This just in…
Posted by Carl on July 4, 2008
The Philadelphia Inquirer is reporting that FLP, J.A. Happ will make his first start for Philly in ‘08 tonight against the New York Mets and (gulp) one Johan Santana. There’d been a great deal of speculation about who would fill the open roster spot in Philadelphia after Brett Myers was optioned to the Triple-A city that shall remain nameless.
The Phillies won’t really need a fifth starter until Saturday when they face the Mets. The problem with that though is that Cole Hamels and Jamie Moyer were set to pitch the first two games against New York and the Phillies might want to keep it that way. The option would be to find someone to make a start against the Braves Thursday night in Atlanta.
J.A. Happ ( 5-6, 3.54 ) has been pitching well at Lehigh Valley (ed: Triple A city that shall remain nameless) and it’s long been whispered that he might be the next one to get the call. One issue with bringing Happ into the rotation is that he would add another left-hander, giving them three left-handers in the rotation. Happ was 3-1, 2.51 in five starts in June and last pitched on Saturday, putting him on a schedule that would have him pitch next on Thursday.
It’s not likely that Happ’s new teammate, Kris Benson, who made a rehab start with the IronPigs on Monday is ready to pitch in the big leagues just yet. Benson needs to keep picking up some velocity, which will come as he adds arm strength, but for now, he’s not likely to be a candidate. The only other Triple-A pitcher who would really warrant any consideration would be lefty Brian Mazone ( 8-6, 3.28 ) who has been steady all season, even through the early season struggles that the IronPigs (ed: team formerly known as the Ottawa Lynx) faced when they lost 23 of their first 25 games.
The pitching staff is pretty well loaded at Double-A Reading if the Phillies want to dig deeper into the minor league system. With Antonio Bastardo on the DL, Carlos Carrasco ( 5-7, 4.18 ) would seemingly be the best pick out of the Double-A ranks. The bad news is that Carrasco is coming off his worst month of the season and has seen his ERA jump over a full run in the past month. Carrasco last pitched on Friday night, putting him on schedule to pitch again Wednesday night, but pushing him to Thursday would be no problem at all.
The Phillies could put together a “bullpen game” and just run a bunch of relievers out to the mound for a game either against Atlanta or New York, but that’s not exactly a great situation. If they do, Steve Green ( 4-0, 3.08 ) could be a nice addition to the bullpen and he did make one spot start for Lehigh Valley and gave them four very strong innings.
Finally, the Phillies could go outside the organization. A phone call to Shawn Chacon? Not likely, although it’s not out of the question. Maybe the Phillies will finally pull the trigger to get one of the starters out there - Randy Wolf, Dan Haren, Ian Snell, Ben Sheets or a list of others - who have been floated on the trade market early on.
You will recall of course, that initially the thinking was that guys like J.A., Zack Segovia and Joe Bisenius (among others) had poor seasons in Ottawa because of the weather. Turns out all three were playing with fairly significant injuries.
Nice to see J.A. get his shot on the 4th of July.
“This could be your golden opportunity…”
