Philadelphia Phillies: All of the midseason bullpen trades have failed
By David Esser
The Philadelphia Phillies still have the worst bullpen in baseball.
Pretty much everyone in the “city of brotherly love” knew that the Philadelphia Phillies bullpen would be their kryptonite in 2020, everyone except for John Middleton and Matt Klentak. Despite boasting a new-look roster which included the likes of marquee free agents Zack Wheeler and Didi Gregorius, the Phillies did next to nothing in terms of improving their pen’ during the offseason.
In fact, they almost went out of their way to make it worse compared to 2019.
Guys like Bryce Harper and JT Realmuto entered the COVID-shortened 2020 season absolutely smoking hot at the plate, launching homers left and right against all opponents. However, despite the duos red-hot start, the team’s bullpen repeatedly blew big leads early and often. Even with two legit MVP candidates in the heart of their order, the Phillies sat below .500 through the first quarter of the season, and pretty much all of it could be attributed to the club’s historically bad bullpen.
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For what it’s worth, Klentak acted quickly on this problem, jumping on a handful of trades in order to somewhat salvage the team’s reliever room. He acquired David Hale from the Yankees, Brandon Workman and Heath Hembree from the Red Sox, and then swung a relatively big trade for David Phelps from the Brewers on deadline day.
While none of it was as eye-popping as say, a Josh Hader trade, the general vibe was that this collective group of veterans should be enough to at least get by for the remainder of 2020.
Spoiler alert, it wasn’t.
Despite having to give up multiple prospects to land them, literally every single one of the Phillies new relievers has been horrible. The grouping of Phelps, Workman, Hembree, and Hale have pitched 21.1 innings for the Phillies thus far, and here’s how it’s gone:
- 18 earned runs
- 46 baserunners
- 10 home runs allowed
- 7.59 ERA
- 2.16 WHIP
Those aren’t just bad numbers, those are bottom of the league bad numbers. While each of the four above mentioned names have track records that would attest to their pitching ability, all of them have apparently forgotten how to pitch a baseball over the last few weeks. Workman has been the best of the bunch so far, posting a 3.86 ERA since joining the Phillies. However his 2.036 WHIP tells a tale of someone who makes every outing infinitely more stressful than you would want from your closer.
The Philadelphia Phillies bullpen had actually settled down there for a bit during their two series with the Nationals, but a lot of that had come from internal options, as opposed to the team’s trade acquisitions. Rookie JoJo Romero has developed into a nice lefty option as of late, and RHP Tommy Hunter was borderline elite there for awhile before his untimely collapse against Boston.
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The Philadelphia Phillies time to improve their bullpen has come and gone, and now they’re simply stuck with what they have. Starters are just going to have to start pitching deeper into games down the stretch, and then you cross your fingers and hope you can get 1-2 innings of just “not terrible” bullpen work a night.