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Phillies

Bryce Harper After Phillies’ Fifth Straight Loss: “Urgency Should Always Be There”

Anthony SanFilippo

By Anthony SanFilippo

Published:

Photo Credit: Bill Streicher-USA TODAY Sports

The Phillies’ clubhouse used to be a vibrant atmosphere with music blaring, lots of laughs, with a few guys having a celebratory beverage together in tribute to a job well done.

I’m not talking about last Fall either, when backup catcher Garrett Stubbs’ Spotify playlist went absolutely viral and an entire region learned the lyrics to Calum Scott’s Dancing on My Own remix.

Nope, I’m talking about last month.

After a slow start, the Phillies started to measurably pick things up and get back to the team everyone thought they’d be in 2023. They clawed their way back from a terrible 1-5 start to get to the .500 mark, taking 2 of 3 from another one of 2022’s baseball darlings, the Seattle Mariners.

You would walk into the clubhouse and that air of confidence and belief was almost palpable. This team is unfazed. They are resilient. They believe in each other. Combine that with the talent that fills the room based on the numbers on the back of their baseball cards, and it wasn’t too difficult to see why expectations for another red october were so high.

Nine days later, the same place, with the same players visibly frustrated. You walked into the clubhouse and there was frustration on every face, in every movement. Small attempts at humor were shrugged off. Certain questions from reporters annoyed more than usual. All of a sudden, a team that was feeling itself just the week prior was searching for answers.

A six-game losing streak will do that to you.

But then something funny happened – they started winning again. This time they’d rattle off five straight wins, the first three against some potently good offenses. And once again, you got the sense that everything was all right and the week before was just a blip on the radar.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice…

Since then, it’s been misery. Shut out in Colorado – who gets shut out in that ballpark? Swept by a terrible San Francisco team. Come home and get bludgeoned 10-1 by a Cubs team that had, itself, lost five straight and were 5-14 in the previous 19 games.

When you walked into that clubhouse Friday night, it was different yet again. This time, it was like Centralia, PA.

It was a veritable ghost town.

And just like that old mining town just north of Reading, there’s a fire still burning beneath the town, (which led to it’s evacuation in the 1980s. Look it up. It’s an interesting story. I think there are actually four residents still living there).

Ranger Suarez, the latest Phillies starter to look completely lost on the mound, was sitting at his locker waiting to do his duty in telling us it was just a bad outing and that he felt fine. A few players who didn’t play in the game sat quietly at their locker. Nick Castellanos, who is in his seat after every game, win or lose, was still there, but he’s been such a go-to guy for the media all season that there was this unspoken feeling of giving the guy a break after this one…. and that’s about it.

Guys like J.T. Realmuto, Brandon Marsh, and Kyle Schwarber were nowhere to be seen. Bryson Stott shuffled off to the shower when we walked in and didn’t re-emerge. Trea Turner was already dressed, with his backpack on and headed for the door within seconds of our arrival.

So, after two minutes with Suarez, we stood around waiting for someone, anyone to comment.

Finally, Bryce Harper invited everyone to his locker. He had some things to say.

It was like he was The Gambler in that old Kenny Rogers song:

And the night got deathly quiet and his face lost all expression

Said, “If you’re gonna play the game, boy

You gotta learn to play it right.”

“It’s on us,” Harper said. “Each guy in this clubhouse should be frustrated with the way we’re playing right now. The mistakes we’re making, we’re not playing the game the right way… You guys see what’s going on. You can’t play like that if you want to be a winning ball club. We gotta be better and we gotta start that tomorrow.”

Harsh words from a team’s best player who is seeing his squad off to vastly disappointing 20-24 start that suddenly has them eight games out of first place.

Obviously, there’s been a lot of talk in the clubhouse about this start. But the time for talking is over. The time for doing is upon a Phillies team that is burning up all their mulligans once again before Memorial Day.

Harper doesn’t care what time of year it is or where a team is at in the standings. He believes a specific mindset is needed at all times – and from all players.

“Every game means something,” he said. “Urgency should always be there. … Each guy in here understands that. We got to be better. We have to play clean baseball. Each guy has to do their job. Each guy has to look at themselves and know what that job needs to be each day. … We can’t forget we’re a really good baseball team too. … That’s not what should have happened tonight.”

Everyone is frustrated. The fans are frustrated. There were healthy boos during the game – especially for guys like Trea Turner and Kyle Schwarber, two of the team’s stars who are really feeling the pressure of elongated slumps right now.

“We need to get it going,” manager Rob Thomson said. “We really do. We need to find our way out of this thing. What is it? Win four, lost six, win five, lose five. I’m not sure I’ve seen a stretch like this. We have to figure it out.”

And the glaring problems continue to fester. It’s not a situation where it’s a run of bad luck anymore, or that it’s just a slump of which they can break out. No. It’s much more than that.

Ranger Danger

Suarez was all over the place. He lasted all of two innings, throwing 66 pitches. He allowed four runs on five hits, three walks and had four strikeouts.

His second inning was something I can’t imagine has happened many times in the history of baseball.

The first six batters he faced reached base via a hit or a walk, and then he struck out the last three guys. But the damage was done – and not just on the scoreboard:

Once again, the Phillies had to tax the bullpen. Ultimately, the Phillies used seven pitchers before having Kody Clemens make his third appearance of the season to get the last two outs of the game, bottoming out with 46MPH sliders.

