Has Joe Girardi disappointed so far as Phillies manager?
By Matt Rappa
Thirty games into the 2021 season, both the Joe Girardi-led Philadelphia Phillies and Gabe Kapler-led San Francisco Giants respectively find themselves atop the National League East and West divisions.
Kapler’s team, however, has three more wins than Girardi’s (18) — scoring 15 more runs on offense while allowing 31 fewer runs on the mound.
There is heavy debate that Phillies manager Joe Girardi has disappointed.
Whether it be sloppy base running or defense, blunders — such as the Enyel De Los Santos lineup card fiasco or visiting the mound more times than allowed in an inning — or losing seven of eight games to end the 2020 season (just one win short of the postseason), it just seems as though the start to Girardi’s tenure in red pinstripes has been a disappointment.
Wednesday afternoon on SportsRadio 94 WIP, well-respected sportswriter Ray Didinger agreed. “When I when I arrived today, I heard a caller say, ‘If Gabe Kapler had done some of the things that Joe Girardi has done, people would be up in arms.’ They would be destroying him,” Didinger said. “That’s all we would be talking about.”
Didinger added that he believes fans have been reluctant to criticize Girardi because they respect his track record while managing the New York Yankees, and at the same time are glad to be free of Kapler.
“They saw Girardi as a giant step forward, so they were kind of a little reluctant to give up on that thought,” Didinger said. “At this point, yeah, I’m disappointed. I thought that this would be a better disciplined team. I thought it would be a better fundamentals team. I’m just not seeing it.”
Only four shortstops and third basemen in the majors have committed more fielding errors than Didi Gregorius (5) and Alec Bohm (4), respectively. Coincidentally, Kapler’s Giants have committed the fewest errors in the majors this season (8), besting the Phillies by seven mishaps.
Bullpen-wise, Phillies relievers have combined for a 5.13 ERA, the sixth-worst in MLB and the fourth-worst in the National League.
“Last year, the bullpen was terrible. We all know that. There’s no point even trying to discuss that anymore,” Didinger continued. “They were losing games because the bullpen threw games away and people criticized the way Girardi was ‘managing his bullpen.’ Well, they had no choice. There wasn’t anybody out there that could get anybody out. There were no good choices out there. There were only bad choices. If he had to go to the bullpen, it was blind luck for him to come up with someone to get him out of an inning.”
While Didinger does not hold the near all-time-worst 2020 Phillies bullpen against Girardi, he figured that this season he would use his strength and reputation form New York of managing a bullpen well.
“Now, it helps tremendously when you have Mariano Rivera, but that was one of his great strengths as a manager,” Didinger said. “Well, we haven’t seen any evidence of it here. They’ve almost lost a couple of games the last two nights because the bullpen failed him.
“I think it was largely because the manager set them up to fail.”
Ninety games as Phillies manager, Girardi is just 43-47, a .478 winning percentage. Considering he had a .562 winning percentage across 10 seasons at the helm of the Yankees, coupled with a 2009 World Series champion, it is fair to say Phillies fans expect much more out of him.