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Rodrigo Lopez started yesterday’s game against the Braves and probably wishes he hadn’t after surrendering eight runs over two ugly innings. Lopez came into the game having thrown seven shutout innings in official spring action, but leaves with a 7.00 ERA and a 1.89 ratio.

The Phils made three errors in the game and lost 17-10.

Brown hit a two-run homer in the contest, his fifth of the spring. 3-for-4 on the day ups his line to 400/471/683. He leads the team in home runs and runs scored. He’s scored 20 run this spring, which leads all players across both leagues by a wide margin. San Diego’s Kyle Blanks is second and he has scored 14 runs.

Betancourt was 4-for-5 with a double and two RBI. 450/455/525. If you had asked me what Yuniesky Betancourt was going to hit in spring training, I would have said under .450.

Howard was 2-for-4 with a pair of singles to up his spring average to .321.

Revere also 2-for-4 with two RBI. 328/359/410.

Ruf continues to hit after a super slow start. 2-for-5 with a pair of doubles and a pair of strikeouts. He’s up to 224/309/388. He continues to struggle in left. In the second inning, Freddie Freeman hit a ball deep to left. Ruf almost picked the ball off to take the home run away, but it went off his glove and cleared the fence. It’s been that kind of a spring for him.

Quintero, Revere and Howard made errors for the Phillies in the game.

Lopez started the game for the Phillies and allowed eight runs over two innings on eight hits, including two home runs, and two walks. Only seven of the runs were earned. Justin Upton hit a two-run homer off of him in the first and Freddie Freeman hit a two-run shot in the second.

Lopez’s ERA goes from 0.00 for the spring to 7.00 with the outing. He came into the start having allowed six hits and a walk over seven shutout innings and leaves it with a 1.89 ratio.

Stutes pitched the fourth inning for the Phils, allowing a solo home run to Juan Francisco and a single.

4.50 ERA and a 1.50 ratio for Stutes over eight innings. He had not allowed a home run coming into yesterday’s outing. He’s walked four over his eight innings.

Bastardo followed Stutes and allowed the first three men he faced to reach on a walk and two singles on his way to allowing two earned runs in the frame.

Bastardo’s ERA is up to 5.40. Three of the seven runs that he’s allowed in official spring action are unearned.

Cook followed Bastardo and threw the last three innings of the game, allowing three runs, two of which were earned, on four hits and a walk. He set the Braves down in order in the sixth. In the seventh he allowed a run on a walk, a passed ball and a single. In the eighth the Braves scored two runs on two singles and a triple.

Cook is tied for Lannan for the team lead in official spring innings pitched at 14. 3.21 ERA with a 1.36 ratio. Just four strikeouts in 14 innings.

Colt Murray also pitched for the Phils and allowed three runs in an inning.

Kyle Kendrick is expected to pitch this afternoon as the Phillies play the Yankees.

Cliff Lee was fantastic pitching in a minor league game yesterday, striking out nine in six shutout innings. He threw 80 pitches and allowed four hits and no walks.

This suggests that Galvis, Betancourt and Frandsen are still battling for two spots on the bench. All three of them have hit very well this spring — between the three they are 47-for-142 (.331) with five walks, 13 doubles, two triples and four home runs. Betancourt has clearly been the best of the three with the bat after a huge day yesterday. Galvis is on-basing .298 and Frandsen .327. Not sure it’s going to matter.

It’s not clear when Halladay will pitch in a game again. Could be Friday or Saturday. Could be a lot of days, actually, but Friday or Saturday are some of them.

Rollins is back with the team after hitting .321 in the World Baseball Classic, but may not be in the lineup until Friday.

Lopez has been reassigned to minor league camp.

Another miserable game for the Phillies last night as they made five errors on their way to a 6-2 loss to the Yankees. Cliff Lee allowed five runs over 2 2/3 innings — only two of the runs were earned as the Phillies made four errors in the less than three innings he was in the game.

For the spring, Halladay and Lee have now combined to make eight starts in which they’ve thrown to 6.45 ERA and a 1.66 ratio and allowed six home runs in 22 1/3 innings.

