Philadelphia Phillies general manager Matt Klentak spoke to reporters late last week, and while he didn't attempt to pour cold water on Vince Velasquez's 16-strikeout complete game this past Thursday, he did suggest that the team will be hesitant to consistently allow Velasquez to go that deep into games.
"Organizationally, the health of our pitchers is going to be very important to us," Phillies general manager Matt Klentak said before Friday night's game against the Nationals. "We're not going to come out in mid-April and start announcing certain innings limits or pitch limits or things of that nature. But it is something we're keenly aware of and it's extremely important to the future of this franchise, so we're going to be certainly monitoring it all season long." [Via MLB.com's Todd Zolecki]
Velasquez tossed six scoreless innings in his first start against the New York Mets, before obviously throwing nine innings in his electric performance against the San Diego Padres last week. Through those two games, Velasquez has averaged 7.5 innings per start, which averages out to over 185 innings in a 25-start season. Velasquez probably won't average 7.5 innings per start all year, but a normal season sees a pitcher make over 25-starts, barring injury.
So the Phillies will be comfortable with a few things. First of all, if Velasquez goes through some growing pains, it keeps them from having to pull him from good starts due to innings concerns. Secondly, the Phillies may elect to have Velasquez, who does have a history of some arm problems, end his season some time early in September.
Between Double-A and the Houston Astros last season, Velasquez pitched just 88.2 innings. Some of that has to do with him struggling in some starts, but the Astros used him exclusively as a reliever from late-July on, which accounts for his innings being so low in 2015. Because he only threw that many innings in 2015, he would still be looking at throwing nearly 100 more innings in 2016 if he pitched into the range of 175 innings. On a bad team, the Phillies will likely try to avoid him having a drastic spike in innings this season, in hopes of preventing future arm injuries.
Klentak isn't the first to suggest limiting the innings of some of the Phillies young starters, with pitching coach Bob McClure saying something similar to Matt Gelb of Philly.com in March. It will be interesting to see how the Phillies being cautious with their three young starters in September will look, especially if one or both of Jeremy Hellickson and Charlie Morton is traded to a contender in the meantime.
Tim Kelly (@TimKellySports) is managing editor of Philliedelphia.com, focusing on news and features.
