Bisenius is a guy I saw mentioned a bunch in a previous post asking which guys could contribute this year. As we all know, he had a terrible 2007 after a promising 2006. He had a few minor injuries, and his control abandoned him. He still has a hard fastball and slider, and if he can rebound, he could be a nice addition to the Phillies pen, instead of having to resort to re-treads like Antonio Alfonseca and Jose Mesa. Take a look at his key peripherals over the last 4 seasons
2004: 50.1 IP — 2.51 BB/9 — 6.83 K/9 — 0.90 HR/9
2005: 61.0 IP — 5.31 BB/9 — 8.26 K/9 — 0.74 HR/9 — 1.00 GB:FB
2006: 88.2 IP — 3.45 BB/9 — 10.25 K/9 — 0.61 HR/9 — 1.51 GB:FB
2007: 43.0 IP — 6.49 BB/9 — 7.95 K/9 — 1.05 HR/9 — 0.91 GB:FB
Was 2006 a fluke? When I did my Top 30, I looked at these numbers, and because of them I couldn’t justify including him in my list. The fact that he doesn’t get a good amount of ground balls is troubling. His HR rate has never been above average, even in 2006, and his best walk rate was almost 3.5 per 9, not mindblowing stuff from a reliever-exclusive pitching prospect. As I mentioned, he does have good fastball velocity, he does have a good hard slider, but does he have enough to be a valuable reliever? To me, he looks like a 6th inning guy, if he makes it. I’m hoping he does, because as I said, he’s much better than having to dig up old relievers past their sell by date, but I think I’m less optimistic now than I was at this time last year.
What do you think? Will he replicate or better his 2006? Will he struggle again?
Phuture Phillies 
I don’t think 2006 is a fluke. It seems hard to get by for a whole year as a lucky fluke. This is not a case of lucky babip, the peripherals for 2006 were great. So, he learned to do something better prior to 2006 or to successfully repeat the good things he had already done. You would expect learning to occur as a guy progresses through the minors.
So, the question is what happened in 2007? Was it all due to the injuries, did he get out of the sync and unable to repeat successful pitches as he did in 2006? He was definitely wilder, and that can lead to all the other bad peripherals, as he needs to throw a fat pitch more often, behind in the count. If the injuries cost him a mph or two on his fastball, that also can be the difference to throwing good pitches by hitters and not being able to and resorting to nibbling.
Hopefully he is healthy in 2008 and we get to seat what he can do in Philly at some point in season. I don’t think he just suddenly forgot how to pitch between 2006 and 2007, although other guys like Brannan have certainly mysteriously lost control and never regained it. Anyway, way too soon to write off Bisenius.
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I agree with you. Also the better pitchers are getting close to the phillies and he is looking average. I will always hope he becomes a superstar .
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I did not see him pitch last year but I did in 2006 and I was very impressed. Any pitcher that has decent control and can throw 2 good power pitches, should have some value, even if only situational.
Naturally, the big question is whether he can return to form but I believe that he should be given every chance to do so and that he will respond.
As so accurately stated by phuturephillies, the last thing we want to see during the 2008 season is that the potential need for a productive reliever takes us back down the road to the likes of Alfonseca, Mesa, etc. Plus, wouldn’t it be nice to have another prospect contribute now and have the potential to continue to get better.
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What happened in 2007? He pitched all last winter with very little or no rest. In the AFL and in Venezuela. All this after pitching 80+ innings in the minors in 2006. And the Phils wonder why he was hurt? Gee, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out. So what do they do this offseason? Back out to the Arizona Fall League again. It’s almost like they don’t want to rest Bisenius’ sore arm. Of all the dumb and stupid things the Phillies do, this one is near the top of the list. After his bad 2005 season at Lakewood, he swam in a pool all winter and added 4-6 mph to his fasball the next season. Maybe he finally got a chance to swim a little this offseason.
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Unfortunately, I’m not as confident as the rest of you. I’ve seen way more pitchers go off the road one year and never make it back that those that do. He’s not yet shown an ability to throw strikes and until he does, he’ll remain a minor leaguer who gives up way too many fly balls and home runs. Also, while I agree I hope we don’t see Alfonseca or Mesa again, it would be wrong to not give Alfonseca credit for pitching great last year for awhile until his arm fell off and then gamely going out there to eat innings after that just to help the team. There’s a reason these old relievers hang around. They take the ball whenever they’re asked and in reality they’re only effective when they’re rested which doesn’t happen during the season. Can anyone explain Doug Jones still being the closer of the Indians????
