Phils pitcher Eflin out after back flares up
With Opening Day 15 days away, manager Joe Girardi is remaining upbeat despite two of his projected five starters working through injuries.
Right-handers Zach Eflin and Spencer Howard are both battling to back soreness as the Phillies continue spring training in Clearwater.
Eflin, who is projected to start the third game of the season, had a flare up on Monday and is “day to day,” Girardi said.
Howard, meanwhile, struggled with injuries during his rookie campaign and could start the season at the team’s alternate site, with the minor league season delayed by a month.
“We want to get (Eflin) on the mound as soon as we can,” Girardi said following Wednesday’s 2-0 victory over the Tigers. “He played catch today, so we felt pretty good about that. We’ll just have to wait and see.”
Non-roster camp invitee Ivan Nova will start in Eflin’s place on Friday.
If neither Eflin nor Howard can make it back before the season begins, righthander Vince Velasquez is the likely choice to slide into the rotation.
As for Wednesday’s game, right-hander Zack Wheeler tossed five innings of fourhit ball. Odúbel Herrera led off the fourth with his third homer and Ronald Torreyes added an RBI double.
Yankees
Jordan Montgomery made his third start for the Yankees, pitching five no-hit innings and lowering his ERA to 0.90 in a 1-0 win over the Blue Jays. Aaron Judge had two hits and scored a run.
Toronto pitcher Thomas Hatch was pulled after a leadoff walk to DJ LeMahieu in the third. The team said Hatch had discomfort in his right arm.
Bo Bichette singled with two outs in the sixth for the Blue Jays’ first hit.
Mets
Miami right-hander Sandy Alcantara continued his impressive spring training with five innings of three-hit ball, striking out nine as the Marlins beat the Mets, 3-2. Alcantara has thrown 12 2/3 scoreless innings, striking out 19. Rookie Jazz Chisholm
hit his second homer — a solo shot in the fifth.
Joey Lucchesi made his first start in his second appearance for New York, allowing two walks in three scoreless innings. Francisco Lindor had two hits, and Albert Almora Jr. drove in two runs.
When the Giants cut Kevin Zeitler last week instead of Nate Solder, fans naturally wondered why their team chose a player with a higher cap hit next season over their most reliable offensive lineman.
The answer boiled down to simple mathematics.
Releasing Zeitler freed up a whopping $12 million in cap space, which was necessary for the Giants to even get under the salary threshold this offseason, whereas parting ways with Solder would have created only $6 million in cap space, with $10.5 million in dead money on the books.
The other explanation is that there was more going on behind the scenes. The Giants announced Wednesday that Solder signed a new contract, which The Athletic reported will reduce his salary to $4 million in 2021.
That creates $6 million more spending money for the Giants, which means they essentially get the same financial benefit as if they had cut Solder but instead get to keep the player.
Solder, 32, agreed to a pay cut likely because he did not want to test the open market and uproot his family at this stage of his career. Solder opted out of the 2020 season out of family health concerns during the pandemic, as his older son continued fighting cancer and his wife recently gave birth to another son.
Solder has been a disappointment in New York since signing a four-year, $62 million contract in 2018.
He was already going to lose the starting left tackle job once the Giants drafted Andrew Thomas fourth overall last April, and now he will likely only start at right tackle if Matt Peart, the team’s third-round pick last year, isn’t ready to do so. General manager Dave Gettleman insisted last week that he is comfortable with Thomas and Peart as the starting tackles moving forward.
So at this point Solder is primarily depth insurance, which is still important for a young offensive line which had three rookie starters last season (third-year pro Nick Gates had never played center).
Expect the Giants to target a free-agent veteran guard who can adequately replace Zeitler at a fraction of the cost. The market is being flooded with cap casualties because the NFL’s salary cap dropped eight percent from 2020 as a result of lost revenue from the pandemic.
One possibility is five-time Pro Bowler Trai Turner, whom the Chargers released last Friday. Gettleman drafted Turner in 2014 when he was the Panthers’ GM. Turner would certainly represent a boost over Shane Lemieux or Will Hernandez, who are set to compete for the left guard spot.
The Giants also announced that they re-signed wide receiver C.J. Board, defensive tackle Austin Johnson and long snapper Casey Kreiter. Johnson might fill in as the starting nose tackle in place of Dalvin
Tomlinson, who will reportedly sign a two-year deal with Minnesota, but the Giants will assuredly look for defensive line depth in free agency and the draft.
With those signings plus Tuesday’s signing of wide receiver John Ross, along with the restructuring of Solder’s contract and Leonard Williams agreeing to a long-term deal, the Giants appear to have about $12 million in cap space.
They could also restructure contracts with cornerback James Bradberry, linebacker Blake Martinez and wide receiver Sterling Shepard to create more financial flexibility, but Gettleman spoke last week about the dangers of “kicking
the can” too much with backloaded contracts that result in heavier cap hits in future years.
Since the Giants won’t be a legitimate Super Bowl contender next season, they shouldn’t be motivated to get into a spending spree.
They also simply aren’t positioned to make a big splash in free agency this year, somewhat because of their own missteps in rebuilding since 2018.
The Giants do have enough flexibility to land one of the top wide receivers available such as Kenny Golladay or JuJu Smith-Schuster. That market remained quiet Wednesday as the new league year officially kicked off at 4 p.m.