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Yesterday’s game between the Phils and Nationals will be most remembered for the one pitch that Roy Halladay threw behind Tyler Moore in the third inning. The other 55 were pretty impressive, though, as Doc delivered his best outing of spring training, throwing four shutout innings in which he held Washington to two hits and a walk.

Stephen Strasburg hit Utley in the shin with the first pitch of Utley’s at-bat in the bottom of the third. With two outs and nobody on in the fourth, Halladay delivered a fastball behind Washington’s Tyler Moore.

After the game, Halladay said it wouldn’t have been the worst thing if the ball had hit Moore.

The Phils finished third in the NL East last year, 17 games behind Washington.

Tommy Joseph started at catcher for the Phillies and went 3-for-4 with a double, including 2-for-2 with a pair of singles off of Strasburg. 6-for-13 with two doubles and a home run in official spring action.

Also notable is that Halladay pitched extremely well throwing to Joseph.

Josh Fields hit his first home run, a solo shot in the seventh off of Cole Kimball. He was 1-for-2 in the game. Hitting .188 without a walk in 16 at-bats.

Domonic Brown had two more hits. 2-for-3 with a double. He was also impressive on the bases. With two outs, he dumped a ball into center and hustled it into a double, which allowed him to score when Nix followed with a single. 385/515/808 in 26 at-bats.

Nix hit a two-run single in the fifth. 1-for-3 with two RBI a day after homering against the Dominican Republic. Just 2-for-18 in official action, but looking a lot better than that in the past two days.

Howard and Betancourt 1-for-3. Betancourt 400/455/450 in 20 at-bats. Revere and Mayberry both 0-for-3. Mayberry’s official line drops to 241/290/414.

Michael Young 1-for-3 with an RBI. Second on the team in RBI with eight. Howard leads with 11.

Galvis played four defensive innings at third base and was 0-for-1 with a walk at the plate. 273/304/500. Tied for the team lead in strikeouts with eight.

Jermaine Mitchell walked in his only chance. 3-for-6 with two triples and a 1.738 OPS. There’s a lot of talk these days about the possibility Ender Inciarte will start the year with the Phils. I think I’d rather see the team carry Mitchell, even if it means losing Inciarte, although I’d guess the chances of that happening are close to zero. Mitchell seems like the better fit — not based on the 19 combined plate appearances the two have been given this spring but the more than 5,000 combined plate appearances the two have been given in the minors.

Halladay started the game for the Phillies and went four shutout innings, allowing two hits and a walk. He struck out two.

That’s the best of three starts for Halladay. 2.16 ERA with an 0.96 ratio in 8 1/3 innings.

Stutes was next and he threw a scoreless fifth, allowing a double and a walk. He seems like a real long shot to make the pen at this point. 9.00 ERA with a 2.33 ratio over three appearances. Opponents have hit .308 against him and he’s walked three in three innings.

Durbin started the sixth with a 4-0 lead and allowed three runs in the frame. Anthony Rendon hit a solo homer with one out. Durbin got the second out and then allowed single, RBI-double and RBI-single before setting the Nats down.

Durbin had been really good in his first two outings before getting hit hard yesterday. His ERA jumps to 9.00 thanks to a rough outing. He had thrown two scoreless frames on the spring coming into the game.

Bastardo struck out two in a 1-2-3 seventh. He’s allowed one run in four innings over four appearances. 2.25 ERA with an 0.50 ratio and opponents are hitting .133 against him.

De Fratus pitched the eighth. He allowed a leadoff single before getting the next three hitters in order.

Step in the right direction for De Fratus, who still has ugly spring numbers. 9.00 ERA with a 2.00 ratio in five innings over four appearances. Always nice to see him not walking people.

Diekman got two strikeouts in a scoreless ninth, allowing a single.

Nice outing for Diekman, whose numbers are getting better. 3.60 ERA with a 1.20 ratio. He’s struck out nine in five innings over four appearances. Nine strikeouts leads the team. Ten pitchers have thrown as many or more innings as he has and 12 have faced as many or more batters.

Amaro seems to suggest that Aumont has a step up on other bullpen candidates in this article. He also says he has confidence in Horst and that Valdes took a step up his last time out. Cause of not letting everyone homer, you see.

I don’t really even know what to say about this article on Delmon Young. Just read it, but brace yourself. I guess I should try to point out some of the highlights. Here goes: 1) Young is not anxious to play in games 2) Amaro is of the opinion that Young is a bad left fielder, which is hard to argue 3) Amaro seems to be of the opinion that Young could be a good right fielder, which would surprise me a great deal 4) Young will only play right field when he plays for the Phillies (that would surprise me) 5) Brown may move from left to right once Young returns and 6) Amaro hopes that Young will be playing for the Phils sometime between mid-April and May.

It’s a little tough to find an article that someone has written about Young that makes him seem likeable. I’m not saying it can’t be done. Just saying it’s a little tough.

Todd Zolecki writes about Yuniesky Betancourt’s unusual contract here, saying the Phillies must tell Betancourt by March 24 if he has made the 25-man roster. If he has not, Betancourt can asked to be released.

