{"id":35380,"date":"2013-04-01T15:53:05","date_gmt":"2013-04-01T15:53:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rcntv.rcn.com\/?p=35380"},"modified":"2023-04-14T15:01:19","modified_gmt":"2023-04-14T15:01:19","slug":"phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\/","title":{"rendered":"Phillies&#8217; Prospects &#8211; The SportsTalk Shop &#8211; April 1st"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cSportsTalk Shop\u201d Looks at Philadelphia Phillies\u2019 Prospects<\/p>\n<p>I recently chatted with the Phillies\u2019 AAA-team\u2019s Director of Media Relations, Matt Provence, (just back from Clearwater) and asked him about some of top Phillies prospects. A number of them could play very important roles with the parent club in the very near future. In fact, with potential free agents like Roy Halladay, Chase Utley, Carlos Ruiz and others all in the last year of their contracts, there could be a quite a few minor leaguers starting the 2014 season with the Philadelphia Phillies. Here are Matt\u2019s comments on some of the top prospects:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/MQZyejwpwxU?rel=0\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>A few other items and observations I\u2019ve obtained about the Phillies top prospects:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Everyone I\u2019ve spoken with has nothing but praise for third baseman Cody Asche. I\u2019ve pressed some of the Phils reporters for areas of weakness or gaping holes in his swing. Everyone thinks he\u2019s the real deal and \u201cright on track\u201d for taking over the position in 2014 \u2014 if not late this year if everything goes well with his play in the Lehigh Valley. A big concern could be that the Phillies would be even more left-handed hitting heavy with Asche in the everyday lineup behind Utley, Howard, Ben Revere, Dom Brown and Jimmy Rollins (who hits better from the left side), but the Phillies are \u201choping\u201d to have that problem a year from now. Everyone I\u2019ve talked to said Asche has an excellent glove that will upgrade the team defensively from current third sacker Michael Young. In addition, Asche won\u2019t hurt you offensively, especially if he bats near the bottom of the order to begin his soon-to-start major league career. He should be fun to watch\u2014along with the continued development of Darin Ruff and his continued learning process of playing left field at Triple-A this year.<\/li>\n<li>B.J. Rosenberg may have been an early exit from the Phillies spring training, but don\u2019t be surprised if he shows up on the Phils\u2019 radar at some point &#8211; especially if Roy Halladay struggles. He\u2019s been inserted into the IronPigs\u2019 starting rotation and is one of the few Triple-A starters that has experience in the big leagues. His lively right-arm that scouts really like might just be the first option if the Phils don\u2019t want to rely on the untested arms of Jonathan Pettibone, Ethan Martin, and Adam Morgan. The latter has continued to pitch well in the minor league camp\u2014so much so that the organization has jettisoned all the veteran free agent pitchers who were brought in to provide insurance to the Phillies starting rotation.<\/li>\n<li>Be careful of \u201cPlayer of the Future\u201d labels. This time in 2012, Cesar Hernandez and Sebastian Valle were projected to be the replacements for Utley and Carlos Ruiz, respectively, yet neither is assured of even starting at those respective positions in Triple-A. Hernandez has been seeing time at shortstop as he looks more to try to tailor his game to a \u201cutility guy\u201d to give himself a better shot at advancing to the Bigs. Valle may go to Double-A just to get some regular reps as he has fallen behind Tommy Joseph (who looked solid offensively and defensively in both the major league and minor league spring training sessions) on the organization\u2019s depth chart. Joseph has also gotten a big \u201cthumbs up\u201d in terms of the all important role of handling the pitching staff thus far. One caveat, there\u2019s a rumor that Valle, who\u2019s has the reputation of a big bat, could also see time in Reading learning left field and could be a back-up plan down the road if Darin Ruff can\u2019t cut it defensively as an outfielder and\/or is traded away.<\/li>\n<li>Tyson Gillies and JC Ramierez, both part of the Cliff Lee trade, continue to struggle to give the Phils any semblance of hope when trying to defend their acquisitions. Gillies, once hoped to be a top-of-the-order\/solid defensive center fielder regular, seems to be on a path similar to Hernandez\u2014that of a utility outfielder as he has seen time at all three outfield positions this spring, and looks to be too inconsistent at the plate to be a major league regular. Ramirez has continued to struggle with his control. Coming off a year at Triple-A in which he ended the season as an IronPig mop-up man, he finds himself once again buried in the pen behind Jake Diekman, Justin DeFratus and others.