The bullpen pitched well in the game as Stutes, De Fratus and Durbin combined to toss four scoreless frames.

Darin Ruf hit his first spring homer, a solo shot off of righty David Aardsma in the sixth. 1-for-3 on the day ups his line to 200/317/371.

Mayberry was 2-for-3 with two singles. He’s hitting 261/320/370.

Brown 1-for-3 with an RBI to drop his average to .395.

Revere 0-for-4. He’s hitting 340/367/426. Frandsen 0-for-4 to drop him to 324/359/649.

Quintero is hitting .231 after going 0-for-3.

Inciarte 0-for-1 with a strikeout. 4-for-14 with three walks and four singles has him at 286/444/286. Jermaine Mitchell walked in his only plate appearance and stole a base. 5-for-10 with two walks, three extra-base hits, three stolen bases and a 500/583/1.000 line.

Five errors in the game for the Phils. Josh Fields started at third and made one. Quintero, Utley, Lee and Stutes had the others.

Lee started the game for the Phillies and went 2 2/3 innings, allowing five runs on six hits and two walks. Only two of the runs were earned.

Kevin Youklils doubled off of Lee with two outs in the first. The inning should have been over when the next batter, Juan Rivera, hit a ball to third, but an error by Josh Fields kept the frame alive for Ben Francisco to deliver a two-run double. Lee walked back-to-back hitters with two outs in the second before Ichiro singled home the third run (which was earned). Lee allowed a run on three singles in the third and another run scored on an error by Utley on a throw from Quintero that Utley didn’t handle. Lee left with two outs and runners on first and third. Miner took over and struck Jeter out looking to keep things from getting worse.

Lee has made four starts in which he’s thrown to a 5.56 ERA and a 1.68 ratio over 11 1/3 innings. Opponents have hit .294 against him.

Miner followed Lee, allowing a run over 1 1/3 innings to drop his ERA to 10.13.

Stutes was next and pitched well, tossing two shutout innings. He allowed a two-out single in the fifth and then threw a pickoff throw away for the fifth error of the game for the Phils, but got a fly ball to center for the third out to leave the runner stranded. He allowed a leadoff walk in the sixth, but got out of the frame with the help of a double-play.

4.50 ERA with a 1.50 ratio for Stutes. He’s walked four in six innings, but has not allowed a home run.

De Fratus threw a 1-2-3 seventh. His results are getting less terrible. He has his ERA down to 6.43 and his ratio at 1.43. He hasn’t allowed a home run, but has struck out just two in his seven innings.

Durbin struck out two in a 1-2-3 eighth, dropping his ERA to 7.20. Opponents are hitting .368 against him in five innings.

Aaron Cook is expected to pitch against the Pirates this afternoon.

Delmon Young continues to rehab and hopes are he will be with the Phillies by the start of May.

Rich Dubee says that Halladay is fine physically. If that’s the case it sure seems like his non-physical problems are significant.

Aaron Hicks homered off of three different Phillie pitchers yesterday as the Twins topped the Phils 10-6. The Phils led 6-1 after three innings but couldn’t hold on. Valdes and Minor were charged with seven runs between them in the seventh and eighth innings combined.

Ruf hit a two-run double for the Phillies in the bottom of the second. A much needed 2-for-4 on the day with three RBI ups his line to 185/313/259 with just two walks and two extra-base hits, both doubles, in 32 plate appearances.

Galvis started at short and had the only other extra-base hit for the Phils, a triple. He was 1-for-5 in the game. Slugging .519 this spring.

Young and Mayberry both 2-for-3. Mayberry also drew a walk to raise his line to 281/343/438 after a slow start. Young’s continued hot hitting has his average up to .310.

Brown and Kratz 2-for-4. Kratz is hitting .200 without a walk in 15 at-bats. Brown is at 400/514/767. Leads the team in walks and runs scored and is tied for Howard with the home run lead at three. Brown has scored 13 runs this spring while no other Phillie has scored more than seven.

This article talks about nice defensive plays made by Young, Brown and Utley in the game.

