Dave Dombrowski: Darick Hall to get the ‘majority’ of first base reps
I’ll be frank here: Yesterday sucked as a Phillies fan. Rhys Hoskins, on what looked to be a routine groundball, immediately fell to the ground in pain, tearing his ACL, which will cause him to miss the entire season. This creates a hole at the first base position, a hole that will likely be filled by Darick Hall, per Phillies general manager Dave Dombrowski.
“There are a lot of topics to discuss, and this will give us an extra topic,’’ Dombrowski said. “But I do feel comfortable saying we like Darick Hall a lot. We feel he’ll get the majority of playing time at first. We think he’s ready to step up and be a big league player.
“You can always get better, and you keep your options open. But we are comfortable with Darick. He worked with us in Arizona with Kevin Long over the long haul in the winter. Kevin said Darick was getting better and better all the time, closing his holes at the plate. He’s a good solid first baseman. He’s a big guy. He catches the ball. He has a good arm. He’s always had power. We felt comfortable even last year that he could play at the big league level.’’
Losing Hoskins will hurt. He was a consistent power bat in the lineup that you could pencil in for around 30 home runs and 80 RBIs, while also walking a lot. His defense is nothing special, but at the plate, he’s exactly what you want from a first baseman.
Hall was called up last year and played 42 games, hitting nine home runs and slugged .522. But he also struggled to draw walks and boasted a 31% strikeout rate — both of which contributed to a modest .282 OBP. He has also struggled mightily against left-handed pitching. His slash line last season against southpaws was .175/.242/.314, with all but 12 of those at-bats coming at the Triple-A level.
But his impressive .280/.344/.601 slash line against righties across 436 total at-bats leads me to believe he can be effective as a platoon. Under no circumstances should he be facing a left-handed pitcher. Alec Bohm can shift over to first and Edmundo Sosa or even Scott Kingery can take over at third.
Overall, I don’t know what to expect with Darick Hall really. I’m certainly not expecting the same production as Hoskins gives but even shades of that would be nice. Maybe the Phillies go out and try to bring in a first baseman who can provide some of that consistency Hoskins gave.
Or maybe Darick Hall will shine in his platoon role and prevent the Phillies from needing to bring someone in. In all honesty, I don’t view the second option as very likely. I certainly hope it happens, but would be lying to myself If I fully believed it would.
Phillies fans have a love-hate relationship with Hoskins. He has some high highs and some really low lows, and it makes watching his play all the more exciting … and stressful. Almost all Phillies fans will miss him over the course of the season.
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