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>What do you think of our Phillies prospects opinions and which players do you think will make an impact in the near future? We\u2019ll be discussing the Phillies and more on our next \u201cRCN SportsTalk\u201d show (Thursdays at 6 pm). Post a comment on our blog or email us at <a href=\"mailto:RCNSportsTalk@rcn.com\">RCNSportsTalk@rcn.com<\/a> and we\u2019ll read and respond to your questions and comments on our next show!<\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cSportsTalk Shop\u201d Looks at Philadelphia Phillies\u2019 Prospects I recently chatted with the Phillies\u2019 AAA-team\u2019s Director of Media Relations, Matt Provence, (just back from Clearwater) and asked him about some of top Phillies prospects. A number of them could play very important roles with the parent club in the very near future. In fact, with potential&#8230;<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"Yoast SEO Relevanssi index exclude","inline_featured_image":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4,5],"tags":[50,54,96,111,168,246,259,341,421,463,468],"class_list":["post-35380","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-featured","category-sports","category-the-sportstalk-shop","tag-ben-revere","tag-bj-rosenberger","tag-chase-utley","tag-cody-asche","tag-dom-browne","tag-jc-ramierez","tag-jimmy-rollins","tag-michael-young","tag-phillies","tag-roy-halladay","tag-ryan-howard"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Phillies&#039; Prospects - The SportsTalk Shop - April 1st - ATVN<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Phillies&#039; Prospects - The SportsTalk Shop - April 1st - ATVN\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u201cSportsTalk Shop\u201d Looks at Philadelphia Phillies\u2019 Prospects I recently chatted with the Phillies\u2019 AAA-team\u2019s Director of Media Relations, Matt Provence, (just back from Clearwater) and asked him about some of top Phillies prospects. A number of them could play very important roles with the parent club in the very near future. In fact, with potential...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"ATVN\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-04-01T15:53:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-04-14T15:01:19+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Chris Michael\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Chris Michael\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Chris Michael\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/6aba8df7f74bf50b72426776afd0067a\"},\"headline\":\"Phillies&#8217; Prospects &#8211; The SportsTalk Shop &#8211; April 1st\",\"datePublished\":\"2013-04-01T15:53:05+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-04-14T15:01:19+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":825,\"commentCount\":0,\"keywords\":[\"Ben Revere\",\"BJ Rosenberger\",\"Chase Utley\",\"Cody Asche\",\"Dom Browne\",\"JC Ramierez\",\"Jimmy Rollins\",\"Michael Young\",\"Phillies\",\"Roy Halladay\",\"Ryan Howard\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Featured\",\"Sports\",\"The SportsTalk Shop\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\\\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\\\/\",\"name\":\"Phillies' Prospects - The SportsTalk Shop - April 1st - ATVN\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2013-04-01T15:53:05+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-04-14T15:01:19+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/6aba8df7f74bf50b72426776afd0067a\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\\\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/\",\"name\":\"ATVN\",\"description\":\"Local Programming &amp; Astound Digital Cable, Internet &amp; Phone Services\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/6aba8df7f74bf50b72426776afd0067a\",\"name\":\"Chris Michael\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"\\\/atvn\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2014\\\/11\\\/Chris-Michael-Sports-Talk-Shop-Author-Image1.jpg\",\"url\":\"\\\/atvn\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2014\\\/11\\\/Chris-Michael-Sports-Talk-Shop-Author-Image1.