awful this spring. Still scouts seem to like his potential and if he strings together more weeks like the last one, maybe he becomes a somewhat hot prospect to follow. .364/.440/.500 with 3 doubles, 3 BB and 3 K. Mike Stutes - Cutesy Stutesy made 4 appearances going 4.2 innings with 4 H, 4 K, 0 BB, 1 ER. If needed in the bullpen merry go round both Stutes and Lefty killer Jake Diekman seem to have warmed up from Ice age cold starts to the year. Zach Collier - Last week I wrote about how awful Collier has been this season, well, no tthis week as he sported a .350/.435/.500 triple slash. Still 7 K in 23 PA is waaaay too high, but I really am glad to see him not scuffle this week. The Not list: Darin Ruf - Just when he was heating up, he drops a .120/.214/.160 line with 0 HR, 2 BB, 1 HBP and 11 K in 28 PA. Tyler Cloyd - Unfortunate timing whe

Rob Kaminsky is a 6'0" 190 LHP with a mid 90's Fastball, a pretty advanced, for a HS Pitcher, Changeup and a Major League ready Curve. So, if we're ticking off the Phillies draft Preferences bingo card here, put a chip on High School Pitcher, put a chip on Left Handed, place a chip on local product and place a chip on Athletic (he's also his team's starting Center Fielder on off days). Of course if we do that we also need to look at what they often avoid in top draft picks and that would typically be short, high effort pitchers. So before we get into what to like about Kaminsky we'll deal with the non-pitching red flag of his strong commitment to UNC for College ball. If I had to guess, being a mid first round pick as a High School Pitcher alone is likely enough to break that commitment, but it may require being on the high end of slot or even just above and therefore going bargain bin later to avoid slot penalties in 2014. If, from discussions, there is any sense that he'll require top 10 money or anything similar it may make him more difficult to draft. Kaminsky has stated himself that while he loved North Carolina, he hasn't made any decision about his future and could go pro or on to College. On the baseball side of things, there is one big issue with Kaminsky that may turn teams off. When you draft a high schooler, for example, we'll use Jesse Biddle, you project. Jesse Biddle was a big, thin kid when he was drafted and already threw in the upper 80's. However, he had a lot of filling out to do so you could project that maybe he can add a few MPH and end up throwing low to mid 90's with good sink. There is pretty much none of that with Kaminsky. He works ~89-91 with his FB and touches 93-94. That's it. It's not likely to get any faster. Because he's short it won't have that heavy downward slope that a 6'5" guy like Biddle can generate. It's entirely possible that Kaminsky is the next Adam Morgan. Is a guy who maxes out as a #2/3 Starter worth the #16 pick? Recent Mock Drafts have him going late First Round (most commonly to the Yankees, since he pitches in their shadow and would be a popular pick with fans who have quite possibly already heard of the kid in Jersey with 5 No-hitters and 18 K/9 strikeout rate) to all the way in early to mid-second round. That suggests that if the Phillies are really into the kid, they may be able to simply wait a round and still stand a chance at picking him (same may be true of Justin Williams who I profiled earlier in the series). Well, let's look at the kid and see what all of the fuss is about. First up is a video from Baseball America. I'm not an expert on pitching mechanics, but I do know that a lot of shorter pitchers appear to be giving full effort every pitch to generate velocity. If this kid throws mid-90's you wouldn't know it from this video. That's a pretty relaxed, loose looking delivery. No dreaded "inverted W", no arm breaking (when a pitcher slows his arm after release). No locking out his front knee. All of those are commonly listed as potential red flags by the various people who write about pitching mechanics. Also, it sounds like there's a pirate in the stands during the game. Next up is a video from Baseball Banter. I can see more in this video that it appears his plent foot lands slightly to the first base side, causing him to throw across his body. That is sometimes pointed to as an injury concern and can affect accuracy. Kaminsky though is widely lauded for his accuracy, ability to adjust pitch sped and work both sides of the plate. So, if this affects accuracy, Kaminsky seems to have found a way to work past it. Here's a video literally taken down the street from where I lived up until a few years ago (It's also where UNC used to play it's Home games). This one's from the USA Baseball Prospect Classic. This is game film, so you get to enjoy watching him pitch to live hitters and field his position. Video is from Diamond Scape Baseball. In this video, which

