Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Kapler buying into new acquisition Pirela
The earliest of the pre-trade-deadline rumbles began Saturday when the Phillies acquired veteran Jose Pirela from San Diego for cash considerations.
Pirela, 29, can play multiple positions and has had 290 games of major-league experience with the Yankees and Padres. This season, he had played mostly in Class AAA El Paso, where he was hitting.353with18homerunsand59RBIs. He also had two games with the Padres.
He is a career .258 major-league hitter with 16 homers.
“We believe we are going to be playing meaningful games in September, and we want the guys who come up and contribute to be experienced with big atbats,” Gabe Kapler said before a game against the Atlanta Braves. “And he had them both with the Yankees and with the Padres, and has had some success.”
Pirela was not immediately promoted to the Phillies. Should he arrive, Kapler hopes to make the most of his versatility.
“He can play the corners, in the outfield, can play second base,” he said. “He is a good baserunner and definitely a good teammate. And any acquisition we bring, we’d like to have some pretty good teammate behavior.”
Last season, Pirela hit .249 in 146 Padres games, hitting five home runs. In 2017, he hit .288 with 10 home runs and 40 RBIs in 83 games.
“There was some good work done on him,” Kapler said. “He is a native Spanish speaker and a guy that will get along with his teammates. So we’re excited across the board on having Pirela with us.”
Kapler is not so excited, however, that he will campaign for a five-man bench, thus reducing his bullpen from eight to seven.
“I don’t personally think a five-man bench is best for us long-term because of the way we will aggressively use our bullpen,” he said. “And the more highleverage weapons we have in our bullpen, the better.
“But we have been pretty close to having a five-man bench for a shorter period of time and I can see that happening in the next 10 days to two weeks for a short period.”
••• A night after Jake Arrieta faded after four innings then complained of the bone spur in his pitching arm, Kapler acknowledged that the Phillies might consider keeping a long reliever prepared for the right-hander’s remaining starts.
“We can probably have somebody at the ready,” he said. “We want to learn as much as we can before we do that. I don’t feel 1,000-percent confident that he is not going to go out there and have an outing where he goes six and lasts a little longer. But it doesn’t mean we don’t have to be responsible with somebody ready to roll behind him.”
Arrieta, whose arm troubles became public July 7, lasted five innings Friday, allowing four earned runs in a 9-2 defeat.
“I still want to go out there, especially the way I was throwing the ball to start the game,” he said. “I don’t want to pull the shoe unless there’s a reason to do so. Things just compounded pretty quick in the fifth. They scored four runs fast. I never want to pull myself out of the game. We have conversations about how I’m feeling and where I’m at physically.
“It’s tough.”
••• Kapler did some lineup gymnastics Saturday against Braves left-hander Max Fried.
Switch-hitting Cesar Hernandez, who was hitting .302 against righthanders but .220 against lefties, was rested. Scott Kingery started at second base, with Roman Quinn playing center.
“There hasn’t been a lot of damage against left-handed pitchers from Cesar,” Kapler said. “I am not declaring a platoon or anything like that. Don’t expect that to happen. But we have to be cognizant that it hasn’t been good against left-handed pitching thus far this year and respect that by giving us the best chance to win tonight.”
Also, left-handed-hitting Adam Haseley had the night off. Sean Rodriguez, who had 30 home runs and had hit .248 against lefties in his career, started in left.
“It’s a tough breaking ball from Fried for Haseley,” Kapler said. “It’s not necessarily a protection thing. It’s just that putting him in the best possible position to succeed might be sitting him against a tough left-handed pitcher from time to time.”
••• A day later, Kapler was unrepentant about using Cole Irvin for two ineffective innings Friday in what appeared to be an early-game surrender. Irvin allowed four runs in two innings, and was permitted to hit for himself with a runner in scoring position.
“I was actually surprised that was such a big story,” Kapler said. “I was kind of caught off guard by that. Because even looking back and evaluating it objectively, because that’s what I will do, with Cole Irvin, I thought that was the right choice. It didn’t work out. It was a bad outing.”
••• The Braves series will conclude Sunday afternoon at 1:05. Aaron Nola (8-2, 3.64 ERA) and right-hander Kevin Gausman (3-5, 5.71) will start. … There is still no plan for the return of David Robertson, who has been out since April 15 with an elbow issue. Kapler: “We’re still kind of figuring things out with him and what the best next step for him is. He’s just still not progressing as fast as we all had hoped he would.” … Kapler said Brad Miller, on the injured list with a flexor strain, “is close” to a return.