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"\\\/atvn\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2014\\\/11\\\/Chris-Michael-Sports-Talk-Shop-Author-Image1.jpg\",\"caption\":\"Chris Michael\"},\"description\":\"Chris handles play-by-play for RCN sports events, including baseball, football &amp; basketball games and produces\\\/hosts the station\u2019s 60-minute live call-in show. Among Chris\u2019s other responsibilities include reporting on local news &amp; sports stories, conducting \u201cTake 5\u201d interviews with community and political leaders, producing commercials, voiceovers and promos; and generating blog entries and videos on the internet. Click here to listen to the weekly Sports Talk podcast.\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.astound.com\\\/atvn\\\/author\\\/rcntvchris\\\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Phillies' Prospects - The SportsTalk Shop - April 1st - ATVN","robots":{"index":"noindex","follow":"follow"},"og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Phillies' Prospects - The SportsTalk Shop - April 1st - ATVN","og_description":"\u201cSportsTalk Shop\u201d Looks at Philadelphia Phillies\u2019 Prospects I recently chatted with the Phillies\u2019 AAA-team\u2019s Director of Media Relations, Matt Provence, (just back from Clearwater) and asked him about some of top Phillies prospects. A number of them could play very important roles with the parent club in the very near future. In fact, with potential...","og_url":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\/","og_site_name":"ATVN","article_published_time":"2013-04-01T15:53:05+00:00","article_modified_time":"2023-04-14T15:01:19+00:00","author":"Chris Michael","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Chris Michael","Est. reading time":"4 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\/"},"author":{"name":"Chris Michael","@id":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/#\/schema\/person\/6aba8df7f74bf50b72426776afd0067a"},"headline":"Phillies&#8217; Prospects &#8211; The SportsTalk Shop &#8211; April 1st","datePublished":"2013-04-01T15:53:05+00:00","dateModified":"2023-04-14T15:01:19+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\/"},"wordCount":825,"commentCount":0,"keywords":["Ben Revere","BJ Rosenberger","Chase Utley","Cody Asche","Dom Browne","JC Ramierez","Jimmy Rollins","Michael Young","Phillies","Roy Halladay","Ryan Howard"],"articleSection":["Featured","Sports","The SportsTalk Shop"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\/","url":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\/","name":"Phillies' Prospects - The SportsTalk Shop - April 1st - ATVN","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/#website"},"datePublished":"2013-04-01T15:53:05+00:00","dateModified":"2023-04-14T15:01:19+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/#\/schema\/person\/6aba8df7f74bf50b72426776afd0067a"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/phillies-prospects-the-sportstalk-shop-april-1st\/"]}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/","name":"ATVN","description":"Local Programming &amp; Astound Digital Cable, Internet &amp; Phone Services","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/#\/schema\/person\/6aba8df7f74bf50b72426776afd0067a","name":"Chris Michael","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"\/atvn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/Chris-Michael-Sports-Talk-Shop-Author-Image1.jpg","url":"\/atvn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/Chris-Michael-Sports-Talk-Shop-Author-Image1.jpg","contentUrl":"\/atvn\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/Chris-Michael-Sports-Talk-Shop-Author-Image1.jpg","caption":"Chris Michael"},"description":"Chris handles play-by-play for RCN sports events, including baseball, football &amp; basketball games and produces\/hosts the station\u2019s 60-minute live call-in show. Among Chris\u2019s other responsibilities include reporting on local news &amp; sports stories, conducting \u201cTake 5\u201d interviews with community and political leaders, producing commercials, voiceovers and promos; and generating blog entries and videos on the internet. Click here to listen to the weekly Sports Talk podcast.","url":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/author\/rcntvchris\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35380","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35380"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35380\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87591,"href":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35380\/revisions\/87591"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.astound.com\/atvn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}