Lee started the game for the Phillies. He gave up a leadoff homer to the first batter he faced before retiring the next three to end the first. He allowed two hits and a walk in a scoreless second and threw a 1-2-3 third. He started the fourth, allowing another solo home run, this time with one out. He got the second out and was replaced by Horst.

Overall, Lee went 3 2/3 innings in the game, allowing two runs on four hits and a walk while striking out five. Both of the runs scored on solo homers. 5.19 ERA with a 1.27 ratio over three starts. Ten strikeouts in 8 2/3 innings.

Horst allowed a walk before getting the final out of the fourth. He came back to pitch the fifth and allowed a run on a solo homer.

Again Horst doesn’t pitch well. The spring started out well for him and has fallen apart a little over his last couple outings. His numbers at this point are ugly — 14.40 ERA with a 2.60 ratio. In five innings he’s allowed four home runs.

Valdes allowed a single single before striking out the side in the sixth. He returned for the seventh and gave up a leadoff walk, which was followed by yet another homer by Aaron Hicks (his third of the day — Lee, Horst and Valdes). Valdes struck the next hitter out for the first out of the frame and was replaced by Kyle Simon.

Valdes’s numbers are better than Horst, but they’re still really bad. 7.36 ERA with a 1.23 ratio. Like Horst, he’s allowed four home runs. He’s struck out a team-high 11 in 7 1/3 innings.

Simon got the last two outs in the seventh. He has now allowed a run in 2 1/3 innings over four appearances.

Miner started the eighth and faced six batters, getting one out, walking two and allowing four singles before getting pulled. He wound up charged with five runs on three hits and two walks over a third of an inning. Fields made an error at first after Miner left that meant that one of his five runs was unearned.

Miner has a 12.71 ERA for the spring and opponents have hit .370 against him.

Savery got the last two outs in the eighth, allowing one runner to reach on Fields’s error. He came back and allowed two singles in a scoreless ninth.

Savery hasn’t been charged with a run in his three appearances, allowing four hits and a walk over 4 1/3 innings while striking out four (0.00 ERA and a 1.15 ratio).

Kendrick is expected to start against the Rays this afternoon. Papelbon will not pitch as scheduled and may pitch Saturday.

USA plays Mexico today in the World Baseball Classic.

Game Score is an enormously flawed stat, but looking at the Start Log data for 2012 does help demonstrate part of what was wrong for the Phillies last year.

The average Game Score for a start by a Phillies pitcher in ’12 was 54.2, which is the lowest it has been since 2009. There were only two starters for the Phils in 2012 who posted an average Game Score for the year better than the team’s average of 54.2 — Hamels averaged 59.74 in his 31 starts and Lee averaged 58.93 in his 30. Halladay, notably, joined Worley, Blanton, Kendrick, Valdes, Cloyd and Rosenberg in the group of starters under the team’s 54.2 average.

In 2011, Halladay, Hamels and Lee all averaged Game Scores above 60.

The Phils had six games in 2012 in which their starter threw to a Game Score better than 80. Here are the teams six best starts for 2012 by Game Score:

April 5, Halladay 83. Phillies beat the Pirates 1-0 on Opening Day as Halladay allows two hits and no walks over eight shutout innings.

April 18, Lee 85. By Game Score, this is the second-best start of the year for the Phillies in 2012. Lee strikes out seven in ten shutout innings. Bastardo started the bottom of the eleventh in a scoreless tie and the Giants got an unearned run on two singles and a Wigginton error.

May 3, Blanton 87. Best start of the year for the Phillies by Game Score. Blanton throws a complete-game, three hit shutout and the Phils top the Braves 4-0. He threw just 88 pitches in the game.

August 7, Hamels 83. Best start of the year for Hamels as he throws a complete game, allowing five hits and no walks while striking out six. Howard hits a two-run homer in the top of the first as the Phils score three runs on their way to a 3-0 win over Atlanta.

August 10, Halladay 82. The only pitcher to make two starts with Game Scores over 80, Halladay allowed a run on two hits and no walks while striking out eight as the Phils topped the Cardinals 3-1, breaking a 1-1 tie in the bottom of the eighth on a two-run shot by Utley.

