The Phillies made a trade with the San Francisco Giants this trade deadline in which the headliner was Luis Arraez. With an offense that would be considered “moribund” at the time of the deal, getting Arraez was supposed to help revive them (narrator: it did not help revive them). To make the deal happen, the Phillies had to part with a solid prospect in Ramon Marquez, an overpay when considering just those two names. Yet there was a third name there in the deal, one Caleb Kilian.
Did you remember him?
What went right
Well, he helped them get Arraez. That’s something, right?
Oh yeah, he has team control. That’s basically why they traded for him.
What went wrong
He got hurt.
That’s basically it. There was something the team saw in him that made them want to make sure Kilian’s name was included in the deal for Marquez, something they saw and liked. However, an oblique strain basically ended Kilian’s season as he was unable to recover in time to help the team down the stretch and into Atlanta.
Final grade: Incomplete
You can’t really grade anything Kilian did as he threw 48 pitches wearing Phillies red. He was abjectly terrible in one of his appearances with the team, so saying that there is something to build on for future seasons might be a bit of wishcasting. It could end up being in the same vein of the Jonathan Bowlan trade where the team saw the unmolded clay of a relief pitcher that they feel they can turn into a piece of art worthy of a major league bullpen, but we’ll just have to put a pin in it for now.