PHILADELPHIA — Taijuan Walker is moving to the Phillies bullpen, a process that manager Rob Thomson hopes will be seamless for the pitcher. For the club as a whole, the arms arrangement might take more finessing.
Walker’s demotion to the bullpen was a foregone conclusion when Ranger Suarez returned from the injured list, formalized Saturday. Suarez didn’t last long in Sunday’s wild 11-9 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks in 10 innings. Had it gone 11, Walker was warming in the Phillies’ bullpen.
The fact that Walker, after a disastrous 2024, pitched very well in six starts to open 2025 was never going to alter his eventual demotion. Even a 2.54 ERA and 1.34 WHIP in 28.1 innings wouldn’t supplant Suarez in the rotation.
So Walker will head to the bullpen … at least eventually, since he threw 85 pitches in his final start Thursday and was available Sunday only in the emergency that very nearly arrived.
That left the Phillies short an arm, Jose Ruiz (neck spasm) placed on the injured list as part of Suarez’s return. It’s the balance they have to restore in a bullpen already thrown out of whack by early-season struggles from expected high-leverage options.
Thomson is optimistic that Walker’s early success will translate. While conceding that Walker isn’t necessarily happy with the move, he trusts the pitcher who in 2023 won 15 games and threw 178 innings.
“I think being the competitor that he is and the teammate that he is, I think he’d do anything,” Thomson said. “It’s not that he’s happy going to the bullpen, but I think when it gets right down to it, he’ll be there.”
Part of that is sorting out Walker’s stuff. He’s been effective with a six-pitch mix; relievers rarely throw more than three pitches, and the Phillies have several who get by on two (albeit elite) pitches. Thomson doesn’t envision Walker’s arsenal being whittled down too much yet, since there may be a need for Walker to start again, if there’s an injury or if they want to go to a six-man rotation.
“Probably not right away, just let him go pitch, do his thing,” Thomson said. “And then if you see some shortcomings or some issues, that may be a lesson to take a pitch away, or just to make it easier for him.”
The plan is to start Walker in bulk situations, where he can take two or three innings, either in the middle of games when a starter doesn’t go deep or games that may be decided late when the starter does exit.
As for the rest of the bullpen, everything shy of Matt Strahm and Jose Alvarado seems in flux, and Walker is another variable to add. Thomson hopes to build him into back-to-back or higher-leverage situations eventually. But the Phillies don’t have much of a structure to insert him into.
Thomson is trying to rebuild Jordan Romano – and take his ERA out of the teens – in low-leverage situations. Orion Kerkering’s confidence could use some bolstering, part of why he entered in the fourth inning of a 7-1 game Sunday. Tanner Banks and Carlos Hernandez, the latter of whom is most likely to be the roster casualty when Ruiz returns, have been OK in low-leverage opportunities, and Joe Ross is adapting to his first season as a full-time, single-inning reliever.
Sunday, Strahm threw a seven-pitch seventh before Ross needed 10 pitches for the eighth. But Thomson opted for Alvarado in the top of the ninth, down a run. The lefty allowed a run, then once the Phillies tied it, was on the hook for all three in the top of the 10th. More worrisome was 30 pitches, even if he is guaranteed off days on either side.
It’s a lot of moving pieces. Walker is another piece new to his role. So Thomson will, for now, “take each game as it is.”
“I think what you try to do, really, is space those guys out so you always have a bulk guy available,” he said. “It doesn’t always work out that way.”
• • •
Suarez’s return didn’t go as planned. He didn’t survive the fourth inning, allowing seven hits, seven runs, walking two and striking out six in his first start since low back tightness cropped up in spring.
It started well, retiring the first seven men he faced, four by strikeout. But the bottom of the D’backs order did him in, setting the table for a Geraldo Perdomo RBI double and a Corbin Carroll two-run single in the third.
In the fourth, nine-man Jose Herrera smacked a two-run double. Perdomo hit a ball to Alec Bohm at third that went off his glove, originally called an error but changed to a hit that Bohm should have at least kept in front of him to prevent Herrera from scoring from second. Carroll punished them with an RBI base knock to end Suarez’s day at 82 pitches.
“I think it was more that I was overthrowing the ball a little bit from the stretch,” the lefty said. “I think that was a thing that could have affected my command because I was practicing that, throwing from the stretch mostly during the rehab start.”
• • •
Bryce Harper homered, singled, walked and scored twice. But he struck out twice, including as the second out in the ninth, and flew out as the potential go-ahead run for the second out of the 10th.
And so, he found plenty of room for self-criticism.
“Just frustrated I can’t come through right there,” Harper said. “Obviously a good moment, good opportunity right there, and just couldn’t get it done.”
Harper is hitting .234, but just .212 in his last 23 games. He’s only slugging .398 and while he’s still getting on base at a healthy enough clip – .364, thanks in part to 26 walks against 31 strikeouts – the power isn’t there, nor is the run production at 17 RBIs in 34 games.
The frustration certainly is.
“I’m just frustrated on a bigger level,” he said, without pointing to anything in particular. “Just want to come through for the team and play well, and obviously I’ve been through ruts in my career and gone through ups and downs, and worse than what I’m on right now, but just frustrated for the fans, frustrated for my team.”
Source: Berkshire mont