With the Phillies thin in the outfield, they’re “showing strong interest” in newly-available veteran Will Venable, CSNPhilly.com’s Jim Salisbury reports. Venable became a free agent after the Indians released him from his minor league contract yesterday.
Venable, 33, hit .244/.320/.350 over 390 plate appearances with the Padres and Rangers last season. Though his batting numbers have declined quite a bit since his 22-homer season/.796 OPS season for San Diego in 2013, Venable has a decent .256/.324/.422 slash line against right-handed pitching over his career. Beyond his bat, Venable perhaps has more value at this point due to excellent baserunning and his above-average defensive metrics at all three outfield positions.
Phillies GM Matt Klentak said last week that the team wasn’t necessarily actively looking for outfield help, despite losing both Aaron Altherr and Cody Asche to injuries. Center fielder Odubel Herrera is expected to play every day but there’s plenty of uncertainty in the corner outfield spots, with Peter Bourjos, Cedric Hunter, David Lough and Rule 5 pick Tyler Goeddel all in the mix for playing time. Goeddel and Bourjos are right-handed hitters, so they could mesh well with Venable in a platoon.
Lough, Bourjous and Hunter have all looked pretty good this spring. Goedell has looked decent. He isn’t going anywhere.
I guess you could drop Cedric Hunter and add Venable, but Venable hasn’t hit very well since 2013, Hunter on the other hand, never really had a shot.
Yeah, a little disappointed to read this. He brings some speed and solid D, but his offensive production looks fairly Asche like. They definitely need someone else in the outfield, but I was hoping they would go for David Murphy. I guess Hunter offers some depth at AAA, but it would be nice to see a hard working guy like him get a shot with the big club. He has looked pretty good this spring.
Maybe its his violent swing, but I liked what I’ve seen from Cedric Hunter. Hes not gonna walk much, but he can square the ball up with the best of ’em.
I like the signing. Good veteran presence in the OF with low risk and high reward. Well maybe not real “high,” but “highish.” If he hits 12-15 HRs I’ll be pleasantly surprised but given what the OF currently looks like, he can’t hurt. Goeddel should get a chance to play a bit, but he’s skipping a level and may not adjust as well as Herrera did. Asche will hopefully be back soon and will give good depth but until I see more from Hunter, he and Lough are nothing but fill in AAA depth IMO and have no real chance in the big leagues. Not that Venable is going to be an all star, but he was quite serviceable just a couple years ago and hopefully had a little left. Just need him to get through the year until Quinn or Williams are ready or Altherr is back.