Phillies bullpen still struggles to find its rhythm even after trade deadline: ‘It’s not a great feeling’

Coming into the trade deadline, the Phillies bullpen had an ERA of 4.40. 

It had been a struggle leading up to the date. The only trustworthy reliever the Phils could use was Jhoan Duran. Maybe a little bit of Tim Mayza. Besides that, everyone else was hard to trust. 

Brad Keller was brought in to be the setup man in the offseason. He struggled over 32 games before undergoing UCL surgery. Orion Kerkering has struggled mightily in high-stakes situations. Jose Alvarado and Tanner Banks have not been good all season, and now Banks is sitting on the 60-day injured list.

So what did the Phillies do at the deadline?

They grabbed one of the best left-handed relievers available on the market, which was Brooks Raley of the rival Mets. He got hit with the Phillies’ bullpen curse and gave up two runs and only recorded one out. They also got right-hander Caleb Kilian from the Giants in the deal as well.

Now, one bad outing doesn’t define your time here with the club, and this isn’t focused on Raley, nor Killian. It’s focused on the disaster that the Phillies bullpen has been in the series against the Toronto Blue Jays.

After taking three of four from the Washington Nationals, the Phils wanted to take advantage against the reigning American League champions, who haven’t been playing the best baseball all season. 

And the Phillies had a chance in two out of those three games. On Saturday night, they got five quality innings from Aaron Nola and had gotten to the Jays bullpen to take a 4-2 lead heading into the eighth inning. 

Alvarado came in and gave up two walks to put runners on first and second, and with Alvarado getting Andres Gimenez down to 0-2, he gave up a two-run game-tying double.

34 relievers have made at least 50 appearances this year, and his 5.77 ERA is the highest in that group.

“That’s where he gets them in and walks two guys, puts you in a spot,” interim manager Don Mattingly said. “Anytime your guy’s out there walking guys, that makes you uncomfortable, especially late in the game.”

It didn’t get any better, as with the game heading into extras, the Phillies used Chase Shugart for two innings of relief. He gave up three runs in the two innings, including the final blow, a go-ahead two-run home run to Nathan Lukes. The Blue Jays won, 7-5.

Mattingly referred to the move as “emergency territory.”

“It’s not a great feeling,” Mattingly said. “When you’re rested, it’s better. But it’s kind of getting to that time of year. We had some starts that were a little bit uncharacteristic, and that has caused us to go into the bullpen more.”

It’s obvious that the Phillies bullpen is worn out, and that showed on full display on Sunday afternoon with yet another blown save.

And it felt like the same thing happened for the second straight day. They got seven fantastic innings and 12 strikeouts from Jesus Luzardo.

So what does Kerkering do? 

Give up three runs off three bloop singles and a double to tie the game. In his last ten outings, he has an 11.74 ERA and 2.09 WHIP in only 7.2 innings. He’s given up ten runs in that stretch.

The Phillies had Raley up and ready for him to face the lefty. But Mattingly pulled his cards and left him out there, thereby giving up the tying hit. 

And that took the game all the way to 12 innings, in which the Phillies were able to salvage the final game of the series, but that isn’t the whole point here. It’s a real possibility this all doesn’t happen today if Mattingly makes the right move at the right time. 

“The [Kerkering] inning where he gets two outs and four hits, I don’t think anything got over 70 miles an hour,” Mattingly said. “It’s crazy what’s going on, but again, we hang in there.”

Now, that same bullpen has an ERA of 6.08 after the trade deadline passed, and after a 4-3 homestand, they go to take on two tough opponents in St. Louis and Minnesota. Even with two new additions, the Phillies will still have a lot of work to do for the home stretch of the season. 

“Everybody out there right now,” Mattingly said. “At some point, hopefully we’re going to be able to reset.”

And to make matters worse, Killian suffered a rib injury on his final pitch of Sunday’s game.

“It didn’t look good,” Mattingly said.

Yet another blow.

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