USATSI_18091346 — © Jim Rassol-USA TODAY Sports

Why Nobody Should Panic About the Phillies

The Philadelphia Phillies have had a noticeably poor start to their season. Is it time to be worried yet?

Author:
Ben Silver
Apr 15, 2022 1:16 PM EDT

The Philadelphia Phillies have lost their last three games, and four of their last five, but it could always be worse.

The 2007 Phillies began their season 1-6, snowballing to 3-10 before an April win streak. The 2008 Phillies also began their season like 2022, 3-4, while the 2009 Phillies started their season 4-6.

The Phillies are frustrating right now—no one will claim otherwise—but it's not time to panic. Keep in mind that for most players' internal clocks, spring training still hasn't ended.

They'll usually have had six weeks from arrival in camp until Opening Day. The regular season has now gone on a full week, and we're only a month out from the beginning of spring training.

That should affect all teams equally, but it's especially unfair to judge a player like Kyle Schwarber based on his performance through one week of the season, or even after a month.

In 2008, Ryan Howard slashed .172/.297/.343 in April, then went on to place second in MVP voting. The other side of the coin is Odúbel Herrera, who slashed .361/.431/.558 through May 17 in 2018, an even larger sample size. He went on to finish the season with a .730 OPS.

It is nearly impossible to extrapolate players or teams through seven games of a season, especially one in which hitters aren't ready to finish spring training and starters haven't built up to full workloads weeks after spring training has ended.

That's true for the negatives, but it's true for the positives too.

The Phillies defense was expected to be the league's worst. Through these seven games, although a very small sample size, they've shown themselves to be poor defenders, but not half as bad as others.

The Phillies have a team total -4 defensive runs saved, good for fifth worst in the league. But division rivals Atlanta Braves have -9 DRS and Gabe Kapler's San Francisco Giants, who won 107 games in 2021, have -12 DRS. The Phillies could be a whole lot worse.

The bullpen has also been a strong suit for the Phillies. Bolstered by the performances of Corey Knebel, Seranthony Domínguez, Brad Hand, Jeurys Familia and Nick Nelson, the Phillies have the National League's 6th lowest ERA for relievers at 3.94. Advanced stats corroborate those results, the Phillies place fifth in the NL in FIP at 3.33.

Much maligned before the season began, the Phillies bullpen and defense could end up being points of strength down the stretch.

Every game is as important as another, that goes for games in April and for games in September. Fans have a right to be upset, but no one can quantify how good or bad this team is right now.

They certainly seem like the same old Phillies through 4.3% of the season, but the 2016 Phillies looked like a World Series contender, 22-15, through 22.8% of the season.

This is all to say you have a right to be angry or upset or frustrated with the Phillies, but don't write this team off through seven games, a lot can change in the next 155.