Phillies 2018 Season News/Notes/Discussion

[zambonir]

The only reason to give up on any of these young players is if you're letting this weak schedule trick you into thinking the team has serious playoff aspirations. If that's really the case, they will address some of these issues - if they still exist - come July. In the meantime, Crawford and Alfaro need to develop on the job, and Altherr will likely just keep losing playing time to Williams (who has the greater platoon opportunities) and Kingery (who will also keep playing a little SS of course).

Maybe the time will come where one of them needs the confidence/"go work on some things" demotion but I don't think that time is anywhere close, especially when the team is winning and they all play good defense (technically every time you play Williams instead of Altherr it does make that day's line-up worse).

I do suspect Alfaro's future is not starting catcher but there is barely a such thing as a starting catcher anymore. Also a lot of mediocre catchers out there who wouldn't actually be upgrades on either of our guys (Rupp included, obviously).

[donaldorc]

Does Altherr have any options left? he needs a little (maybe more than a little) time to work on the hitting. being sent back might alleviate some pressure. he really is struggling. i think even Melvin Matos could be putting up better numbers.

Maybe his 3-3 today, especially the walk-off hit, will turn him around. He's been pretty good before, so I think he is just in a little slump.

[zambonir]

You could also wonder if Altherr is hurt, since that was the case for his two bad partial seasons, and, in truth, he hasn't hit that well since coming back from last year's injury (look at his September 2017 numbers). But it's also kind of a start-of-season fallacy to assume that he (or anyone) is "struggling" in a way that's meaningful or permanent, as opposed to when someone has a bad May or July. If he just needs to find his groove or make some more adjustments MLB is where he needs to do it, and today he did.

[Slinging_Southpaw]

This is why I thought it was a mistake for Nick Williams to go north with the team out of Spring Training. He had a very poor spring. Now you have two players who should be starting wherever they're playing, instead they're sharing AB's(with Kingery too) and both are struggling. I felt they'd both be better off getting full time AB's, with a true back up as the 4th outfielder.
That said, I wouldn't doubt from things we've heard, that Williams would be doing some pouting at AAA.

[allentown]

You obviously dislike Williams, but he is outhitting both Altherr and Santana. Williams has elite bat exit velocity. If there is a bat to be concerned about, based upon the current small sample size, it is Santana's. Phillychuck credits him with helping the team through OBP, but his OBP is a paltry 0.307 and his OPS is comparable to Crawford.

[Slinging_Southpaw]

I don't dislike Nick Williams at all. I just think he's further away from being a polished ballplayer than Altherr.

[Lawman]

Right now, the best lineup probably features Hoskins at 1B, an OF of Williams, Altherrr, and Herrerra, and Kingery at SS or 3B.

[julio]

I don't dislike Nick Williams at all.

Really? You wrote:

I wouldn't doubt from things we've heard, that Williams would be doing some pouting at AAA.

I was impressed that allentown was able to just move past that comment with what I saw as a fairly gentle rebuke, and focus on what was - this bit aside - a post that otherwise was thought-provoking. Personally, I was put off enough by the gratuitous cheap shot that I just dismissed the rest of your post. That happens sometimes.

"Many people are saying..." Where have I heard that recently?

[tom81]

Right now, the best lineup probably features Hoskins at 1B, an OF of Williams, Altherrr, and Herrerra, and Kingery at SS or 3B.

. Kingery has really cooled off lately, his OPS is nearly identical to Franco’s now. He may need to make some adjustments as undoubted the league has made some to him.

[Austinfan]

The reason to send Kingery to AAA to start the season wasn't his contract status but his plate discipline. I think he gets excited at each promotion and takes time to calm down and be patient at the plate - and we're seeing that in the majors, he was chasing outside balls yesterday.

SSS shouldn't influence perceptions, Altherr was struggling, then went 3-3 off the bench, often that's all a player needs to get back into their "normal" groove.

Pivetta and Velasquez are pitching well, but both are works in progress, 94-95 is nice, and their command is better, but in both cases long-term success will still depend on mastery of their secondary pitches.

But the bullpen depth has gone from shaky to very deep with Arano, Rios and Ramos all looking very good, and Hunter seems to be fine. At some point Klentak may have to move a veteran for a A ball prospect just to make room.

[andyb]

The other side of the coin on Kingery is defense though. Not sure we have enough sample size to really know how good he is at secondary positions (and he is not playing much of his best position, 2B). The error he had at 3B yesterday was almost 100% due to not having the arm or the practice of making a long throw at 3B. In OF also he is a better fit for CF than a corner skill-wise. There is a cost for playing Kingery out of position defensively.

