Phillies Designate Carlos Hernández For Assignment

The Phillies announced Wednesday morning that right-handed reliever Carlos Hernández has been designated for assignment. His spot on the 26-man roster will go to fellow righty Michael Mercado, who’s been recalled from Triple-A Lehigh Valley. Mercado was already on the 40-man roster, so the Phils now have one open spot.

Hernández, 28, came to the Phils via waivers back in spring training. The Royals had attempted to pass the flamethrowing, out-of-options righty through waivers and retain him as a depth arm, but Philadelphia claimed the power-armed, 6’4″ righty in hopes of unlocking what’s long looked like some latent potential.

It hasn’t worked out thus far. In 25 2/3 innings out of Rob Thomson’s bullpen, Hernández has been tagged for 15 earned runs on 32 hits and 13 walks. He’s plunked a pair of hitters as well. The resulting 5.26 ERA is an eyesore, Hernández’s once strong strikeout rate has dipped below average; he’s fanned only 18.7% of opponents against a 10.6% walk rate.

Back in 2023, Hernández looked like a breakout arm in Kansas City’s bullpen in the season’s first half. He was averaging better than 99 mph on his fastball and carried a 3.57 ERA, 30% strikeout rate and 7.1% walk rate into that year’s trade deadline. With the Royals operating as sellers and Hernández performing so well, he even looked like an under-the-radar trade chip for a club that, at the time, didn’t have much to peddle to deadline buyers.

The Royals hung onto Hernández — understandably so; he had four additional seasons of club control remaining — and things went south almost immediately. Hernández served up four runs in his third outing post-deadline, and his season snowballed from there. In 17 innings post-deadline, he was shelled for 20 runs. The strong command he’d displayed evaporated, as he walked more hitters than he struck out in the season’s final two months. Hernández missed about two months the following season due to shoulder troubles. He never required surgery, but his velocity has never returned to his 2023 levels, and his command has never rebounded to the levels we saw in the first two-thirds of the 2023 season.

Now that Hernández has been designated for assignment, the Phillies will either trade him or place him on waivers within the next five days. Waivers themselves are a 48-hour process. Within a week’s time, we’ll know what’s next for the hard-throwing righty.