Phillies Talking with Roy Halladay About Potential Role with Team
By John Town
The Phillies and Roy Halladay are in talks about Halladay working with the team in some capacity as soon as the end of spring training this year.
Former Phillies pitcher Roy Halladay may be feeling the itch to get back into baseball, and he may soon get that opportunity. According to Todd Zolecki of MLB.com, the team and 39-year old Halladay are in talks about Halladay possibly working with the team.
While it is uncertain what role Halladay will fill, Zolecki wrote, “it seems likely he will be roaming Spectrum Field and Carpenter Complex in a Phillies uniform before the end of Spring Training.”
Halladay was a guest instructor in spring training with the Phils back in 2014 the year after his retirement. However, he has not worked with the team since in that role, but he did speak at the team’s prospect seminar last year.
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Halladay lives near Clearwater in Oldsmar, Fla., so he could easily work with the team. He was in Clearwater over the weekend for a gala where he was honored. Phils prospect Nick Pivetta, who grew up in Canada as a fan of the former Blue Jay, got to meet “The Doc.”
Pivetta told Matt Breen of Philly.com:
"“I got to briefly shake his hand. He knew I was like a stalker. There are hundreds of things I respected about him, but, the one thing is the way he went about his business and how hard he worked. From day one, I’ve realized how hard he worked and what kind of pitcher and role model he was for everyone else, his teammates. That resonated with me. That’s what I want to do when I get older and I’m more established.”"
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One area where Halladay could help the team’s pitchers is in their mental approach to the game. Halladay says sports psychologist Harvey Dorfman and his book, “The Mental ABC’s of Pitching”, were a huge part of his success in the major-leagues. When he was still on the team, Halladay would give out copies of the book to the young pitchers in the clubhouse.
It helps that Halladay was a Hall of Fame-caliber pitcher. Halladay had a career 203-105 record to go along with a 3.38 ERA and 1.178 WHIP. He won two Cy Young awards – one in each league – along with being named an All-Star eight times.
His career JAWS of 57.6 ranks among the likes of current Hall of Famers Bob Feller, Juan Marichal, and Hal Newhouser.
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The presence of one of Philadelphia’s best pitchers in recent years could very well help many of the team’s young pitchers as they develop into major-league starters.