Game 71 - Father's Day at the IronPigs; Phillies Game Skipped

2019 Chachi Ballpark Visits #17

2019 Chachi Ballpark Visits #11

2019 Chachi Ballpark Visits #15

While Jenna took Ben to a family graduation party in Quakertown, Doug and I travelled a little further north to take in an IronPigs game in Allentown.  The rain held out until after the game was over, and it was a wonderful way to spend Father's Day.  Doug continued his minor league ballpark tradition of (a) getting many autographs and (b) getting a ball tossed to him at some point during the game.

Unfortunately, starting pitcher Enyel De Los Santos gave up a trio of home runs (two to Bobby Bradley) and the Clippers, the top affiliate for the Indians, won the game 3-1.  Following the game, the IronPigs opened up the outfield for a Father's Day catch on the field, which was the highlight of the afternoon for both of us.  The afternoon outing merited another 10 cards in the growing Ballpark Visits insert set.  Our next stop is scheduled for Lakewood in July to take in a BlueClaws game.

2019 Chachi Ballpark Visits #8

2019 Chachi Ballpark Visits #10

2019 Chachi Ballpark Visits #13

2019 Chachi Ballpark Visits #16

2019 Chachi Ballpark Visits #9

2019 Chachi Ballpark Visits #12

2019 Chachi Ballpark Visits #14

Meanwhile in Atlanta, the Phillies had a very bad day.

Braves 15, Phillies 1
Game 71 - Sunday Afternoon, June 16th in Atlanta
Record - 39-32, 2nd place, 2 1/2 games behind the Braves

One Sentence Summary:  The bullpen game concept completely backfired as the Braves demolished each Phillies pitcher presented to them.

What It Means:  With J.T. Realmuto and Jay Bruce out of the line-up with minor injuries, and no reliable fifth starter in sight, this was a massacre of a ballgame.  Moves will need to be made if the Phillies hope to catch the Braves, and they'll enter the week looking up and two and half games back.

What Happened:  Only utility player Sean Rodriguez, who pitched a scoreless eighth inning, escaped without allowing a Braves run.  Vince Velasquez (2 1/3 innings, 4 runs), Cole Irvin (3 2/3 innings, 6 runs) and Jerad Eickhoff (1 inning, 5 runs) were all torched.

Transactions:  Pat Neshek was activated from the Injured List and Irvin was recalled from the IronPigs.  Ranger Suarez and Edgar Garcia were sent back down, but neither arrived in Allentown in time for Sunday's IronPigs game.

Game 126 - 2018 Grandstand Reading Fightin Phils Update #38 Seranthony Dominguez

Nationals 8, Phillies 7
Game 126 - Tuesday Night, August 22nd in Washington
Record - 68-58, 2nd place, 3 games behind the Braves

One Sentence Summary:  With two outs in the 9th and the Phillies holding a 7-6 lead, Juan Soto doubled and Ryan Zimmerman homered off Seranthony Dominguez to give the Nationals an 8-7 win.

What It Means:  I was going to rank the most painful loses of the season for purposes of this post, but then I decided I didn't want to dwell on that nonsense and I moved on.  "There is no panic," according to Rhys Hoskins.

What Happened:  This was a back and forth game all night and ultimately the Phillies bullpen just couldn't keep the Nationals off the scoreboard.  Zach Eflin suffered one of his worst starts of the year, lasting 3 1/3 innings and allowing five runs (four earned) on 10 hits.  Cesar Hernandez (11), Maikel Franco (21) and Justin Bour (1st with the Phillies) all homered.

The Phillies loaded the bases with one out in the top of the 9th, but Asdrubal Cabrera popped up and Bour struck out to end the threat.

Featured Card:  Dominguez is only 23, and while these losses are painful, it's important to remember that at this point last season he was a starting pitcher for High-A Clearwater.

Transactions:  Yacksel Rios was optioned back to the IronPigs and Eflin was recalled to make the start.

