Soto says trade ‘changed my life’
Gregory Soto didn’t expect his phone to blow up in early January when he was spending time with family in the Dominican Republic. But once the subject of those messages, a trade from the Detroit Tigers to the National League champion Philadelphia Phillies, went public, Soto started to understand what it might mean for him.
“This has definitely changed my life,” Soto said Thursday via a translator at BayCare Ballpark. “All the time I spent with the Tigers, I never made the playoffs. So coming into a team where I know I can make the playoffs, it’s huge. It adds to my life, to my baseball career.”
Soto reported to Clearwater Wednesday, his arrival delayed by visa issues. But he kept up with his throwing routine in the Phillies’ academy in the Dominican and threw a simulated game on a back field Thursday. He’ll get two days off and appear in his first game Sunday against Toronto.
“It was very good,” manager Rob Thomson said. “I sat up top and watched it. The fastball is electric, and the slider is really good.”
The Tigers are all that Soto has known in pro baseball. He signed with them as an international free agent in December 2012, six weeks before his 18th birthday. He made his big league debut as a starter in May 2019, transitioned to the bullpen later that year and has made consecutive All-Star Games. He’s posted a 3.34 ERA with 48 saves in 124 innings over the last two seasons.
Soto didn’t know much about the delays in his visa paperwork, calling it, “an internal problem that was out of my hands.”
It cost him a chance to play in the World Baseball Classic, which he admits “hurts a little.” But he was able to keep up with his offseason throwing regimen, making the hour trip each way to the Phillies’ facility every day to get his work in.
The fact that he’s entering a new environment made the wait even more anxious.
“It made the process a little more uncomfortable because I knew I was getting into a new team,” he said. “I wanted to get familiar with the new personnel, the new teammates. The longer I was in the DR, the less time I was going to have here in spring training.”
Soto is a talented arm who the Phillies see a chance to optimize. His 8-14 record the last two years owes in part to 16 unearned runs. While his numbers for hits allowed (95) and strikeouts (136) are excellent, 74 walks are a problem. The Phillies hope Soto follows a trajectory like Jose Alvarado, maximizing his strengths and minimizing weaknesses in his pitch mix and accuracy. That includes getting back to a slider that opponents hit .136 against in 2021.
Soto is one of several pitchers in the bullpen with experience closing, but he’s jiving with the company line of not caring about when his innings come.
“I’m just happy to be here,” he said. “We have a pretty good bullpen, so if they want me to throw in the fifth inning, I’m down for that.”