The Instructional League began in earnest today when the Phillies faced off against the Toronto Blue Jays at Spectrum Field.  In addition to the 15 or so fans and one baseball reporter (me), there were about 30 scouts and a couple dozen Phillies front office and support personnel in the stands,  Notables included Jorge Velandia, Dana Parks, a guy who looked like Bryan Minniti, and Oneri Fleita.  Fleita was hired last off season to supervise scouting in Mexico.  After the 2015 season, he had been signed by the Tigers as an international crosschecker.  But, prior to that he had spent 25 years in the Cubs organization – notably as the director of the Cubs’ Latin American operations from 1997-2008, Director of Player Development from 2000-2008, and Vice President, Player Personnel from 2011 until his firing when Theo Epstein took over as GM.  Continue reading Florida Instructs; September 24, 2018 →

Saturday, the coaches held an intrasquad game among the Instructs participants.  They started a five inning game at 10:00 AM.  Ten pitchers got work, but there were few if any substitutions among the position players.  The most exciting news was that Sixto Sanchez was pitching in the first inning. Continue reading Florida Instructs; September 22, 2018 →

Wednesday I turned the calendar on another year, taking the day off from the heat and humidity at the Carpenter Complex.  I returned Thursday to observe similar exercises and drills as the previous couple days.

The format remained the same with the players coming out around 10:00 AM for stretching exercises, conditioning drills, and long toss.  These were followed the various fielding drills for each group – infielders, outfielders, catchers, and pitchers.  Continue reading Florida Instructs; September 20, 2018 →

Phillies Instructs continued Tuesday with the players beginning outside around 8:00 AM for individual work with the coaches.  They mix in meetings during the day and broke for one after this.  They came out again around 10:00 AM and began their stretching and conditioning exercises, followed by long toss.

There was a lot less outside work today.  They ran some pretty heavy catcher’s drills, ending with two coaches hitting balls to the plate for the catchers to catch an apply a tag.  They also ran fielding drills on the other fields. Then they scattered for batting practice.

I’ve got a little more video today, so I’m going to embed the links to save space here. Continue reading Florida Instructs; September 18, 2018 →

The Phillies’ Fall Instructs started this morning.  Over 70 players took to Roberts and Schmidt Fields to perform required stretching and conditioning exercises around 10:45.  When finished, they split up into smaller groups with position players staying on Roberts and Schmidt and pitchers going to Carlton and Ashburn for long toss to loosen their arms.

When ready, the groups remixed for drills on each of the four available fields.  Seventeen coaches worked with  pitchers, infielders, outfielders, and catchers on various fielding drills.  These concluded with pop up drills.  Then came batting practice.

Here are three shots of third baseman Alec Bohm during fielding drills. Continue reading Florida Instructs; September 17, 2018 – Plus Roster →