The fact that the Phillies have turned to position players to pitch five times in the first 44 games is alarming.

But the reality is that the starters aren’t helping at all.

In the 44 games, 25 times the Phillies had to use at least five pitchers and eight times they had to use at least six. Also, not counting the game in which Connor Brogdon was used as an opener against the Giants, Phillies pitchers have failed to go five innings in a start 16 times already. They had an additional nine starts that didn’t get through the sixth, meaning 25-of-43 games started by a real starting pitcher has required the bullpen to enter the game before the end of the sixth inning.

Not good.

It’s being exacerbated by the failings of Bailey Falter, who was demoted to the minors, leaving the Phillies uncertain of what their No. 5 spot in the rotation is going to look like.

It seemed like the plan was simply to throw a bullpen game Sunday,, but after Suarez’s short outing needed seven innings of relief, that’s in danger if Aaron Nola can’t give the team length on Saturday.

The Phillies don’t have any minor league options at this point either, unless they want to lose someone off the 40-man roster.

They won’t call up either Christopher Sanchez or Michael Plassmeyer. Both have been disappointing at AAA Lehigh Valley, and neither will be rested enough to get the call. Nick Nelson is back on the minor league IL after re-aggravating his hamstring.

As far as guys not on the 40-man roster, T.J. Zeuch, who they acquired from Colorado on the eve of the season opener, and Jon Duplantier, the former Arizona Diamondback prospect who signed a minor league deal in the offseason, are both injured. That leaves Noah Skirrow, who was pitching well for Lehigh Valley until has last start. But, would you blow someone off the 40-man roster just to get a spot start or two from Skirrow? Unlikely.

While the bullpen has been the most reliable part of the Phillies team this season, making a bullpen game every fifth day until a better option emerges not the worst idea, the Phillies can’t rely on that possibility if Suarez and Taijuan Walker, who has been another disappointment, can’t at least go five innings in their starts.

Wake Up the Bats

Look, starting pitching is a real issue, but the Phillies lineup is equally perplexing. On Friday, Stott lead off with a single, then after one out Bryce Harper doubled. The Phillies would have 31 more plate appearances in the game after that. The only one that resulted in a hit was a leadoff single by Edmundo Sosa in the third inning.

That’s it.

Before the game, the focus was on not hitting with runners in scoring position (RISP) – and they haven’t – but it’s tough to hit with RISP if you can’t even get them there.

The Phillies ended up 0-for-3 with RISP in the game, making them 2-for-42 during this five-game losing streak.

And while it was hardly a key component of this one, Phillies hitting coach Kevin Long told reporters before the game that we were making too big a deal out of this.

“If it was, I don’t know, 50 games? Forty games? Four games, that’s a little unfair. It’s just not enough sample size,” he said.

Although he continued his comments and said it does need to be better than what they have provided this week, Long, like Thomson, stands by the belief in his players that they will figure it out and get going in the right direction.

But the reality is it’s not just be four (now five) games. It has been 44. Has it been exacerbated by this losing streak? Yes. But the reality is, the Phillies have been terrible with RISP all season.

League average: .254/.336/.415 .751 OPS

Phillies: .230/.315/.321 .636 OPS

The slugging percentage is the worst in baseball. They have also struck out 105 times in 444 plate appearances with RISP. And, with two outs, it gets worse:

Phillies: .225/.341/.310 .651 OPS; 50K in 220 PA

Stott, Turner and Schwarber specifically have been brutal. Entering play Friday, they were hitting a combined .155 with RISP. Schwarber was the only one of the three who came up with RISP in the game. He struck out.

Send a message?

Thomson is not a manager who likes to send messages to his players. That’s why they love him. He’s a players’ manager and lets them figure it out on their own. He’s loyal, almost to a fault sometimes, trotting the same guys out there in the same sots in the lineup, believing in their talents and abilities and that in the long run, those will shine through more than their flaws.

But it’s hard to look at guys like Turner and Schwarber right now and feel like they’re going to get through it. It’s impacting other parts of their game as well. Schwarber misplayed a single into a double in left field Friday. Originally it was recorded as an error – and it was. But then the official scorer absurdly changed it.

Turner booted a grounder to short that ended up costing the Phillies three runs.

He was booed a few times by a fan base growing annoyed with his subpar play:

One guy who has flown under the radar with his futility of late is Marsh – whose overall numbers are still very good, but that’s because he was otherworldly the first three weeks of the season.

Since April 20 – so one month – Marsh is slashing .194/.356/.299 for a .655 OPS with just one homer and five RBI.

Yes, he’s walking more, which is good, but his offense has all but dried up. A .299 slugging percentage is woeful.

Maybe it’s time for Thomson to start giving guys a day off. Turner hasn’t had one. Maybe sitting him a game would shake the cobwebs. Schwarber, too. Marsh has had games off, but only against lefties, so it’s not like it’s been as a result of a lack of production.

It might be time to start trying things these guys don’t expect, because letting it go and putting the onus on them to fix it while playing, doesn’t seem to be working.

Anthony SanFilippo
Anthony SanFilippo

Anthony SanFilippo writes about the Phillies and Flyers for Crossing Broad and hosts a pair of related podcasts (Crossed Up and Snow the Goalie). A part of the Philadelphia sports media for a quarter century, Anthony also dabbles in acting, directing, teaching, and strategic marketing, which is why he has no time to do anything, but does it anyway. Follow him on Twitter @AntSanPhilly.

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