Reds prospect Connor Phillips grew from his ups and downs in the big leagues in 2023

GOODYEAR, Ariz. –– In the biggest start of his life, Cincinnati Reds pitcher Connor Phillips had a historically bad game. Last September, with the Reds’ playoff hopes on the line, Phillips didn’t throw a strike and walked three batters before manager David Bell pulled the 22-year-old rookie from the game.

On Sept. 30, 2023, Phillips became the first starting pitcher since 1986 to throw 12-plus pitches without a strike. The Reds went on to allow five runs in the first inning of a blowout loss to the St. Louis Cardinals. That night, the Reds were eliminated from the playoff race.

After he got pulled from the game, Phillips went back to the clubhouse to stew on everything that had just gone wrong.

“Joey Votto sat with me,” Phillips says five months later. “That’s something that has stuck with me. He sat there and told me, ‘You’re not the reason we’ll lose this game. You’re not going to be the reason, if we do lose, that we didn’t make the playoffs.’

“He told me that he’d see me at spring training and ask me what I did the next week.”

Phillips, a top-100 prospect in baseball, wasn’t supposed to pitch in that game. Ideally, Nick Lodolo and Graham Ashcraft would have been healthy last September to pitch in a must-win game. At the time, Phillips was the sixth-youngest starting pitcher in the big leagues, and he was the only one of those pitchers making meaningful starts down the stretch in the playoff race.

On top of all of that, Phillips revealed he “had other factors going on physically” that day. Phillips declined to reveal what the injury was, but he didn’t feel like himself.

That didn’t make the loss sting any less.

“At the end of the day, I didn’t throw a strike,” Phillips said. “It’s on me.”

Phillips isn’t sure how he’d answer the question that Votto asked him that night. He doesn’t remember what he did during the first week of the offseason to put that terrible start behind him. “It wasn’t baseball related, that’s for sure,” Phillips said.

He does remember what Reds pitching coach Derek Johnson told him that night.

“He let me know everything would be ok,” Phillips said. “When you get to spring training, it’ll be ok.”

Phillips arrived in the big leagues ahead of schedule. Now, he’ll get a proper reintroduction.

On Tuesday, Phillips made his first spring training start of the year and pitched two scoreless innings against the Chicago Cubs. He has already shown the potential to be a top-half of the rotation starting pitcher. He overpowers hitters with a 97 mph fastball and then gets them off-balanced with a dynamic slider-curveball combination.

He perfectly painted two curveballs on the outside part of the zone for a strikeout against Cubs third baseman Christopher Morel. The next batter, second baseman Nico Hoerner, whiffed on a slider for strike three.

He’s also working on a changeup because “I want to be top tier,” he says.

Phillips closed out the 2023 season with the worst possible last impression, but he has also proved that he's capable of being an impact pitcher in the big leagues.

“He grew a ton from spring training (in 2023) to when he came back on our team,” Bell said. “He just got more comfortable. He’s still so young. It was good for him to have a good chunk of the season in the minor leagues. When he got to us (in the big leagues), the true talent really started to come out.”

When he got called up on September 5 for a Reds team that desperately needed pitching, Phillips started his MLB career with two up-and-down games. He allowed eight runs during his first two big league starts, but he impressed Bell with his confidence and his aggressiveness against great hitters.

Phillips’ next two starts were phenomenal. On September 18 against a Minnesota Twins team that was heading to the postseason, Phillips pitched seven innings, allowed two runs and struck out seven batters. Bell was so confident in Phillips that he stuck with the rookie in the seventh inning after Phillips allowed a homer. Bell watched Phillips close out the inning with two strikeouts.

Five days later, Phillips got another standing ovation as he left the game. The Reds’ loss to the Pirates on September 23 is remembered for an epic nine-run collapse, but the Reds had only allowed one run when Phillips left the game in the sixth inning.

As Bell looks at Phillips’ long-term outlook, those are the starts that stick with him.

“He makes it look pretty easy out there with his stuff,” Bell said. “When he doesn’t try to do too much, that’s what happens.”

In the big leagues last year, Phillips said that he learned that he’s good enough to get anyone out. The key for this electric pitcher has always been command. “I know that hitting is hard,” Phillips said. “Throw it over the plate, and we’ll be good.”

Phillips is one of 10 starting pitchers in big league camp who are competing for five starting rotation spots this spring. He has five MLB starts under his belt, but Phillips has also only pitched in 11 Triple-A games. He’s not even a year older than Reds pitching prospect Rhett Lowder – the team’s top pick in the 2023 MLB Draft.

This spring, Phillips is competing in the rotation battle with pitchers like Andrew Abbott, Nick Martinez and Brandon Williamson, who all have more of a big league track record.

“At the end of it, whatever happens, we’ve got some really good guys this year,” Phillips said. “I understand that. I also understand that if I don’t make the team in camp, I’ll be there midway through the season. It’s not a bad situation. It hasn’t lost me sleep at night.”

Phillips is working on a changeup as well as the consistency of his mechanics. He knows the best versions of his best pitches are good enough, but he has to make sure his delivery and release point are always the same.

Phillips has already grown from a player-to-be-named later in a trade with the Seattle Mariners into a top-100 prospect in baseball. He has already made the leap. He still has a few small steps to take to become the pitcher he believes he can be, and his performance in the big leagues last year gave him some extra motivation.

“I’d love to go out there right now and prove that I belong,” Phillips said. “I do have some people that doubt that. We see the stuff that comes over our phones on Instagram or Twitter. We don’t love reading it, but it makes you laugh. If you take it the right way, it can really fuel you. I know I can do it. That’s all I need.”

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Cincinnati Reds pitching prospect Connor Phillips 2024 MLB outlook