2009 Projection: Jack Taschner

Jack Taschner, RP (LHP)
Age: 30 (31, April 21)

2008: 48 IP / 3-2 / 4.88 ERA / 24 BB / 39 K / 0 SV / 4 BS / 1.69 WHIP

Summary: As the primary left-handed pitcher out of the Giants bullpen, Jack Taschner was OK againast left-handers. He held them to a .279 average and a .394 slugging percentage. Not bad, but not good enough to be a solid lefty specialist. Sadly, he wasn’t good against righties (.308/.406/.495). Interestingly he was much better in the first half of the season, recording a 3.03 ERA, as opposed to a second-half ERA of 8.80.

Career Level: Prime (Year 2)

Green Flags: The first-half numbers show maybe Taschner is just good for a small period of time, which might do the trick since JC Romero is missing the first 50 games. … He did have good K/9 ratings with 7.31.

Red Flags: Taschner did, however, walk a ton of hitters, at a rate of 4.5 per nine. … Taschner also let up a lot of fly balls, inducing big flys from 42.6 percent of his pitches. That won’t bode well at Citizens Bank Park.

Prognostication: Taschner won’t be a great lefty specialist. In fact, he won’t be used too much, very likely, which can’t be such a bad thing. But he might have trouble. He hasn’t really had a great season yet in the majors, so don’t expect anything eye-opening.

2009 Projection: 19.1 IP / 1-3 / 5.12 ERA / 13 BB / 18 K / 0 SV / 2 BS / 1.81 WHIP

Tim Malcolm

Tim first found the Phillies as a little infant at Veteran’s Stadium, cheering on a Juan Samuel game-winning home run in his very first game. With the pinstripes in his blood, he witnessed Terry Mulholland’s 1990 no-hitter, “Steve Carlton Night” at the Vet, game three of the 1993 World Series, countless games during the charmed 2008 championship season and various road excursions. Since November 2007 Tim’s been writing about them daily at Phillies Nation, becoming one of the world’s most popular Phillies scribes. You can catch him on Twitter and Facebook, as well. When he’s not talking about the Phils he’s relaxing with a St. Bernardus ABT 12 or one of his many favored brews.