Phillies 2020 Player Grades: Heath Hembree, David Hale
Grading the 2020 season of Phillies relievers Heath Hembree and David Hale.
The Phillies acquired four relievers ahead of the 2020 season trade deadline — Brandon Workman and Heath Hembree from the Boston Red Sox, David Hale from the New York Yankees, and David Phelps from the Milwaukee Brewers.
General manager Matt Klentak made the deals because most Phillies bullpen relievers proved to be incapable of pitching in the Major Leagues. The Phillies were running out of options.
Hembree and Hale weren’t stars, but they both had significant MLB experience and had some success at the big-league level for their previous teams. The Phillies did not ask them to be great; they just needed them to be adequate. Here’s how they performed.
Heath Hembree
Hembree came over to Philadelphia as the second piece acquired from the Red Sox in the deal that sent Nick Pivetta and Connor Seabold to the Red Sox. While Workman was the centerpiece of the deal, the club valued Hembree as well.
From 2013-2019, Heath Hembree pitched out of the bullpen in 249 games and had a 3.52 ERA. While he never had a standout season (like Workman’s 2019), and although his underlying numbers were never as impressive as his ERA, he had proved himself capable of pitching in a Major League bullpen.
Unfortunately, Hembree had the worst season of his career in 2020. He posted a 12.54 ERA and never managed to string together consecutive outings without allowing a run. His advanced stats were awful, too. He had a 13.05 FIP, a 279 ERA, and even his xFIP was an atrocious 6.60.
Hold on, though, because it gets worse. He finished the season with -0.8 fWAR in 11 games for the Phils. That was the worst fWAR on the entire team. Not only that, but it’s the worst fWAR for a Phillies pitcher since Brad Lidge put up -0.8 fWAR in 2009. And Lidge pitched 67 games that year. Hembree pitched just 11.
When the Phils acquired Hembree, they hoped to keep him under team control for 2021 as well. However, he pitched so poorly in 2020 that the Phillies decided to part ways with him early this offseason.
RHP. Philadelphia Phillies. HEATH HEMBREE. F.
There isn’t anything positive to say about Hembree’s 2020 season; he was among the worst relief pitchers in all of baseball. He had the highest FIP, the highest HR/9, the second-highest ERA, and the lowest fWAR among all major league relievers.
Grade: F
Grading Phillies reliever David Hale’s 2020 season
Right-hander David Hale was the first reliever the Phillies acquired during the 2020 season — and arguably the most effective. Yet, he made the fewest appearances of the Phillies four trade acquisitions.
The team landed Hale from the New York Yankees on August 21. However, he didn’t appear in a game for the Phils until August 30, after the also-acquired Heath Hembree and Brandon Workman already made multiple appearances for the team.
Hale’s appearances were few and far between; while Workman, Hembree, and David Phelps frequently pitched on back-to-back days or every other day, Hale almost always went four to six days between appearances.
Neither Joe Girardi nor Matt Klentak ever acknowledged why Hale pitched so infrequently. This was particularly frustrating to Phillies fans, considering that the team gave up a promising young prospect in the Hale trade — Addison Russ — who was ranked among the team’s top-30 prospects.
When Hale did pitch, he was perfectly competent, which is all the Phillies needed from him. His ERA was a non-ideal 4.09, but his strikeout to walk ratio of 7.00 was stellar. Also, Hale’s 1.64 HR/9 wasn’t great, but compared to some of the other Phils relievers, it was good enough.
C. . RHP. Philadelphia Phillies. DAVID HALE
It’s hard to grade Hale’s season when he pitched in so few games. Should Girardi be blamed for not using Hale enough? Or should we presume that Girardi had a good reason not to trust Hale? It’s hard to say, so I’ll just grade Hale based on numbers he put up in his six games here.
Grade: C
Phillies 2020 Season Player Grades: JoJo Romero. light. More