The Silver Lining Report: Game 11/162 (O's lose 13-2)

[interloper]

Oh I'll find 'em.

• Evan Phillips: Far and away the standout of a mostly lost evening of Orioles baseball. Jim Palmer remarked that his windup and slider seem much improved since his appearances following last season's trade. And it showed, as he struck out a career high 4 over 3 IP and only allowed 1 hit and 1 walk. Really nice work out of the bullpen. 
   
• John Means: Pitched much better than his line shows. Other than the mistake home run pitch and the mental error to not cover 1B quickly, it was almost all soft contact that found holes through the infield. His ERA remains shiny due to an error, and I feel like that's fair based on the fact that he was pretty unlucky. He'll get another start, says Hyde, and I think he should. 
   
• Dwight Smith Jr.: Back in the lineup, Dwight got 2 hits and stole his second base. He also had a fantastic, difficult sliding catch in LF. 
   
• Pedro Severino: His 2-run double was responsible for all the runs the O's would score. Threw out a runner at 2B on a perfect throw.
   
• Injuries During the Game: 0, which is nice considering the rash of IL designations recently. 

That's about all I got, but let me know if you saw any other silver linings from this game. 

[Moose Milligan]

Evan Phillips was really surprising.  I saw him hit 95 a few times.  Struck out Khris Davis on a high fastball which was great.  

[interloper]

27 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

Evan Phillips was really surprising.  I saw him hit 95 a few times.  Struck out Khris Davis on a high fastball which was great.  

Yeah he looked great in ST, but I'm not sure folks were buying it, myself included. He was just so bad last season. But getting traded is hard and maybe he just was out of sorts. Seems he's cleaned up a few things. It would be nice to have him stay and be a decent bullpen guy while guys like Castro and Bleier figure out what the heck they're doing. 

[Moose Milligan]

Just now, interloper said:

Yeah he looked great in ST, but I'm not sure folks were buying it, myself included. He was just so bad last season. But getting traded is hard and maybe he just was out of sorts. Seems he's cleaned up a few things. It would be nice to have him stay and be a decent bullpen guy while guys like Castro and Bleier figure out what the heck they're doing. 

I wasn't buying it either in ST.  

If he could be a 2-3 inning guy out of the pen, that would be awesome.

 

[bobmc]

Severino blocked a ball to the side of the plate and threw out Joe Piscopo - er - Piscotty at second on a perfect throw (but this belongs in the D thread right?).

The other silver lining was being able to go to bed earlier and not worry about any comeback, etc!  Is it a silver (or sliver) lining to "look forward" to Dan Straily and Josh Rogers tonight?  I believe this might be another disaster but let's keep this positive!!!!!  

[Tony-OH]

1 hour ago, Moose Milligan said:

Evan Phillips was really surprising.  I saw him hit 95 a few times.  Struck out Khris Davis on a high fastball which was great.  

As I said in the game thread, best I've seen Phillips ever. Threw the ball really well, good command, slider had nice late break and was fairly consistent. Now the question is ca he be consistent with his stuff from outing to outing. That's his next step at the big league level.

[Moose Milligan]

1 minute ago, Tony-OH said:

As I said in the game thread, best I've seen Phillips ever. Threw the ball really well, good command, slider had nice late break and was fairly consistent. Now the question is ca he be consistent with his stuff from outing to outing. That's his next step at the big league level.

I agree.  I will say, the fastball looked pretty straight though.  Didn't see a whole lot of movement.

[atomic]

8 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

I agree.  I will say, the fastball looked pretty straight though.  Didn't see a whole lot of movement.

I didn't see the game last night but Phillips has been a 1 inning guy mostly in the minors.  Is pitching him 3 innings in his first game up good for his arm? 

[interloper]

41 minutes ago, bobmc said:

Severino blocked a ball to the side of the plate and threw out Joe Piscopo - er - Piscotty at second on a perfect throw (but this belongs in the D thread right?).

The other silver lining was being able to go to bed earlier and not worry about any comeback, etc!  Is it a silver (or sliver) lining to "look forward" to Dan Straily and Josh Rogers tonight?  I believe this might be another disaster but let's keep this positive!!!!!  

Thanks - I'll add!

[interloper]

2 minutes ago, atomic said:

I didn't see the game last night but Phillips has been a 1 inning guy mostly in the minors.  Is pitching him 3 innings in his first game up good for his arm? 

He averaged 1.31 IP in the minors last season (51.1 IP over 39 games), so he's not strictly a 1 inning guy. He didn't allow many baserunners last night so his pitch count was probably pretty low for 3 innings. 

[Moose Milligan]

4 minutes ago, atomic said:

I didn't see the game last night but Phillips has been a 1 inning guy mostly in the minors.  Is pitching him 3 innings in his first game up good for his arm? 

He didn't look gassed at the end of it.  I think its more pitch count related than inning related.  Not sure how many pitches he threw.

[atomic]

6 minutes ago, interloper said:

He averaged 1.31 IP in the minors last season (51.1 IP over 39 games), so he's not strictly a 1 inning guy. He didn't allow many baserunners last night so his pitch count was probably pretty low for 3 innings. 

So sounds like mostly 1 innings with every third game or so 2 innings. 48 pitches seems like a lot for a guy used mostly in shorter outings.  Especially so early in the season.  Givens pitched 49 pitches his second outing of the season and he didn't pitch more than 37 pitches last season.  And his career high was 42 in 2017.  I worry that Hyde is over pitching these guys.