When the Phillies signed Chan Ho Park in the offseason, Park made it known that he was coming to compete for a spot in the Phillies rotation. Despite his previous success in the pen, he wanted to start. And then he went out and earned the job, beating out former BlueClaws JA Happ and Kyle Kendrick in the process.

Then the real games started and Park has been, well, awful. You can find his game log and full stats here. But basically, he has allowed a run an inning as a starter (he threw 1 shutout inning in relief the first week of the year), with 11 walks, including six last night in getting taken apart by the Mets.

JA Happ has been pretty good in relief (see here). Not perfect, but certainly better than Park, and remember, he pitched very well at the end of 2008 as a starter. Further, one justification for putting Happ in the pen was the Phillies need for a lefty reliever. But they have Jack Taschner now, acquired right before the season, and Scott Eyre, with Mike Zagurski not that far off.

Note: Happ didn’t exactly distinguish himself last night walking pitcher Pedro Feliciano on four pitches, but overall he’s still been good, with 7 Ks/9 and 10 hits in 15 innings.

Here’s what Charlie Manuel said yesterday: “Our pitching is something we’ll talk over. I’m not ready to say Chan Ho Park is not going to get any more starts. I’m not ready to say that.”

BlueClaws Blog says: It’s time to make the switch. We still say Happ over Kendrick, and the Phillies did too in spring training, sending Kendrick down with two weeks left in the spring.

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This entry was posted on Saturday, May 2nd, 2009 at 10:52 am and is filed under Past BlueClaws, Phillies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.