Earlier in the day, the Phillies announced another trade, sending Double-A pitcher Felix Paulino to the White Sox for lefty reliever Luis Avilan.  Pitching prospect Jose Taveras was designated for assignment to make room on the 40-man roster for Avilan.  In 58 games this season with the White Sox, Avilan has a 3.86 ERA and a 14 walks to 46 strikeouts over 39 2/3 innings pitched.

Sharing the fate of most middle relievers, Avilan's baseball card appearances have been scarce in spite of appearing in almost 400 games the past 7 seasons.  His most recent mainstream card is from the 2016 Topps set, picturing Avilan with the Dodgers.

2016 Topps #494

2018 Grandstand Reading Fightin Phils Update #36

2018 Chachi Almost #8

Arrived During the 2018 Season

Trevor Plouffe (4/23/18) - Signed as a minor league free agent, formerly with the Texas Rangers organization.
Asdrubal Cabrera (7/27/18) - Acquired from the New York Mets for Franklyn Kilome.
Wilson Ramos (7/31/18) - Acquired from the Tampa Bay Rays for a player to be named later or cash.
Aaron Loup (7/31/18) - Acquired from the Toronto Blue Jays for Jacob Waguespack.
Justin Bour (8/10/18) - Acquired with cash from the Miami Marlins for McKenzie Mills.
Luis Avilan (8/22/18) - Acquired from the Chicago White Sox for Felix Paulino.

Departed During the 2018 Season
Drew Hutchison (6/5/18) - Designated for assignment and elected free agency.
Hoby Milner (7/15/18) - Sold to the Tampa Bay Rays.
Zac Curtis (7/31/18) - Designated for assingnment and claimed off waivers by the Texas Rangers, 8/7/18.
Jake Thompson (8/14/18) - Traded to the Milwaukee Brewers for cash considerations.

40-Man Roster Additions/Subtractions

2017 Grandstand Clearwater Threshers #8

2017 Bowman Prospects #BP41

2017 Choice Lakewood BlueClaws #26

2017 Topps Pro Debut #91

On Monday, all 30 teams worked to set their 40-man rosters in advance of next month's Rule 5 draft.  The Phillies completely overhauled their roster a year ago, dropping three players and adding 11.  There wasn't that much activity this year as the team dropped three players and added five.  Here's a look at the players involved in the roster shuffling along with some baseball card notes for the new additions.

Dropped from 40-Man Roster

• Mark Appel (rhp) - Former 1st round pick of the Astros and acquired as part of the Ken Giles trade.  Appel has had his prior two seasons ended prematurely due to arm injuries.
• Elniery Garcia (lhp) - Garcia sticks with the organization, as he was simply outrighted to the IronPigs.
• Alberto Tirado (rhp) - Part of the return in the Ben Revere deal.

Added to 40-Man Roster

• Seranthony Dominguez (rhp) - Has appeared in the 2016 Crosscutters and 2017 Threshers minor league team sets.
• Franklyn Kilome (rhp) - One of the organization's top pitching prospects, I already have 11 of his cards in my collection from various Bowman and Topps releases.
• Ranger Suarez (lhp) - Appears in the 2016 Crosscutters and the 2017 BlueClaws minor league team sets.
• Jose Taveras (rhp) - Along with cards in the Phillies minor league team sets, Taveras appeared in the Topps Pro Debut and Topps Heritage Minor League sets this past season.  He also already has a Chachi card to his name, having appeared in the 2016 Chachi BlueClaws Signing Autographs limited edition set.
• Engelb Vielma (inf) - The Phillies claimed Vielma off waivers from the Giants on Monday afternoon.  Primarily a shortstop, Vielma spent the past six seasons in the Twins organization and to date he's only appeared in Twins minor league team sets.

2018 Chachi New Additions #1

With his addition to the 40-man roster, Vielma becomes the first card in the 2018 Chachi New Additions set.  This insert set, released between now and opening day, will feature players new to the organization and added to the 40-man roster throughout the winter/early spring.