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It’s odd that both Bisenius and Happ floundered in AAA last year after acing AA the year before… especially considering that AA is traditionally considered the big test for prospects, while AAA is ideally no more than a pit stop on the way to the majors.
Bisenius needs to start this year in AAA and show that he has his stuff back before we can risk putting him in the Philly bullpen. Right now Bisenius belongs in the same boat as Francisco Rosario and Matt Smith: guys who you shouldn’t count on for anything, but we can hope that they’ll get their butts in gear and help the club out.
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Keep in mind that Ottawa was a horrible team last year(.385 win %). They had zero offensive firepower and they were near the top of the league in unearned runs allowed. It would be tough to get amped up to pitch for a team like that. I’m not giving Happ or Bisenius a pass for last years performance, but a crappy team could have some effect on a young pitchers confidence.
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i think Happ and Bisenius both rebound strongly from a pathetic ’07 season. They both had a cup of coffee in the majors and didn’t do as well as anyone had hoped, so going back down a level after the high of making to the bigs could have had some effect on their psyche. Add in injury problems and you have yourself a full blown bust of a season. I say Bisenius makes the team out of spring training and Happ comes up mid-season as an injury replacement and sticks. God help us if we bring back either Mesa, Alfonseca or Rosario.
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I am pulling for any of our prospects to turn around and help out. As for Bisenius–Ron Reed or Kyle Farnsworth?
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I don’t have a whole lot of faith in Bisenius. I think making it to the bigs and not being good enough (in his mind, at least) really hurt his development. That, coupled with the fact that he hardly gets any time off, spells trouble.
I’m not sure why the Phillies over-work a promising prospect, which is what Bisenius looked like after the 06 season. Maybe they send him to the AFL because that’s where elite prospects go to play and they wanted Joe to feel like they still have faith in him. However, that might come back to bite them in the butt when Bisenius has another year like 07.
While I’d like to pull for Joe, the numbers don’t lie in this case. Maybe he does something different with his delivery that we can’t see with the numbers which makes the ball easier to pick up? Who knows, really, but he needs desperately to rebound and help the club. I can’t stand to see Mesa types in our bullpen anymore, even though the older vets do take the ball whenever asked to (Tom Gordon, ‘Fonzie). Murray’s point seems well-founded.
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The good: Bisenius was really good in 2006. He looked pretty good in the spring last year as I recall. Ottawa is a bad place to play baseball I think. Two guys who were doing OK retired in the middle of the season last year — I don’t think that happens al that much. It’s very possible that injuries were the main cause of his problems last season.
The bad: Although injuries can be a fine excuse, if he can’t stay healthy, he won’t make it. Most of the other stuff has been addressed — control issues and fly ball tendencies. He hasn’t been a really good pitcher throughout his career.
I think though, that he will rebound this season. If his injury problems are behind him and he had some decent rest this off season, I can see him starting off in AAA and coming up during the season to replace a hurt Gordon or a lousy Condrey or something like that. The Phils look to be OK in the late innings with Lidge, Madson, Romero and maybe a healthy Gordon. The Phils might be able to break him in slowly in non-big-pressure situations.
Bisenius, Mathieson, Zagurski are all kinda in the same boat. If healthy, any of them or all of them might pitch very well for the big club some time in 2008.
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I agree with Eric. If they are on a bad team (Ottawa) they will likely be effected in a negatively way. He falls into the same catagory as many other pitching prospects this year: showing flashes of brilliance in the recent past, but also showed problems. They include: Mathieson, Zagurski, Matt Smith, Bisenius, Castro, Sergovia, Happ, and a few others.
Some of these guys will likely come thru and shine this year while the law of averages say that some will faulter. Bisenuis has a good upside and should improve over last year, likely somewhere between the last 2 yrs.
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I just got the BA Prospect Handbook yesterday and Bisenius was ranked number 24. I agree with Bob D. I believe Bisenius was negatively affected by being with such a bad team (Ottawa). He’ll rebound.
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I think that Yoel Hernandez has a better chance to make the team than Bisenius.
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