Deep Breaths

Photo linked from philly.com

I was going to use Hector Neris as today's Former Phillie of the Day in a fit of wishful thinking after last night's gut-punch "performance." In a span of two hitters, he turned a 1-0 lead into a 3-1 loss. It reminded me a lot of last weekend's blown save against the Nationals. And the Opening Day loss to the Braves, where he gave up a walkoff homer to Nick Markakis.

Neris has already blown 3 saves this season. His first 2 saves came against truly awful teams, Cincinnati and Tampa. He had one good week–3 saves against the Pirates and Diamondbacks in April. He has the second-highest ERA on the team and the second-highest ERA among all closers in baseball. He's starting to remind me of Jose Mesa, who blew 9 saves in 2002.

His numbers are not good. In 15.2 innings, he's allowed 15 hits and 9 walks, which works out to 5.2 walks per 9 innings. If you had a starting pitcher who allowed that many walks, he wouldn't be starting for long. Neris has appeared in 17 games and has allowed a baserunner in all but 5 of them. He's allowed 2 or more baserunners 6 times so far this year. Last season, Neris had just 26 clean innings (no baserunners) in 74.2 innings. I'm just glad he's making a little more than the major league minimum. I can't imagine how angry I'd be if he was making big money.

It might be time to try Luis Garcia as the closer. A young team needs to be able to put games away when they're ahead in the 9th inning. Neris has been doing the closer thing full-time since last season. He's too erratic to count on.

But we need to focus on the positive. The Phillies are 22-16 and have the fifth-best record in the National League. They're a half-game out of first place. If they continue to win at the same rate they have so far this season, they'll finish with 94 wins. Which sounds like enough to make the playoffs.

Last year, the Phillies didn't win their 22nd game until June 15. This year's 22nd win came on May 10. That's 5 weeks earlier.

More positives–Odubel Herrera is an offensive machine. He has reached base in every game he's played in this season and leads the league in hitting at .360.

Carlos Santana and Maikel Franco have shaken off their early season slumps. Franco's average is up to .281 and he leads the team in RBI.  Santana has 26 RBI even though he's still hitting below .200, but his average is up 30 points in the last 2 weeks.

The pitching has been fantastic, except for Neris. Aaron Nola and Jake Arrieta have been tremendous and Nick Pivetta, Vince Velasquez, and Zach Eflin have had their moments. The bullpen, except for Neris, has been solid.

So there's lots of reason for optimism. Except for Neris.