I don’t really understand why the Phillies thought acquiring Betancourt was the way to go in the first place. Given that they did, it’s a little tough for me to see them being unimpressed by his hitting .400 so far. Consider me worried.

Cliff Lee is expected to start this afternoon against the Twins.

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.

I finalized the Start Log for 2012.

I think there’s some interesting stuff there that reminds a lot about what went wrong for the Phillies in 2012.

Looking at the blue band in the middle and starting at the top, we see the team’s record by starting pitcher. Some highlights:

• The Phillies went 14-11 in Halladay’s starts in 2012. Coming into the season, in Halladay’s two years with the Phils the team was 46-19 in the games he started.
• 21-10 in games started by Hamels, by far the best mark of any pitcher on the team. The Phils finished the year 81-81, so that means they were 60-71 when someone other than Hamels started. That’s a little remarkable given that two of the team’s other starters were Cliff Lee and Roy Halladay.
• In 2011, the Phillies won 15 or more games in the starts made by four different pitchers (24-8 under Halladay, 18-13 Hamels, 22-10 Lee and 16-5 Worley). In 2012, the team only won 15 or more games in the starts made by Hamels.
• The Phillies went 23-32 when Lee or Worley started. They were 38-15 in starts by that duo in 2011 (22-10 when Lee started and 16-5 when Worley started). In 2011, the Phillies had a better record in Worley’s 21 starts (16-5 for a .762 winning percentage) than they did in Halladay’s starts (24-8, .750).
• Despite a nice year from Kendrick, the team was still just 11-14 in the games he started. The Phillies went 1-9 in the first ten games in which Kendrick appeared in 2012 — he started five of those games and appeared in relief in the other five. Over the last two season the Phils are 30-41 in games in which Kendrick appeared and 18-22 in the 40 games that he started.
• 11-9 in the Blanton starts. The Blanton era ends in Philly with good results for the team. He made exactly 100 starts for the Phils between 2008 and 2012 with the Phillies going 58-42 in the games that he started. Since 2008, the Phillies have won about as many games that were started by Blanton (58) as they have games started by Halladay (60). Blanton has made 100 starts for the Phils over the last five seasons while Halladay has made 90. Hamels is the only pitcher who has started more games that the Phillies won over the past five season — they are 92-68 in games started by Hamels since the beginning of ’08.

The Phillies have signed 37-year-old right-handed pitcher Rodrigo Lopez to a minor league deal. Lopez made seven appearances with the Phillies in 2009, ending the year with a 5.70 ERA. He had a 3.09 ERA with a 1.37 ratio through his first four starts and took a 3.99 ERA into his final appearance of the season on August 9. Lopez allowed six runs in two-thirds of an inning in that game, which was also memorable because Shane Victorino was ejected for arguing balls and strikes while he was in center field with the other team batting. Lopez will try to make the team in spring training as an NRI.

This mailbag from the Phillies web site mentions Humberto Quintero and Zach Miner as top candidates to make the team to start the year among the non-roster invitees. I will be surprised if Miner makes the team to start the year and surprised if Qunitero does not. The same article suggests the possibility of bringing Delmon Young to the Phillies and mentions his “baggage” as one of the reasons that might be difficult. Another is he is a bad defensive outfielder and has had two bad years offensively in a row. The mailbag also guesses that Cloyd will start the year in Triple-A.

This article suggests that the Phillies could easily be in rebuilding mode by July. The Phils would have a real tough time rebuilding if they weren’t able to trade Howard, Utley and Halladay. I would guess they would have some difficulty trading Howard at this point unless they were willing to pay a whole lot of his salary.

The last post looked at the Baseball-Reference’s bWAR for the four elite pitchers on the Phillie pitching staff, Halladay, Lee, Hamels and Papelbon, have produced over the last five seasons. Those four haven’t all been on the Phillies over the past five years (the Phils only had all four of them in 2012) but here’s a look at the bWAR the four of them have contributed to Phillie teams over the past five seasons and how their contributions as a group compares to what the rest of the Phillie staff has done:

The most alarming thing about that table is 2012 — the only year in which the Phillies had all four of Halladay, Hamels, Lee and Papelbon. Last season, all of the other pitchers on the team other than those four combined to do close to nothing. The 16 other pitchers put up a combined bWAR of 0.1.

Over the last five years, the bWAR provided by Phillie pitchers other than that quartet has ranged from 0.1 to 12.2 and averaged 6.9. It’s obviously hugely important that all four of that group were not with the Phillies in any year other than 2012, as the absent members of the group gave others chances to pitch and accumulate WAR. In 2008, for example, Hamels was the only guy in the group with the team.

Over the past two years, the group of Halladay, Lee, Hamels and Papelbon have thrown an average of 45.6% of the innings for the Phillies. Over the past five years, that group’s percentage of total bWAR for the Phillies has been about 1.86 times the percentage of total innings they have pitched. If they threw 45.6% of the team’s innings in 2013 and the percentage of the team’s total bWAR they provided was 1.86 times greater than that, they would account for about 84.8% of the team’s total bWAR for pitchers.