It’s been a pretty crazy couple of days for the the Phillies, with the frantic, exhilarating wins and the slow, dreadful losses. Ehsan Kassim of Marlin Maniac is back to document some answers for this latest Phillies-Marlins series, as the Phils try to figure out what kind of team they are, and how bad that team is going to be.  Check out my answers on his site if you really want a faceful of text. I see the Marlins promoted a guy named “Duane Below.” Is he the main character in a Rob Schneider movie about a fish reproduction expert? Seems to me he is. The Marlins claimed him off of waivers from the Tigers and Tigers pitchers (see Andrew Miller) never seem to do well for us. So this should be pretty interesting. May 12, 2013; Los Angeles, CA, USA; Miami Marlins starting pitcher Jose Fernandez (16) in the dugout during the game against the Los Angeles Dodgers at Dodger Stadium. Dodgers won 5-3. Mandatory Credit: Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports What’s that X factor it takes for the Marlins to push through and finally pull off a win every 6-7 games? I believe that has to be the fact that the other teams don’t feel like playing that particular day. I don’t think the Marlins are winning as much as other people are letting them. I guess the other x-factor has to be that Jose Fernandez is pretty damn good. How exciting are the prospects the Marlins are close to bringing up, and do they offer any sort of counter balance to the immeasurable weight of despair? I believe the only prospect that is close right now would be Christian Yelich. Let me put it this way on the promotion of Yelich, our left fielder right now is Juan Pierre. Don’t think I need to explain that anymore, especially if Yelich can hit like Marcell Ozuna and Derek Dietrich have upon their promotions, the rest of the season does look brighter for the Marlins. This especially when you consider that Logan Morrison and Giancarlo Stanton return soon to the Marlins lineup. Jeffrey Loria recently went to a Marlins game and no one noticed. Is hating him the only thing fans can really do? I hate Loria, but not everything that happened has been his fault. He did not injure the Marlins players. But I am done talking about him, he deserves no mention or recognition. Mar 12, 2013; Jupiter, FL, USA; Houston Astros starting pitcher Bud Norris (20) throws to Miami Marlins shortstop Adeiny Hechavarria (3) during a spring training game at Roger Dean Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY Sports Is there any chance of a rivalry surfacing between the Marlins as Astros as a sort of “best of two horrible situations” thing? Would improve or destroy fan morale in either camp? Winning would destroy the morale for sure. I mean, clearly the best path to become a contender is to tank all your games for a few seasons, get a Bryce Harper and a Stephen Strasburg, and BAM! You’re a contending team now. Oh never mind, you have to spend money on current players for that to happen. Scratch that plan. Bullpens are hard. The Marlins recently let Jon Rauch go for being bad at his job. What is keeping somebody like Chad Durbin in the Phillies bullpen, despite a similar situation mired in craptacularness? Grit and determination. He obviously works so hard and is a great clubhouse presence, much more valuable than a reliever that gets batters out. Maybe he has some pictures of Amaro and Manuel from the Christmas Party?

The Phillies have rounded the first quarter pole of the 2013 season and it can be tough to get a read on exactly how to feel about this team. I’ve asked two people with two different opinions on the team to share their thoughts with us in the hopes that we can find some common ground. Providing the fan perspective is Ryan Petzar. Ryan, 27, lives in South Philly. He considers himself a diehard Phillies fan and brags about how, in 2011, he attended 35 games in one season despite not having season tickets. His favorite current Phillie is Roy Halladay and his favorite former Phillie is John Kruk. Providing our counterpoint is Ryan Petzar. Formerly of ESPN Radio and Philly.com, Ryan is an emerging voice in the Philadelphia sports media. Ryan’s work has been featured in print with the Philadelphia Daily News and the York Daily Record, as well as online at CSN Philly, Yahoo! Sports, and Deadspin. Ryan would not give his age for this story. Now that we know our contributors, let’s get to the questions. RP: In general, what’s your opinion of the season so far? RP: I guess I’m disappointed but it could certainly be worse. As of now, they’re only a couple of games below .500. None of the core players have really been lighting it up, but there haven’t been many outright disappointments yet. RP: It’s a disaster. Even at three games below .500, they’re a total disappointment. There were a lot of factors conspiring against them at the beginning of the season (Chooch’s suspension, a murky outfield situation, etc.) but they’ve had a pretty soft schedule so far and should have been able to tread water. This team is an embarrassment. RP: Okay, so you two are pretty far apart. Let’s try to find some common ground. What are your thoughts on the pitching staff’s early season performance? RP: Ugh. Pitching. It sucks that all of a sudden you can’t be confident in the starting pitchers anymore. The team used to have four aces. Now we only have two. If that. RP: Kyle Kendrick has been a pleasant surprise so far. In nine starts, he’s allowed only 19 earned runs and has an ERA of 2.82 in 60.2 innings. He’s pitched only 3 innings less than Cliff Lee and has an almost identical stat line. In fact, Kendrick is the only Phillies pitcher to have pitched a complete game shutout so far. If Kendrick wasn’t performing at the level he is now, the team would be in far worse shape. RP: Sure, but now Roy Halladay is hurt. He’s going to be out until August at the earliest and who knows what he’ll be like when he’s back. And