Memory Lane

2009 Additions - Quintin Berry, Yohan Flande and Jesus Sanchez
2010 Additions - Cesar Hernandez, Matt Rizzotti, Harold Garcia, Freddy Galvis and Justin De Fratus*
2011 Additions - Phillippe Aumont, Jake Diekman, Tyson Gillies and Sebastian Valle
2012 Additions - Zach Collier, Ethan Martin, Trevor May and Jonathan Pettibone
2013 Additions - Aaron Altherr, Kelly Dugan, Tommy Joseph and Rob Rasmussen
2014 Additions - Jesse Biddle, Adam Morgan and Nefi Ogando
2015 Additions - Jimmy Cordero, Roman Quinn and Edubray Ramos
2016 Additions - 11 prospects
2017 Additions - Seranthony Dominguez, Franklyn Kilome, Ranger Suarez, Jose Taveras, Engelb Vielma

*Somehow I skipped doing a post for the 2010 40-man roster additions.

4th Annual Lakewood @BlueClaws Outing

2016 Chachi BlueClaws Signing Autographs #1

2016 Chachi Special Edition #8

Chachi BlueClaws Signing Autographs #2

For the fourth summer in a row, we travelled to Lakewood to see the Phillies low Class-A team, the BlueClaws.  As an added bonus, thanks to the rain out on Friday night, we were there for a double header!  As an super added bonus (not really), it was #Caturday at the ballpark and the BlueClaws players and coaches had the unfortunate task of wearing jerseys adorned with hundreds of pictures of cats.  There were cat puns throughout both games, cat-inspired between innings shenanigans and actual cats on the field pre-game.

In game action, the BlueClaws won the first game, 4-0, helped by a Carlos Duran home run and a fine pitching performance from Edgar Garcia who pitched five shutout innings.  The second game ended up going 12 innings and the BlueClaws won, 2-1, on a walk-off wild pitch.  The team's #1 draft pick from last year, Cornelius Randolph, went 0 for 2 in the first game as he's trying to battle back from an early season injury.  We also got to see visiting player Ke'Bryan Hayes, who played third base for the West Virginia Power (a Pirates affiliate) in the first game.

Chachi BlueClaws Signing Autographs #3

2016 Bowman Family Tree #FT-H

Chachi BlueClaws Signing Autographs #4

Chachi BlueClaws Signing Autographs #5

The 2016 BlueClaws team sets weren't available for sale yet, but our boys purchased team baseballs and were able to get five signatures on each of their baseballs.  The gracious signers were Jose Taveras, Edgar Garcia (right before he took the mound in game one), Sutter McLoughlin, Zach Morris and South Atlantic League All-Star Josh Tobias.  Sitting behind first base, my wife Jenna was quick to recover an overthrown baseball that bounced into the stands and the ball immediately became part of our youngest son Ben's collection.  (Doug was kind enough to let Ben have the ball.)

We had another #Clawsome time at the game, and we'll be back next year for our milestone fifth annual visit.

Memory Lane
2013 BlueClaws Game
2014 BlueClaws Game
2015 BlueClaws Game

Meanwhile, in Denver . . .

Rockies 8, Phillies 3
Game 89 - Late Saturday Night, July 9th in Denver
Record - 41-48, 4th place, 12 games behind the Nationals

One Sentence Summary:  Jared Eickhoff's train went off the tracks in this game, and the Phillies couldn't get a hit with runners in scoring position as the Rockies won easily, 8-3.

What It Means/What Happened:  Eickhoff had pitched extremely well of late and it's a shame he has to go into the All-Star break after such a shoddy outing.  He allowed eight runs on eight hits in just 5 1/3 innings.  Tommy Joseph had a four-hit night, including his 11th home run.

Be sure to check out the 2016 Season Summary page with game results and links to game summary posts.