It’s hard to find good
So this has been a disappointing week I would say. Talk about trying your hardest to find the good in something. We’re trying to find good things to talk about here, but the Phillies did their best to make it tough on us.
Three up
Ranger Suarez
Mr. Rager is starting to heat up. Not being blessed with any run support this week, Suarez still gave the team another solid start, this one of seven innings of two run ball that was ultimately lost because his offense was still asleep. I’d caution anyone that wishes to trade Suarez this trade season to upgrade another position: you may regret that.
Alec Bohm
This is what I mean about stretching to find something good about this past week. Bohm’s 113 wRC+ is about as empty as one can get. He did have seven hits in 24 plate appearances, but only one went for extra bases. There was one run batted in.
It’s getting dire, folks.
Trea Turner
Turner has continued hitting, even adding a few extra base hits to the ledger. At this point, one has to start to consider him as an option to start at shortstop for the National League in the All-Star Game (though Francisco Lindor may have something to say about that).
Three down
The rest of the offense
I mean, there isn’t much left to say here. The offense has been terrible of late and doesn’t show many signs of snapping out of it. They will, of course, do just that. Snapping out of it is kind of a matter of time, but for how many players will it happen to? One has to assume that Kyle Schwarber will start heating up at some point. Bohm has been fine since his rough start. Nick Castellanos is what he is. But the other spots? What exactly are we expecting moving forward with Bryson Stott, Brandon Marsh and others? If this team wants to do any kind of damage in the playoffs, they’ll have to rely on their starting pitching, of course, but this offense has to start doing something.
Injury decision making
So here is what I do not understand.
Bryce Harper gets hit on the elbow by a pitch by Spencer Strider and proceeds to miss the next five games. The team did not believe he was in need of a stint on the injured list and was willing to play a man down those five games. Then, when Harper comes back, he needs to actually go on the injured list with a wrist issue that has been lingering for some time now, bad enough that he “can’t really function on a baseball field or hit a baseball or anything like that.”
Even though, with the hit by pitch he suffered that injured him quite a bit, they could have used some of those days he was down to help heal a wrist injury that has lingered for some time.
Oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooook. More on this later.
The defense
Was it me, or were there some defensive gaffes this weekend in Pittsburgh that were totally avoidable?
The outfield defense in particular has been rough for a while with the center field position, whoever that may be, looking tentative about just anything in the air. When you have at least one player that is known for his defense looking worse than he did even two years ago, there needs to be some questions asked.