The injuries continue to pile up for the Phillies staff -- Antonio Bastardo was the latest victim when he was placed on the 15-day disabled list on Monday night with a left shoulder strain.
The rookie southpaw was already only in the Phillies rotation to replace injured starter Brett Myers.
Bastardo dazzled in his first career start against the San Diego Padres out dueling Pads’ ace Jake Peavy. He used a moving fastball to hold the Pads to one-earned run, four hits and one walk while striking out five over six innings.
But, since then Bastardo did little to impress. His ERA climbed to 6.75 as his record dropped to 2-3.
The final straw was last week when the Tampa Rays shelled Bastardo for six earned runs, seven hits and three walks in only 3.2 innings before leaving with the shoulder strain.
For now the Phillies called back up lefty reliever Sergio Escalona to join the team in Atlanta. (He sure earned some frequent flier miles this season jumping back and forth between the Phils and Triple-A IronPigs.)
The Phils must look internally to bring up another starter. The two top guys are right-handers Andrew Carpenter and Carlos Carrasco.
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Carpenter pitched once this season for the Phils earning a win against the lowly Nationals. Carrasco has never pitched in the Majors.
But, the need remained for the Phillies to find another arm just like most of the other teams in the league.
"When you have this many teams in the race it's very thin," General Manager Ruben Amaro Jr. told MLB.com.
"It's always thin,” he continued. “Again, there were three teams who got pitching last year. Three teams out of 30 -- that's 10 percent. We can say, 'Pretty please can we have a pitcher?' but that doesn't mean one will become available."
Now that doesn’t sound promising.
