Under-performing: Not the Worst Problem the Phillies Could Have?

Jack Merlino

Here are two stat lines for two presently nameless players. The first is a major leaguer. The second is a minor leaguer.

1. 83 games/299 plate appearances/72 strikeouts/.247 AVG/.284 OBP/.648 OPS

2. 100 games/441 plate appearances/80 strikeouts/.298 AVG/.373 OBP/.869 OPS

That first line is unavoidably bad. It's Cody Asche's for 2015. The second belongs to Aaron Altherr across AA and AAA. It's pretty damn good, especially considering the ceilings most scouts and analysts bestowed upon him. But first, let's don our surgical gloves and dive into the autopsy of Asche's season.

First, Asche was given the 3rd base job. In spring training of this year, there was some talk that Maikel Franco could take it away with a strong spring. However, the latter appeared like he could hardly hit his own foot, and Cody limped into the season with a .232 spring average and a major-league roster spot. That's when he took off and hit .301 for the month of April, punctuated by a home run at Citi Field off of Matt Harvey. "This is fantastic!" People thought. "He can play, and they won't rush Franco!" Thank goodness Franco didn't need much more seasoning, as Cody would proceed to hit .181 in May and be demoted in favor of his boulder-crushing counterpart.

The Phillies decided that Asche would have the best chance for a future with the team as a left-fielder. This wasn't too crazy of a thought; Kansas City had success in that same endeavor with an albeit more highly-thought of player in Alex Gordon, who has since turned into a perennial Gold Glove candidate and 2-time All Star. So Cody went to the AAA Ironpigs, where he could learn his new craft in an environment where only a fraction of a MLB crowd could laugh at him for the inevitable miscues he would make. He performed well enough and the Phils were adequately satisfied with his defense to the point where he was recalled just before June began.

It didn't matter.

Let's slow down. I'll fess up and acknowledge what I've said in the past: I genuinely thought Asche could one day pan out to be a Chase Utley-lite. The similarities are there, from the batting stance, down to the skinny, white frame and sweet, compact, left-handed swing. Hell, their minor-league numbers aren't too different: consistently nice batting averages with respectable power numbers. The difference is that Utley was a mid-1st round pick for a reason, and Asche was passed over by everyone 4 times (the very last pick in the 4th rd.) for a reason. This isn't completely fair to the former Nebraska Cornhusker; unless he put up Utley-In-His-Prime stats, he wasn't going to hold off Franco for long.

But now he finds himself in a new predicament.

Out of nowhere, the Phillies' farm system could rank in the top-10 (top-15 for sure) in all of baseball. There are a million reasons why: better drafting, well-executed trades, etc. A big part for this year specifically is the emergence of outfielder Aaron Altherr. Aaron was thought of by many as one of the 'safer' prospects in the system, though he wouldn't pan out to be much. Think of a better version of John Mayberry Jr. That idea seems laughable now, as he's all Phillies minor-leaguers in home runs with 13 (which puts him at 2nd in the entire organization behind Ryan Howard). His .298 average, if he carried it over to the big leagues, would be leading the team.

You get the picture? He looks like he could end up being a starter.

Now throw in a guy like Kelly Dugan, who has hit at every level but just needs to stay healthy. Same idea with Roman Quinn. Factor in Nick Williams, who was just acquired for Cole Hamels and is off to a blistering start at Reading.

So why name all of these guys?

Because that's 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 reasons why this could very well end up being Asche's last season with the team. In the 84 games he's played in, Cody has amassed a -1.4 WAR. For comparison, Domonic Brown's worst season yielded a -1.6. And there are 53 games left, which means that if he keeps his current pace, Asche could end up being even worse.

Let that sink in. He could be worse than Domonic Brown's worst effort.

And the fault is with Asche alone. He's gotten the chance to start, even more consistently now that Ben Revere has been traded off. But he strikes out too much. And with his weak production from hitting, he'd need to produce Gold Glove-caliber defense at a brand-new position just to break even in overall value. Even Dom Brown, who has seen abuse come his way not heard in Philadelphia since the days of Terrell Owens, has gotten on a short little hot streak reminiscent of his one 2013 month of glory. But with the five minor league outfielders mentioned above, and Odubel Herrera looking like a major leaguer, we can be certain that there won't be an Asche-Herrera-Brown trio next year. In fact, it isn't outrageous to believe the Phils could go with 2 rookies in an Altherr-Herrera-Dugan outfield. These last two months could and should be Asche's swan song.

Same idea goes for the Cody-Asche-of-pitching, David Buchanan. After pretty literally coming out of nowhere in 2014 and making the Phillies think that they'd accidentally stumbled upon a back-of-the-rotation starter with his 3.75 ERA, he's completely fallen apart. In his 9 starts, he has 3 performances that would qualify as 'quality starts'. 5 would be considered 'not terrible'. Thus, his 7.23 ERA.

When Ruben Amaro & Company acquired every single minor league starting pitcher not named Julio Urias, the Phils suddenly found themselves overflowing with advanced pitching prospects. For funsies, let's name every AA-and-above pitcher who could have a future: Zach Eflin, Ben Lively, Tom Windle, Joely Rodriguez, Alec Asher, Jared Eickhoff, Jesse Biddle, Nick Pivetta, and Jake Thompson. All of those guys should be knocking on Philly's door by the end of 2017. About half could end up slotting in by the end of 2016.

That means there's no real reason for the Phillies to stick it out with Buchanan and try to help him hone in on his potential, which is a #5 starter at best. Same for Asche. The Phils simply don't need to wring them out for every last drop of value, because there are plenty more guys who are figuratively dripping with potential.

Four years ago, when (to put into perspective) Jesse Biddle was your top pitching prospect and Larry Greene was your top hitting prospect, the Phillies wouldn't have had the luxury of being able to dump Cody Asche and David Buchanan like a pair of bad girlfriends. What else could the team do besides attempt to spend their way out of the problem? Now, Amaro has built himself a deep farm system that he won't be around to see the fruits of. The future suddenly looks brighter in Philadelphia.

Just, it probably doesn't include Cody Asche or David Buchanan.