Categories: News

News: Phillies acquire switch-pitcher Pat Venditte

Two! Two! Two times the fun today, and for multiple reasons!

PHILLIES WIN TWICE: Double the pleasure, double the fun this weekend as the Phillies beat both Toronto and Boston in spring training action.

Saturday, in the 8-2 win over Toronto, Vince Velasquez pitched three and change (and said some stuff about umpires). Meanwhile the young guys were hitting – J.P. Crawford  smacked two hits including a two-RBI single, Nick Williams added three hits, and Cam Perkins also scored two hits (plus two walks).

On Sunday the Phils came back to beat Boston 6-5. Daniel Nava beat his old team with four hits, while Roman Quinn had two hits, including a home run, and stole a bag.

The story, though, was Aaron Nola’s 3.1 innings, in which he gave up a Pablo Sandoval home run among five hits and three runs. He did strike out six, however. I’m not terribly worried about Nola (give the guy two months of regular season action before we make any judgments), and the Ks were good to see.

TODAY’S GAME: The Phillies head to Sarasota to face the Orioles. Jeremy Hellickson is on the bump. The lineup: Coghlan/Crawford/Kendrick/Saunders/Franco/Stassi/Rupp/Altherr/Valentin.

A TRADE!: And a cool one!

The Phillies traded minor leaguer Joey Curletta (acquired in the Carlos Ruiz trade) to the Mariners for pitcher Pat Venditte.

And why is it cool?

Venditte can throw BOTH lefty and righty. Yup, he’s the ambidextrous (not “amphibious”) pitcher.

Venditte put up a 5.73 ERA in 15 games last year for Seattle and Toronto. Just so you know he was better as a lefty against lefties (.250 BAA), but in a small sample size. He’ll probably be asked to compete for that final bullpen spot.

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Tim Malcolm

Tim first found the Phillies as a little infant at Veteran’s Stadium, cheering on a Juan Samuel game-winning home run in his very first game. With the pinstripes in his blood, he witnessed Terry Mulholland’s 1990 no-hitter, “Steve Carlton Night” at the Vet, game three of the 1993 World Series, countless games during the charmed 2008 championship season and various road excursions. Since November 2007 Tim’s been writing about them daily at Phillies Nation, becoming one of the world’s most popular Phillies scribes. You can catch him on Twitter and Facebook, as well. When he’s not talking about the Phils he’s relaxing with a St. Bernardus ABT 12 or one of his many favored brews.

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