Phillies Pharm Report

Currently, there are four Phillies minor league teams in action. In the last week, I’ve seen two of them in person. A fifth, the Williamsport Crosscutters, will get underway in June.

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There were highs, such as Lakewood taking three of four from the Savannah Sand Gnats, and the low of finding out that Rawlings Golden Glove 2nd baseman Carlos Alonso was lost for the season to injury.

The four Phillies farm teams have accumulated a combined record of 50-58 thus far in the first month of the 2015 season. Most of that negative mark comes from AAA, where Lehigh Valley is a dozen games under the .500 mark. Lakewood and Clearwater are battling right around.500, and Reading has a winning record.

Lakewood BlueClaws (Low-A):

One could say, “As Carlos Tocci and Rhys Hoskins go, so goes the team”: if Tocci and Hoskins hit, the BlueClaws win. If they do not hit, the BlueClaws lose. In the last 2 games of the week, Tocci went 1 for 8, Hoskins 1 for 9 and the BlueClaws lost. In the prior six games, Tocci was 14 for 25, Hoskins 12 for 23 and the BlueClaws won five of the six.

The starting pitchers also have struggled in those two most recent games. Ricardo Pinto and Josh Taylor were hit hard and took the losses. In the three games prior, Lakewood received outstanding starts from Ranfi Casimiro with 5 shut out innings, Chris Oliver over 7 shut out innings, and Elniery Garcia, who pitched 6 innings giving up only 3 hits. All three pitchers earned victories.

Lakewood has a 13-14 current record, sitting in 4th place of 7 teams in the South Atlantic League Northern Division, 5.5 games behind the first place Hickory Crawdads.

Clearwater Threshers (High-A):

The 2015 Threshers have been led by the bats of Willians Astudillo, Drew Stankiewicz and Andrew Knapp. All three have been hitting at .300 or higher this season.

Pitching has been up and down, Brandon Leibrant has become one of the top pitchers in the Florida State League. The left hander has a 2-1 record with an ERA of 1.74 with of the lowest WHIPs at 0.84.

Two other pitchers have been outstanding, David Whitehead has struck out 38 in 35.2 innings and Mark Leiter Jr., who has joined the starting rotation after pitching out of the bullpen earlier in the season. Leiter has struck out 27 in 20 innings of work, and has an impressive 0.95 WHIP.

The Phillies top minor league prospect, shortstop JP Crawford, made his season debut in Clearwater, going 2-3 with a home run and 3 RBIs, and will give the Threshers a much needed boost for as long as he stays. It is anticipated that he will move up to Reading at some point.

So far on the season, the Threshers are at 14-14, good for 3rd place in the North Division of the Florida State League, 3 games behind the first place Daytona Tortugas.

Reading Fightin Phils (AA):

The Fightins suffered a huge blow with the loss of 2B Carlos Alonso to a torn knee ligament in a game against the Harrisburg Senators on what manager Dusty Watham called a “dirty slide” while he was trying to turn a double play.

The top hitters are DH/1B Art Charles who’s batting .333, and CF Roman Quinn hitting .310 and leading the league with 5 triples. The leaders in RBI are 1B Brock Stassi with 20 and LF Aaron Altherr with 16.

Pitcher Aaron Nola with a 3-2 record and 2.27 ERA, and Ben Lively with a 2-0 and 2.16 ERA have been the aces of Reading’s starting pitching staff. The Fightins are also looking to fill a hole in the staff caused by Elvis Araujo‘s call-up to the Phillies.

Reading, led by a strong 5-man starting rotation of highly valued prospects, has the best record in the Phillies farm system at 15-10, placing them in second place, 3 1/2 games behind the New Britain Rock Cats in the Eastern Division of the Eastern League.

Lehigh Valley IronPigs (AAA):

The Pigs have been led by the offense of LF Brian Bogusevic, who is hitting .347 for the season and .425 in the last 10 games. 3rd baseman Maikel Franco, who is expected to be recalled soon to the Phillies, is hitting .327, and in the last 2 games has gone 5-9 with 5 RBI. They have also been helped by the rehabbing Domonic Brown, who was optioned to the Pigs from the Phillies. In his last 10 games Brown has heated up a bit, having gone 12-41 for a .293 average and 9 RBI.

Pitching has received a boost with the addition of RHP Severino Gonzalez, returned to them by the Phillies after two starts in the majors in which Gonzalez picked up his first MLB win. Phillippe Aumont has been moved to starter and has been up and down in his two appearances. In his first start, Aumont pitched 5 innings of shut out baseball. In his second start, he lasted only 3 innings and gave up 6 hits and 3 runs and took the lost. He has a 1-1 record. RHP David Buchanon was returned to the Pigs after a terrible April with the big club, and recorded a win in his first start.

The Pigs have been struggling but have come back to life, winning their last two games, bringing their record to 8-20. They are in last place in the Northern Division of the International League.