Phillies' Andrew Painter takes the mound at Citizens Bank Park Wednesday night for the first time since June 17, seven weeks to the day since his last start at home.
On that hot Wednesday, boos rang out after surrendering six earned runs on six hits, two of which being home runs, in just two innings of work. He was sent down to Triple-A following the game.
After taking an extended break to revamp mechanics and his arsenal and putting together solid starts in his final two outings with the IronPigs, the rookie earned a chance at redemption.
Whether it was the right time or not could be up for debate, but the Phillies were hoping for something from Painter.
The rookie redeemed himself at Camden Yards on Friday turning in a quality start but more importantly, putting the team in a position to win the game before a bullpen meltdown.
“The biggest thing would be consistency,” interim manager Don Mattingly said the team is looking for from the once highly coveted prospect.
“That outing in Baltimore was aggressive; you can see he was on the attack. Just body language, all that was good. We want him to feel like that and look like that every time he takes the ball…We’d like it to be consistent so the guys on the field know we are going to get a consistent start and have a good chance to win.”
Painter’s body language and aggressiveness could have easily evaporated in that start after being greeted by a double and a Pete Alonso two-run home run against his first two batters faced.
Instead, the 23-year-old retired 17 of the final 21 batters he faced, including a stretch of 10 consecutive Orioles hitters, providing a glimmer of hope that he has righted the ship after a brutal start to his big league career where he went 1-8 with a 7.06 ERA in 14 appearances with 12 being starts.
That glimmer was enough for it to play a factor in president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski’s decision to not acquire another starting pitcher for that fifth spot in the rotation, despite talking to a lot of other teams regarding other possible starting pitchers.
“I think it was important. Not only his last start but his two starts before that [in Triple-A],” Dombrowski said on Monday.
“Part of that ends up being my conversation with our staff members and their comfort zone and how they feel. If he’s making the progress they would like him to make and he continues to make going forward. They feel that he has a lot better feel of himself when he’s drifting out of his rotation and some of the adjustments he’s made with his pitches. So it made quite a bit of difference.”
Painter has a chance to show in front of the home faithful that his last start wasn’t a mirage. Instead, he has made the necessary adjustments to become a consistent force at the back end of the rotation for the Phillies down the home stretch of the regular season.
