Phillies front office went wrong with starting pitching

Where did Phillies GM Matt Klentak go wrong when assembling the 2019 Phillies? It all lies in the most important part of the game: starting pitching.

A frustrating 6-3 loss to the Boston Red Sox on Sunday has officially put the Phillies near the brink. Trailing in the Wild-Card race by 4.5 games, which can grow to five by the end of Monday, the team is unofficially done, as fans have given up hope and turned their attention to football season. Attendance has been lousy, and rightfully so.

Perhaps the attendance woes result from the front office coming out two weeks before the trade deadline and saying “if we don’t, we don’t” regarding the team’s playoff hopes. Why should paying customers come to see the team play when the front office doesn’t seem to care about the product?

In addition, despite an “objectively excellent” offseason in which fans were told the Phillies would win 90 games, The Phillies are 76-72 with 14 games left on the schedule that includes three at Atlanta, three at Cleveland (with the Indians in the thick of their Wild-Card chase), five at Washington, and three at home to close out the season against the Marlins.

The Phillies would have to go 4-10 to close out the season to match last year’s record. And they very well might, which is an utter failure by general manager Matt Klentak after adding Bryce Harper, J.T. Realmuto, Andrew McCutchen, Jean Segura, and David Robertson. I know McCutchen and Robertson are hurt, but two players going down should not have been the demise of this team.

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Do you notice a pattern with those additions? Not one of those players is a starting pitcher. Nick Pivetta, touted by many to have a breakout season, has been relegated to mop-up man after a 1.53 WHIP, 5.52 ERA, and a -0.5 WAR in 91.1 innings this year. Vince Velasquez still can’t pitch past the fifth inning. Zach Eflin threw two complete games early in the season but has since struggled to find any semblance of consistency.

To patch up the lack of starting pitching acquisitions early in the year, Klentak went out and acquired Drew Smyly and Jason Vargas. Smyly has pitched like a fourth or fifth starter, but it is unfair to throw him into the fire as a No. 2 or No. 3 guy. I’d be interested in bringing Smyly back on a one or two-year deal to be a back-end rotation guy. Vargas has been lousy and has a 7.63 ERA in his last four starts.

Here is a list of the last 10 Phillies starting pitching lines (most recent first):

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• 3 IP, 3 H, 1 BB, 4 ER, 6 K, 71 pitches
• 7 IP, 4 H, 3 BB, 1 ER, 9 K, 103 pitches (Aaron Nola)
• 4 IP, 4 H, 1 BB, 3 ER, 6 K, 80 pitches
• 3.2 IP, 3 H, 3 BB, 0 ER, 5 K, 95 pitches
• 3 IP, 6 H, 3 BB, 2 ER, 3 K, 77 pitches
• 6 IP, 6 H, 4 BB, 4 ER, 7 K, 99 pitches (Aaron Nola)
• 4.1 IP, 6 H, 4 BB, 4 ER, 5 K, 96 pitches
• 7 IP, 4 H, 2 BB, 0 ER, 6 K, 108 pitches
• 5 IP, 6 H, 0 BB, 2 ER, 6 K, 86 pitches
• 5.1 IP, 4 H, 0 BB, 2 ER, 6 K, 82 pitches

Smyly was the last Phillies pitcher not named Aaron Nola to get out of the sixth inning. But more astonishing is the number of pitches that each of those starters has thrown in such few innings.

The farm system consists of few pitching prospects after dealing Sixto Sanchez for Realmuto. Adonis Medina went 7-7 with a 4.94 ERA in Double-A this year. Spencer Howard looked good in Double-A, but he only has 30.2 innings to his record in Reading. The list after these two is slim.

Free agents on next year’s market include Gerrit Cole (29 years old), Zack Wheeler (30), Madison Bumgarner (30), Cole Hamels (36), Rick Porcello (31), Dallas Keuchel (32), Hyun-Jin Ryu (33), Tanner Roark (33), Jake Odorizzi (30), and others. If Klentak is still around after this year and doesn’t want to sign anyone, he needs to find a way to trade for someone with a thin prospect pool, most of which consists of position players.

In all, the Phillies are where they are right now because of neglect to recognize a problem with starting pitching. You need starting pitching to win, and their options are slim unless they opt to vault over the Luxury Tax threshold next year. But being told “if we don’t, we don’t” does not make me believe that the Phillies front office is particularly worried about the consequences.