Could Gage Wood factor into the Phillies 2025 bullpen?

The right-handed college star could be a fast riser… maybe very fast.

Could the Phillies have found some potential bullpen help from a guy who was pitching in the College World Series just a few weeks ago?

Picking at the back of the first round of Sunday night’s MLB Draft, the Phils selected right-handed pitcher Gage Wood at No. 26 overall, a college pitcher from Arkansas. As noted in our write-up Sunday night, Wood is the first college player selected in the first rounder in the five years scouting director Brian Barber has been running the draft. (Barber tripled down on college pitchers by selecting left-hander Cade Obermueller in the second round and righty Cody Bowker in the third.)

Based on pure stuff, the selection makes a ton of sense, and Phillies fans should be very excited.

Wood famously threw a no-hitter in the College World Series last year by featuring a fastball that hums in the mid-90s and ramps up to 98 mph with a good chase rate, coupled with a swing-and-miss curveball. He has a slider that needs work and a changeup he barely uses, but both can be worked on.

When the Phillies drafted Aaron Nola out of LSU in the 2014 Draft, they did so believing he was already close to being big-league ready. Nola proved them right when he made his MLB debut in July of 2015, 13 months after he was selected, and put up a 3.59 ERA in 13 starts at the end of the ‘15 season.

Could Gage be on the same path? Or, something a little different?

If the Phillies are committed to Gage being a starting pitcher, there is no chance he would come to the big league rotation this year. First, once Nola returns, it’s already five-deep, with Mick Abel and Andrew Painter available for depth (provided they’re not traded). The 2026 season could be a possibility, depending on what the Phils do over the next few months, but there is another option that they are perhaps considering.

Could Gage be a potential option in the bullpen as soon as this season?

At least for now, per MLB’s Todd Zolecki, it doesn’t appear the Phils are heading in this direction.

There are no internal expectations that Wood will help the Phillies this year, but he could move quickly.

“I don’t think it’s ever really easy to predict how fast a person is going to have the ability to move,” Phillies assistant general manager of amateur scouting Brian Barber said. “I do know he has the potential to move quickly, just because he does the two things: it’s already more ‘now’ stuff that you don’t have to project a ton on.

“Obviously, we think there are certain things … especially his slider shape that we think we can enhance a little bit. But he also already throws strikes. You don’t normally have an opportunity, especially at No. 26, to select a college pitcher with stuff in such a dominating performance when he was on the mound.”

The Phillies have not had a drafted player appear for them in the same season he was selected since pitcher Dick Ruthven in 1973, but it’s not out of the realm of possibility. There are a number of players who tugged on a big league uniform before ever wearing minor league duds.

Gage appearing as a starter for the Phillies in 2025 is not going to happen, but do Barber’s comments above mean he couldn’t join them in the bullpen? Per Zolecki, Barber understands it could be tempting.

“It’s a guy that can just dominate hitters through the lineup with two pitches,” Barber said. “We see him as a starter. You see those dominating two pitches and people are going to automatically think, ‘Move to the bullpen.’ But this is a guy who’s shown the ability to do it.”

The name most will point to is Brandon Finnegan, who was drafted out of TCU by the Royals in the first round (No. 17) of the 2014 Draft and made his MLB debut for them in September of that season. He was good enough to stick in Kansas City’s bullpen throughout a postseason run that ended in a seven-game World Series with San Francisco. MLB Pipeline’s description of Gage’s stuff would seem to indicate a pitcher who has at least two plus-pitches that could make him an intriguing reliever option for the Phillies this season.

After Wood became Arkansas’ closer as a freshman in 2023 and then continued to log high-leverage relief innings as a sophomore, scouts looked forward to him joining the rotation this spring. He came down with a shoulder impingement after his second start and missed two months before coming back for the stretch run. Though his command was sporadic, his combination of stuff and strikes could still land him in the top two rounds. Wood has one of the best fastballs in the Draft, sitting at 94-96 mph and reaching 98. Its combination of velocity and carry, along with his low release height and flat approach angle, produce elite rates of chases, as well as overall and in-zone swing and misses. He relies heavily on his heater and a power 82-85 mph curveball that shows flashes of becoming a plus pitch.

Until this year, Wood had been a reliever in college and, when they attempted to make him a starter, he suffered a shoulder impingement that forced him to miss two months before returning for the end of the season. He has only 13 career college starts under his belt. The Phillies likely will want to see if he has the durability to make it as a starter, but for 2025 alone, could they tell him to focus on relief pitching through the end of the season?

In terms of Stuff+, it would appear he has the pitches to be a big league reliever right now, with a 122 Stuff+ that is 22 percent higher than the MLB average (100). His average curveball velocity of 83 mph is three ticks higher than the MLB average (80) and has 16 inches of drop, compared to the average big league curve, which has 10 inches. Pairing his fastball and curveball provides a combination of depth that can confuse even the best big league hitters.

Dombrowski won’t force a square peg into a round hole. He will be careful with their first round selection, and whatever they decide to do with Gage, it should not impact their desire to acquire one or multiple relief pitchers at the Trade Deadline. But one can’t help but wonder if Barber and the scouting department didn’t select Gage with the idea he could reach the Majors quickly and, if all went well, factor into this season as a reliever.

It’s all speculation, of course, and there’s no doubt this would be an aggressive course. Once Gage is officially in the farm system, we’ll watch to see where he’s sent and what his role is. If he starts in the Reading or Lehigh Valley bullpen, we’ll have our answer.

Regardless, it’s hard not to envision a scenario where Gage is logging important outs in pressure situations as the Phillies push for a second straight NL East title, or even in October as they case their elusive third World Series. Dombrowski shouldn’t plan on it, but you can’t help but wonder if it wasn’t already inside their heads when they made the selection Sunday night.