This might be the easiest top three we have had in a while. Guess that is what happens when the team is playing good baseball – you have players performing well!
Three up
Bryce Harper – I usually don’t mess around with leaderboards on the bigger numbers until Memorial Day. I’ll use them for searching for specific things that are more granular in nature, or if I’m looking for something that fits my very specific purpose in life. So today, I changed things up and brought up the Fangraphs leaderboards for hitters.
Most of the time, filtering by wRC+ shows you the best hitters in the game currently and you’d expect to see the same names. Judge, Ohtani, Yordan – these are the names that are familiar at the top. Twelfth in the game right now? Bryce Harper, holding a 159 wRC+ on the year. His season has been outstanding thus far, this week a particular example (.429/.520/1.048 in 25 PA). Sometimes, we just forget how good Harper really is.
Kyle Schwarber – Want to know who’s eleventh on said leaderboard? One Kyle Schwarber, two points ahead of Harper with a 161 wRC+. He’s on his patented heater, smashing five home runs this week, which is truly what happens when this offense is clicking. Overall, the offense hit 14 home runs on the week altogether. Not too shabby.
Brandon Marsh – It’s hard to leave off a guy who hit .519/.533/.593 on the week, so Marsh gets the third nod here. Sure, we’d rather a lot of those hits be of the extra base variety, but thinking back to when they were doing nothing at the plate during their losing streak, singles are great too.
(bonus!) Cristopher Sanchez – I mean, you can’t leave a guy off a top three that had two starts in which he didn’t allow a run over 15 innings in a week, or over 20+ innings in his last three starts. Sanchez is locked back in at the moment.
Three down
Andrew Painter – Here’s a question: if the team had a viable option in Lehigh Valley that they believed could come to the majors and make a few starts effectively, without overtaxing the bullpen each time that turn in the rotation came around, do you think they’d give Painter a quick timeout in the minors? He was dreadful against the Athletics, which we still should contextualize as just one start, but it showcased some of the concerns that are surrounding the young starter. It’s still very early to worry about anything LONG long term, but this wasn’t a good week for him.
Jesus Luzardo – Luzardo had zero idea where the strike zone was for much of his Friday night start. It was reminiscent of his midseason hiccup last year, which is a shame because he had three really good starts in a row. Of course, the usual undercurrent of pitch tipping was there, but he just kind of stunk Friday.
backup catching – When J.T. Realmuto got hurt, one might not have expected the backup catchers to bring all of the value Realmuto brings to the team, but maybe some kind of semblance of offensive aptitude. Yet this week is a stark reminder: when Realmuto gets hurt and has to miss any chunks of time, the Phillies are in real trouble behind the plate. At least Garrett Stubbs can contribute on the mound…