This says that Angel Pagan and the Giants have agreed to a four-year deal.

Nate Schierholtz was not offered a contract and became a free agent.

This article mentions Josh Hamilton, Michael Young, Ichiro Suzuki, Cody Ross, Alfonso Soriano, Michael Cuddyer and Dexter Fowler as players that the Phillies could target to acquire.

In the article linked above, Amaro seems to suggest that Mayberry could play center if the team was strong enough in right and left. That would be a disaster. It would look a lot like last year’s disaster.

This suggests that the Phillies have “long coveted” Peter Bourjos, but that a deal with the Angels is unlikely. It also suggests the Phillies might be interested in a trade for Josh Willingham if he were available.

The whole thing is starting to take on the feel of a slow-moving disaster. Not over yet, though.

A post earlier this week looked at the total bWAR of hitters and pitchers for the top teams in the NL over the last five years. In 2012, it appears the Phillies will have four elite pitchers on their pitching staff. What should we expect the Phillies to get from the group of Halladay, Lee, Hamels and Papelbon in 2013?

Here’s a look at the Baseball-Reference calculated WAR for each of the four over the past five seasons:

So, looking at those four players, over the last five seasons the combined bWAR they have contributed has ranged from 10.7 to 24.5 with an average of 17.7.

Sadly, by a wide margin, the worst year of any of the five is the most recent.

Also sadly, that group has been outrageously healthy over the last five seasons. Halladay’s 2012 season is one exception, but he still made 25 starts and threw 156 1/3 innings. Lee has thrown more than 200 innings in each of the last five years. Hamels has made at least 31 starts every year of the last five. Papelbon has thrown at least 60 innings in relief in each year.

So it’s likely they are going to spend less time on the field in the future than they have over the last five years, giving them less opportunities to accumulate bWAR.

The good news is that the average mark for the last five years, 17.7, would be a huge improvement over what they did in 2012.

The previous post suggested that the total combined bWAR for the team’s pitchers and hitters should be around 36 to give the team a solid shot to be among the four best by bWAR in the NL. If you assume a return to the five-year average for the group of Halladay, Lee, Hamels and Papelbon, that gives the Phils 17.7. Over the last two seasons, the best combined bWAR for all of the Phillie position players is 15.0. That’s 32.7. That sounds like it should be good news — it means that all pitchers on the team other than Halladay, Lee, Hamels and Papelbon, including the missing 40% of the rotation, would only need to post a cumulative bWAR of 3.3 to get the Phils to 36.

But.

In 2012, the Phillie pitchers other than that quartet combined to throw to a bWAR of 0.1. Halladay, Lee, Hamels and Papelbon were at 10.7. The other 20 pitchers who appeared for the Phillies combined for a 0.1 — that includes negative bWAR performances from 11 guys (Blanton, Schwimer, Bastardo, Contreras, Qualls, Sanches, Stutes, Diekman, Savery, Lindblom and Rosenberg).

The obvious other big issue here is Halladay, whose 2012 bWAR dropped to 0.7 coming off of back-to-back seasons in which he was amazing, posting a bWAR better than eight in both years. If you saw any sign in 2012 that Halladay was about to return to 2010-2011 form, I sure missed it. And for now, at least, the Phillies are built around the rather reasonable notion that Roy Halladay is going to be the elite pitcher he has been in recent years.

So let’s hope for the best. But if you suggest that Halladay, Lee, Hamels and Papelbon are going to combine to post a bWAR of 17.7 or better in 2013, I’m taking the under. They all have to stay healthy for one thing. And even if they do, they have close to no chance unless Halladay is way, way better than he was in 2012. Also, the entire pitching staff for the Phillies has thrown to a combined bWAR of 17.7 or better twice in the last 29 years — in each of the seasons in which they did, Hallday posted a bWAR better than eight. In one of them, 2011, Lee also posted a bWAR better than eight.

Bottom line is that the group of four has set the bar almost impossibly high for themselves in terms of whether or not they can ever return to previous, especially 2011, form. In 2011, those four pitchers combined to produce a bWAR of 24.5. Over the past ten seasons, only four NL teams other than the ’11 Phils have put up a combined bWAR for their pitchers of 24.5 or better for their entire staff (the ’12 Reds (26.4), ’09 Giants (24.6), ’08 Cubs (26.9) and ’03 Snakes (27.6)).

In this article from last night, Jim Salisbury suggests the deal for Wilton Lopez is not a sure thing.

This says that BJ Upton and the Braves have agreed to a five-year, $75 million deal. I truly do not know what Upton is going to do over the next five years. But if it’s similar to what he’s done over the last four years, I think it will be good news for the Phils that it’s the Braves and not them paying him $15 millionish a year. He does have huge upside, though. So we’ll see.

Update1: This says the Wilton Lopez deal fell apart.

Update2: This says Denard Span has been traded to the Nats for pitcher Alex Meyer.

Updates one and two are both bad news for the Phillies. Span would have filled the center field hole very nicely.