The Vanimal

I have gotten several requests from my readers to write an entry about the Phillies fifth starter, Vance “The Vanimal” Worley. After last night’s rain drenched victory, I have finally decided to relent.

Where do you start with this guy? Well, we can start at the beginning of the season when he was not on my, or really anybody else’s radar for that matter. Save probably Ruben Amaro and Charlie Manuel. Do you get the feeling that those two may be the smartest baseball guys in the room at all times? Just figure that Worley, and moves like playing John Mayberry Jr. during his recent hot streak, while still giving Raul Ibanez enough at bats are not things to be taken lightly. These guys have a plan, and they are executing it.

Needless to say, the plan at the beginning of the season did not involve a bespectacled mohawked rookie running rampant all over the National League. The guy is rocking the 2010s version of Kurt Rambis rec specs, and yet, manages to pull it off. The Phillies looked to be set at starting pitcher with the obvious big four, Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee, Cole Hamels, and Roy Oswalt. Joe Blanton would be the fifth starter and Kyle Kendrick (all he does is win games, 42-30 career record) would be insurance if they needed it. A myriad of injuries to the bullpen, as well as Oswalt and Blanton, thrust Worley into the rotation a month into the season.

Worley made his Major League debut April 29th against the New York Mets in Philadelphia. He went six innings of scoreless ball, gave up two hits (two hits!?!?), four walks (tied for the most he has given up all year), struck out five and picked up the win in a 10-3 victory over the queens from Queens. He picked up three more wins in May, one as a starter, and two in relief.

In mid-May Roy Oswalt returned from his first stint on the disabled list so Worley was sent back down to Triple-A Lehigh Valley to continue starting games. Oswalt’s return to the able list was short-lived and Worley found himself back with the big club within a week or so. He had a tough start against Cincinnati on May 24th, when he gave up three runs in five innings and received a no-decision in a Phillies loss. Another rough start followed, his second worst of the season. He gave up five runs in just three innings to the Mets in a 9-5 loss. His record dropped to 2-1 for the season. That game was played on May 29th. Since that game, Vance Worley has made fourteen starts for the Phillies. The Phillies record in those games: 14-0. I have to blink a few times whenever I read that somewhere else, so I hope you are doing the same.

Let’s list some records shall we? No team has won 14 consecutive games started by a rookie since Cincinnati did it for Joe Simpson in 1970. The Phillies have not won this many consecutive starts for any pitcher since a guy named Steve Carlton won 15 straight for the hapless 1972 Phillies. Those are triple-take stats. At this point in the season, Worley is 11-1 with a 2.85 ERA.

Obviously, on the surface Worley has been an outstanding pitcher this season, but it is also the way he has gone about it that makes him unique in my mind. He was born in 1987 and will celebrate his 24th birthday later this month. He stepped into a rotation that already had two Cy Young winners (Halladay, Lee), an NLCS/WS MVP (Hamels), and the guy who leads the National League in wins over the last ten years (Oswalt). I haven’t even seen Vance flinch under that kind of intimidating presence. Obviously, I am not in the clubhouse with these guys, but I have to figure that the veteran staff has taken Worley under their wings and made him one of their own. He is always smiling in the dugout with his hat not quite on all the way, chewing on sunflower seeds, and most likely scoping chicks in the crowd with Shane Victorino. If you’re 23 and killing it for the Phillies, wouldn’t that be what you were doing if you only played once every five days?

On the mound, Worley is all business. This is one of the most impressive pages I have seen on espn.com. He picked up three straight inter-league wins in June. The Phllies have historically been between not-good and awful in inter-league play so this was pretty good. The way he did it was borderline unbelievable. He picked up the only win the Phillies got in a three game series in Seattle, a 5-1 victory in which he went five innings and gave up just the one run. In his next start against Oakland, he went six innings and gave up a goose egg in a 1-0 Phillies victory. The Phillies offense was not exactly clicking during this part of the season so the pitchers knew there was little margin for error. This obviously did not faze The Vanimal. His third and final start in June was against the perennial AL East power Boston Red Sox. What did he do against the best offense in baseball you ask? He went seven innings, gave up one measly run and struck out five in a 2-1 Phillies victory.

Turn the page on the calendar to July and things really just got better for this young man from Sacramento. Worley went 4-0 in five July starts. He pitched 35.1 innings, struck out 29, and recorded a 2.04 ERA. The highlights of these starts included a marvelous eight innings of one run ball in the most oppressive heat of the year in Chicago. This was the series that Roy Halladay finally snapped his streak of pitching at least six innings in road starts that spanned over 50 starts due to heat frustration. Worley shrugged off the day game 100 + degree weather and went to work. I remember tweeting after the Cubs series “Vance Worley was better than Halladay and Lee in this series.” That is pretty much the highest praise you can get in baseball. His next start, against the defending World Series Champion San Francisco Giants was his best of the season. He pitched a complete game in San Francisco while giving up two runs and striking out five and improved his record to 7-1. I kept texting my friend Bob before every Worley start. “I know he cannot keep this going. He is going to get blown up.” Bob agreed, but for some reason it just has not happened. Even in his worst start of the year, a day game in Los Angeles against the Dodgers in which Worley gave up six runs in four innings, the Phillies rallied behind him and came back to win 9-8.

After this many impressive starts, Worley can no longer really be considered a fluke. If he had enough starts to qualify for the league leaders only eight starters that are not on his team have a better ERA than he does. Unfortunately for Vance, the Rookie of the Year race is out of control this year. The Braves have a pair of guys, in first baseman Freddie Freeman (.291/ 18 HRs / 64 RBI) and closer Craig Kimbrel (rookie saves record at 42 and counting – tops in the NL) who are possibly more deserving of the award than he is.

Having said all this about Worley, it is crazy to think about just how good the Phillies pitching staff is. There is little to no chance, despite all of the numbers and wins he has racked up, that Worley will get a start in a playoff game for the Phillies. It is a testament to the pitching staff that they can afford to leave a guy who is pitching this well out of the rotation. The big three of Doc, Lee, and Hamels will certainly start the first three games of every playoff series, and with a ton of postseason and big game experience, Roy Oswalt will almost certainly get the nod for a game four start in the playoffs. It will be nice to know that we have Vance waiting in the bullpen, ready to go if a starter is having an off night, or if the Phils have to go through some god-awful rain delay that would force a starter from the game. Confidence is the key out there, we know Vance has it, and as a fan base we should have it in him.