GDT 4/5/17: Phillies (Eickhoff) @ Reds (Finnegan)

[zambonir]

Tonight's Philly.com notebook story says Nava, Stassi and Knapp will all be in the starting line-up Thursday.

[gmwannabe]

Altherr's hit was a gift. a 2 hop chopper to the backhand side of the 3B and he bounced the throw which votto couldn't dig out. the throw beat him by at least a step. good to see stassi getting his chance tonight. i wouldn't be sold on joseph at 1B. he hit lefties last year and not too well against righties. if stasis has the stick i'd play him. although you can't fault joseph too much last night. finnegan was pretty good. must be nice to have a lefty starter than can keep you in games. we had one. nothing like that in the pipeline.
gm

[BostonRoss]

I don't want to read too much into a single early season game when it wasn't hitting weather. But I think we're going to see a lot more low scoring games. The offense wasn't good last year, and it's mostly the same guys. They are young as a group and should improve, and Saunders should be better than all the corner OFs they trotted out last season. But this group is a very long way from the prime seasons of Utley, Howard, Rollins, Werth, etc.

[Austinfan]

You learn more about pitchers than hitters in April. Basically what kind of stuff they have. Hitters often need time to get into a groove.
Eickhoff was consistently hitting 92-93, a very good sign, though his velocity was falling off in the 7th, which suggests adrenalin wearing off.
He stuck with the changeup, even though it's a work in progress and inconsistent, and that's a good move, hitters seem to time his cuvre the third time through the lineup.
Developing that changeup could make him a #2 starter, it provides an option that will keep teams off balance in the later innings.