August 19, Kendrick 82. The third Game Score of 80 plus in a 12-day period for the Phils. Kendrick makes his best start of the year, allowing three hits and a walk over eight shutout innings while striking out seven. The Phillies score five runs charged to Randy Wolf in the first three innings and roll to an 8-0 win.

For the Phillies it was their first season since 2008 in which they didn’t get a start with a Game Score better than 90.

In 2011, Lee threw a complete-game shutout of the Nats on April 14, allowing three hits and a walk while striking out 12 and posting a Game Score of 92.

Halladay threw a perfect game on May 29, 2010 with a Game Score of 98.

There were two starts with a Game Score above 90 in 2009. On August 19, Lee struck out 11, walked none and allowed two singles in a complete game against the Snakes. The Phils won 8-1 and Lee’s Game Score was 92. On September 1, Hamels allowed two hits and a walk while striking out nine in a complete game shutout as the Phils topped the Giants 1-0. 91 Game Score in that start for Hamels.

This Q&A from the Phillies web site speculates that Michael Young could play some first base against lefties this year if Howard continues to struggle against them. Mayberry and Ruf seem like good candidates as well. Mayberry seems like the one of that trio who would not be terrible defensively at the position he was playing (left field, presumably) if he was in the lineup and not at first, which presumably makes it less likely he would be there than Ruf or Young if Howard was on the bench against a lefty.

This suggests that the Phillies and Bastardo have avoided arbitration by agreeing to a one-year, $1.4 million deal.

Article on 22-year-old lefty Adam Morgan here. Morgan threw to a 3.35 ERA in 158 2/3 innings over 27 appearances, 26 of which were starts, between Clearwater and Reading in 2012.

This article discusses the possibility that Michael Young will hit between Utley and Howard in 2013.

This article suggests the Phillies are seriously considering signing Delmon Young.

Update: The Phillies signed Delmon Young to a one-year, $750,000 deal. I would have guessed he would get more money than that. At least on paper, that’s a really good deal for the Phils to land the MVP of last year’s ALCS. No word yet they plan to play on paper next year, though. So brace yourself for the possibility there might be a bump or two ahead.

This says Young could earn as much as $3.5 million if all incentives are reached.

Young earned $6.75 million in 2012.

And our outfield, too. Don’t forget that.

Moving down the blue band in the middle of the Start Log for 2012, you’ll find the section on quality starts. The biggest surprise from 2012 in that area is that Halladay made 25 starts for the Phillies in 2012 and only 15, 60%, were quality starts.

Here’s the percentage of starts that Halladay, Hamels, Lee and everybody else have made over the past three

So all three of Halladay, Hamels and Lee delivered quality starts in a lower percentage of outings in 2012 than they did in 2011. But Hamels and Lee were down a little and Halladay was down a lot. Over the last three seasons, the trio of Halladay, Hamels and Lee have combined to make a quality start in 72.5% of their outings. From 2012 to 2011, the percentage for that group dropped from 77.9% to 68.6%, thanks mostly to Halladay’s drop.

Notably, over the past three years, the percentage of quality starts delivered by pitchers other than Halladay, Hamels and Lee has had a very slender range, between 50.0% and 52.6%. Since 2010, the only pitcher to make quality starts in 60% or more of his starts in any year is Oswalt. Oswalt made quality starts in 60.9% of his 23 starts in 2011 and 75% (9 of 12) in 2010.

One final thought on quality starts and Vance Worley. Whether it was due to his enormously high BABIP or not, Worley was worse in 2012 than he was in 2011. His walk and home run rates stayed about the same while his hit rate skyrocketed and his ERA went from 3.01 in 2011 to 4.20 in 2012. In 2012, the Phillies went 9-14 in the games that Worley started. In 2011, they were 16-5. But for the two years, the percentage of Worley’s starts that were quality starts stayed the about the same — 56.5% in 2012 and 57.1% in 2011.

The Phillies and 33-year-old righty Aaron Cook apparently have a deal and Cook will try to make the team as a NRI. Cook has been awful over the last three years, throwing to a 5.54 ERA in 318 2/3 innings with the Rockies and Red Sox. Prior to 2010, Cook had had four straight years in which he threw at least 150 innings with an ERA+ better than 110.