[Slinging_Southpaw]

julio
1h

Slinging_Southpaw:
I don't dislike Nick Williams at all.
Really? You wrote:

Slinging_Southpaw:
I wouldn't doubt from things we've heard, that Williams would be doing some pouting at AAA.
I was impressed that allentown was able to just move past that comment with what I saw as a fairly gentle rebuke, and focus on what was - this bit aside - a post that otherwise was thought-provoking. Personally, I was put off enough by the gratuitous cheap shot that I just dismissed the rest of your post. That happens sometimes.
"Many people are saying..." Where have I heard that recently?

Am I wrong about that? Has there been no talk questioning Nick Williams attitude in the past?
I really like Nick Williams, just don't think he's ready yet and would like to see both players getting full-time at bats and definitely, not a platoon for two young players. I was all for both Williams and Altherr being MLB starters before the signing of Santana.

[julio]

Am I wrong about that? Has there been no talk questioning Nick Williams attitude in the past?

Sure, there's been "talk." Is it legitimate? Is a good deal of it (at least) motivated by jealousy - which appears to infect at least some of our sportswriters, at least some of the time? Is some of it driven by stereotyping, which I don't think I need to elaborate?

You went from "things we've heard" to "I wouldn't doubt..." - which says you take these rumors at face value, that you find them credible. At the same time, you ignore or dismiss all the reports from the past years about Williams' work ethic, etc. Why is that? Why choose to end a reasoned post with something personal and scurrilous?

Am I over-reacting here? Maybe. But it seems to me that Nick Williams has been defined as the current whipping boy - the current target of irrational abuse by fans. It's a well-established role. I find it offensive. Again, maybe that's just me.

There was a time when I would have added, "We are better than that." Funny, but I don't feel inclined to make that comment any more.

[EDmuch]

Wow, 14-7 and there is still so much grumbling.

[Philsmania]

Wow, 14-7 and there is still so much grumbling.

It could be that they are winning despite the offense being somewhat uneven (some good indicators, some bad, some guys doing well, some guys not) and analytics people tend to focus on the offense more. Have they won with smoke and mirrors like they did in the early stages of 2016? No, I don't think so but I am not sure they are this good either. We shall see.

[andyb]

We are winning with a great starting rotation. Only given was Nola at the beginning of the year. Arrieta has been largely as advertised so far and the two starters with good "stuff" have stepped up (Pivetta and Velasquez).

If this continues we are a good team and the offense is only likely to improve as the kids get more reps.

Edit - and of course we have mostly played bad teams. So we SHOULD be winning now if we hope to contend for a wild card. The upside though is that this rotation might definitely be able to put us in that position of contending.

[flyers19rw]

The other side of the coin on Kingery is defense though. Not sure we have enough sample size to really know how good he is at secondary positions (and he is not playing much of his best position, 2B). The error he had at 3B yesterday was almost 100% due to not having the arm or the practice of making a long throw at 3B. In OF also he is a better fit for CF than a corner skill-wise. There is a cost for playing Kingery out of position defensively.

This is the problem that I have with the musical chairs going on with positions for players. Most players have an optimum position where their skills or lack thereof come to fore. Moving around all of the players to create PT for them is one thing but it does have a price. This goes for all of the position players on the roster not just Kingery.

[Philsmania]

It is interesting how modern analytics seems to support this newfangled trend of multiposition everyday players. I remember in the '90's when the Phillies moved Hollins from third to first, a lot of the sabermetricians I knew back then downright howled in disapproval.

[allentown]

It is interesting how modern analytics seems to support this newfangled trend of multiposition everyday players.

I'd be interested exactly which metrics show that and what the difference is. It seems totally counter-intuitive to think this approach could possibly improve defense. It has value in getting a guy like Kingery MLB ABs which he otherwise wouldn't get and it permits a smaller bench, but you don't need this level of position shifting to operate a smaller bench. It does make more double shifts possible when a reliever is brought in, but that can leave you in a tie game with Hoskins on the bench.

[andyb]

I think the bigger difference with analytics is the use of more relief pitchers. This shortens the bench. And on a shorter bench the versatile multi-position player is more valuable.

Longer benches also provided more pinch hitting opportunities. But conversely the number of times you need to go deep on a bench (extra innings) is limited, so the extra pitchers are more important in day to day use than the extra pinch hitters where fatigue is not an issue.

We'll have to pinch hit a pitcher 10 times a year (Arrieta or Lively). The addition of an 8th member of the bullpen who pitches 60 innings is just more valuable than the situations where you lack a pinch hitter.