Bullpen shaping up as Phillies’ biggest trade-deadline need after fumbling three-run lead in walk-off loss to Twins
Orion Kerkering struggled to throw strikes in the seventh inning, while Gregory Soto showed a lack of command in the ninth.
MINNEAPOLIS — Let it be said that the Phillies’ first six games after the All-Star break shined a spotlight on their most urgent need at the trade deadline.
Reliever wanted.
A road trip that started with a ninth-inning meltdown by one hard-throwing lefty (José Alvarado) ended with an all-out lack of command from another (Gregory Soto). The latter resulted in a 5-4 walk-off gut punch by the Twins in a Wednesday matinee, bookended Alvarado’s blown save five nights earlier in Pittsburgh, and maybe crystalized the front office’s approach before the deadline at 6 p.m. Tuesday.
“We can’t let two games get away from us in the last two series like that,” Bryce Harper said after the Phillies fumbled a 4-1 lead in the seventh inning. “That just can’t happen. For us to be a winning ball club and a winning team, that just can’t happen.”
Soto was installed this week as a late-inning alternative while Alvarado regroups. He was an All-Star closer with the Tigers, so before president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski spends trade capital on a reliever, it was worth finding out if Soto is an internal solution, especially because the Phillies are also shopping for a righty-hitting outfielder.
But Soto has been prone to lapses in control throughout his career. And when he entered a 4-4 game in the ninth inning, he couldn’t find the strike zone with a GPS. After missing badly with two pitches to Trevor Larnach, he drilled him, then uncorked a wild pitch to the next batter.
Larnach went to third on a sacrifice bunt before lefty-hitting Max Kepler, who drew a four-pitch walk from Soto on Tuesday night, chopped an infield single to drive in the winning run.
It took all of 12 pitches. Only six were strikes.
“I’m not disappointed,” Soto said through a team interpreter. “I’m just going out to compete. If anything, I’m thankful for the opportunities they have given me, and I know that there will be many more to come.”
Asked to clarify, Soto indicated he wouldn’t feel disappointed with one rotten inning. The outcome was a different story. But it wasn’t clear that manager Rob Thomson will give Soto another shot to seize the ninth-inning role.
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“I thought he would, and maybe he will,” Thomson said. “He’s just not attacking the zone like he was in his last 10-11 outings before these last two. I’ll talk with him and make sure that he’s still got his confidence level, and he has the ability to throw the ball through the zone and get people out.”
Since taking over as manager in June 2022, Thomson has preferred not to designate a closer. Because the Phillies have several relievers with closing experience, he deploys them based on matchups. So, although Jeff Hoffman has been the team’s most dominant reliever, Thomson wanted to use him in the eighth inning against the righty-heavy bottom of the Twins’ order rather than in the ninth against lefty-hitting Larnach and Kepler.
This time, it didn’t work out.
By the middle of next week, Thomson might have other options.
“There’s going to be spots where certain guys are [unavailable] anyway, and then [Soto] has got to take those spots,” Thomson said. “We’ve got to figure out, are these guys capable of doing it? I’m sure they are. But it’s being able to pick the other guys up when they’re down.”
To be fair, it isn’t only Alvarado and Soto who have faltered. After going 13 appearances — a span of 48 batters — without issuing a walk, Orion Kerkering walked back-to-back hitters and hit another in the seventh inning.
Kerkering’s wildness set the stage for the Twins to tie the game. After Matt Strahm inherited a bases-loaded, one-out threat, Carlos Santana blasted a two-run double over the outstretched glove of Brandon Marsh in left-center field.
Marsh was being treated after the game for what Thomson described as a “stinger” in his right shoulder, although the Phillies didn’t consider it to be anything serious.
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The Phillies have lost four of six games since the All-Star break and six of nine overall. At 64-38, they still have the best record in baseball. But it’s their biggest stretch of adversity yet, and it has manifested in ways that go beyond a leaky bullpen.
Through three innings, the Phillies stranded six base runners, par for the course on a road trip that was neither the most productive nor consistent from a hitting standpoint. They have scored in only nine of the last 49 innings.
Harper homered Monday night and started a winning rally in the ninth inning Tuesday. But he went 0-for-5 in the series finale, at one point slamming his bat after being called out on strikes on a pitch that he believed was low.
A sign of frustration?
“There’s no frustration. The frustration is they don’t know how to call balls and strikes,” Harper said. “And they’ve done it the last six games. In Pittsburgh, too. Balls down, not a strike.”
The Phillies finally built a three-run lead when Kyle Schwarber snapped an 0-for-20 skid with a two-run single in the sixth inning and Nick Castellanos singled home a run in the seventh. But the bullpen follies wasted a solid start from Aaron Nola, who cranked up his fastball to 95 mph for a strikeout to sidestep a bases-loaded jam in the sixth inning.
“I think we’re just going through a down stretch right now with our offense a little bit and certainly throwing strikes with our bullpen,” Thomson said. “But these guys are talented enough, I have no worries that they’re not going to come out of it.”
Especially if they get help from Dombrowski.
“Dave’s going to get the job done,” Harper said. “If he wants to.”