This article reminds that Ryan Vogelsong was with the Phillies in spring training in 2010. He made two official spring training appearances, allowing six runs in three innings. Didn’t make the team. Went to Triple-A and threw to a 4.91 ERA in 25 appearances and was released in July. Was picked up by the Giants in time to make 61 appearances between 2011 and 2012, 59 starts, in which he threw to a 3.05 ERA with a 1.24 ratio. In 2011 he was an All-Star and finished eleventh in NL Cy Young voting.

The Phillies went 12-18 in Cliff Lee’s starts last year, which was odd given that Lee was in the top ten in the NL in ERA, ratio, strikeouts and WAR for pitchers. While Lee was off his outstanding 2011 pace, he was still very good and a lot had to go wrong for the Phillies in his starts for them to go 12-18. A lot did.

Here are some of the lowlights:

• The Phillies scored 3.60 runs per game in the games started by Lee and 4.36 in the games he did not start. They scored a total of three runs in the first three games he started in 2012 and a total of three runs in the last three games he started in 2012 and the Phils went 0-6 in those games. 3.60 runs per game of offense in their starts is the worst mark for any starting pitcher who started more than one game for the team in ’12 (although Worley was close behind at 3.61 runs of offense per game he started).
• The Phillies went 10-11 in the 21 games in which Lee delivered a quality start. In those 21 games he threw to a 1.86 ERA with an 0.97 ratio. The Phillies went 52-26 in quality starts that were made by any pitcher other than Lee.
• The bullpen pitched to a 4.82 ERA with a 1.43 ratio in the 30 games that Lee started. In the 132 games that he didn’t start, the bullpen pitched to a 3.79 ERA with a 1.27 ratio.

So Lee was good, the offense was bad, the bullpen was bad and even when Lee pitched well the Phillies didn’t win. There’s got to be more than a little plain old bad luck in there as well. You wouldn’t expect your team to go 10-11 in the games where their starting pitcher throws to a 1.86 ERA and a ratio under one.

Seven of the 18 games the Phillies lost that Lee started were one-run games.

The Phillies were 4-12 in the first 16 games that Lee started. Over those 16 starts, the Phils managed to lose a game in which Lee threw 10 shutout innings, another in which he struck out 12 while allowing two runs over 7 2/3 innings and a third in which he allowed a run on two hits and a walk over eight frames.

That’s not to say Lee excelled at all times during those first 16 starts. That simply wasn’t the case. Most notably, from June 10 to June 29 (outings 10 to 13 on the year), Lee made four starts bad starts in a row, throwing to a 7.30 ERA in those outings and puffing his ERA on the year from 2.92 to 4.13. After June 29, Lee pitched to a 2.44 ERA over his last 17 starts and the Phils went 9-8 in those games.

Bastardo filed for arbitration yesterday.

The Nats appear to have agreed to a deal with right-handed reliever Rafael Soriano that will pay Soriano $28 million over the next two years. Soriano has been very good in two of the last three years.

This suggests that the Phillies may have interest in right-handed pitcher Brandon Webb. It doesn’t suggests that Webb has become an outfielder. Now 33, Webb had six good years with the Diamondbacks from 2003 to 2008, throwing to a 3.24 ERA over 198 appearances, 197 of which were starts. He has been slowed by shoulder problems since, throwing just 16 innings between the majors and minors since the start of 2009.

The Phillies signed Juan Cruz to a minor league deal. Love this move. I’ve always been a huge fan of Cruz. I forget why, cause his results haven’t been especially good and he walks too many hitters to be consistently successful. Cruz is a 34-year-old right-handed pitcher with a 4.05 ERA and a 1.41 career ratio in 655 innings over 13 years. He’s had several miserable years, including 2003, 2005 and 2009. Over the last three years, he’s made 104 appearances, all in relief, and thrown to a 3.41 ERA with a 1.51 ratio. In 89 2/3 innings, he’s walked 51. His walk rate for his career is 4.8 batters per nine innings. The years when he’s been good he still walked a ton of people, just didn’t allow many hits.