John Lannan, who I still kind of hate, is hurt too. They have all these young guys from the minors pitching now instead of our aces. It’s terrible to watch. RP: Those young guys are the aces of tomorrow though. It’s cool to get to see them pitching now, doubly so when they’re doing well! Jonathan Pettibone has made six starts, fifth most on the team, and he has an ERA of 3.00. That’s definitely good. No two ways about it. RP: You’re wrong. He’s got a 3 ERA but he’s allowing nine hits per nine innings and he’s not striking guys out like he could be. It’s just a matter of time until those baserunners start scoring that that ERA balloons. RP: Okay, but that’s conjecture. You’re talking about something that might happen and that’s not the point of thi— RP: [Nervous laugh] Calm down, guys. It’s just a friendly discussion. Let’s change the subject. We’ve talked about pitching, what about the offense? RP: What is there to say about it? It’s putrid! RP: Don’t exaggerate, man. It’s not ‘putrid’. It’s not even bad, per se. Michael Young is hitting the ball really well, same with Rollins whose power numbers are higher. Dom Brown leads the team with nine homers! It’s good to see him finally starting to produce regularly. RP: Sure, but at this point last season the team was doing so much better offensively. Through 45 games (41 starts), Carlos Ruiz was hitting .357. This year, Chooch and Kratz combined are only hitting .222 through the first 45. Kratz has

The Phillies have played more than a quarter of the 2013 season and won one game of the ten started by Cole Hamels. They’re 11-4 when Kendrick or Pettibone start and 8-18 when they start Hamels, Halladay or Lee. Last night, Hamels pitched well again, but the offense provided a single run and the Phils fell 5-1 to the Marlins. The Phillies have scored one run or less in four of the last six games that Hamels has started. Last night they faced Alex Sanabia, who came into the game having thrown to a 5.00 ERA in his eight starts this year while opposing batters posted a 316/400/531 line against him. The Phillie bullpen continues to be miserable, allowing three runs over two innings last night. They have a 5.26 ERA and a 1.65 ratio over the last 18 games with 59 hits allowed in 49 2/3 innings. The Phillies are 21-24 on the season after losing 5-1 to the Miami Marlins last night. Hamels got the start for the Phillies and went six innings, allowing two runs on seven hits. Two of the hits went for extra-bases, a double and a triple. He struck out ten and didn’t walk a batter. Hamels struggled in each of his first two starts this season, but has thrown to a 3.12 ERA in his eight outings since. His walk rate is still up — over his last eight starts he’s walked about 3.3 per nine inning. Coming into 2013 he had walked about 2.2 per nine for his career. He has made seven quality starts in his last eight appearances. Adeiny Hechavarria singled to right to start the bottom of the first. He stole second with one out and went to third on an infield single by Derek Dietrich. It brought Marcell Ozuna to the plate with one out and runners on the corners. Ozuna singled into center, scoring Hechavarria (1-0) and moving Dietrich up to second. Justin Ruggiano grounded into a double-play to end the inning. Hamels allows three singles and a stolen base in the inning, but holds the Fish to a single run with the help of the double-play. It was 1-1 when Chris Coghlan tripled over the head of Revere in center to start the bottom of the second. Hamels kept him from scoring, though, getting Nick Green to foul out to third, Jeff Mathis to pop to short and pitcher Alex Sanabia swinging for the third out. No run for Miami after the leadoff triple. Hamels threw a 1-2-3 third. He struck out the first two men in the fourth before Coghlan singled to left. Coghlan took second on an errant pickoff throw by Hamels before Green struck out swinging to leave Coghlan at second. Young should have handled the throw from Hamels, which was wide of the base, but catchable. Hamels struck out Mathis and Sanabia in a 1-2-3 fifth. Placido Polanco singled to center to start the sixth. Hamels struck Dietrich and Ozuna out before Ruggiano doubled off of the wall in right, scoring Polanco to make it 2-1. Coghlan went down swinging to leave Ruggiano at second. Justin De Fratus pitched the seventh. Mathis reached on a throwing error by Galvis with one out, but De Fratus got the next two to leave Mathis stranded. Polanco singled to left off of De Fratus to start the eighth. Horst came in to pitch to the lefty Dietrich and got him on a fly ball to center for the first out. Aumont took over to face the righty Ozuna and Ozuna singled to left, moving Polanco up to third. It brought Ruggiano to the plate and he singled into center, scoring Polanco (3-1) and moving Ozuna up to second. Aumont struck Coghlan out swinging for the second out, putting men on first and second for Green. Green blooped a ball into shallow center field, just in front of a diving Revere. The ball was in the air a long time and with two outs, both runners were running and both scored. 5-1. Aumont struck Mathis out to leave Green stranded. Green’s ball was in the air a long, long time. Not sure why Revere was playing him so deep, but I was surprised the ball wasn’t caught. De Fratus faced five men in the game. He got three outs, one reached on an error and the