Adam Haseley and Roman Quinn lead Phillies sprint to start in center

The Philadelphia Phillies competition for the starting centerfielder’s job started with a literal bang Feb. 28 when Adam Haseley homered to the opposite field against the Tigers in his first at-bat. The 2017 eighth overall pick in the MLB draft, Haseley took an outside pitch to straightaway left, starting off the Phillies 10-2 loss in their first spring training game. He later walked and ended his day 1-for-2.

The competition for the center field slot in Philadelphia’s lineup includes at least four players, Haseley, Roman Quinn, Scott Kingery, and Odubel Herrera.

Oh, the Phillies have plenty of people who can play center.

Additionally, there are other players in the Phillies Clearwater, FL camp who can play center field, including Andrew McCutchen, who won the NL MVP award playing the position, and Travis Jankowski, a non-roster invitee to the major league camp who has been a career bench player with the arguable exception of one season five years back.

Some feel Haseley deserves at least a lane advantage in this race based on his 107-game career thus far – a rookie, 67-game slash line of .266/.324/.396 in ’19, similar figures last year, and solid, occasionally brilliant fielding. Some like Quinn’s blinding speed and look forward to a season he doesn’t manage to injure himself. And some like Kingery because, well, he’s Scotty Jetpax, and that’s a cool nickname.

After the spring’s first game, manager Joe Girardi said, “I want somebody to grab ahold of this [position]. It’s one game, but it’s a good start.” Girardi has also indicated that he’s open to a platoon situation in center field, and this makes some sense since Philly is loaded with offense – on paper – without starting a huge bat there.

However, Haseley did come to Florida with 15 new pounds of muscle he added in a pandemic gym he built at home.

The wild card in the competition is probably Herrera, who last had a locker at Citizens Bank Park in late May of ’19, when he made the most questionable decision to grab his girlfriend by her neck, and although that didn’t send him to jail, it did guarantee him a suspension, the proverbial “ticket out of town,” and immediate status as a polarizing figure in the city.

At one time Herrera was a Phillies All-Star. Then, before the incident involving his significant other, he displayed an intermittent but dismaying lack of interest in the game he’s paid to play. Now he has columnists calling for him to be gone – anywhere, anyhow – but gone.

The problem is that Herrera is still under contract; for the moment he’s dressing with the minor leaguers. If he disappears, it has to be for a baseball reason.

For game two of spring training, against the Orioles, Herrera did not start in center. Roman Quinn did, and he singled sharply to right in his first at-bat. He survived his first sprint to first base, then survived a 90-foot trot to first after a walk in his next AB, and a trot all the way home on a homer by the next batter.

The Phillies led the O’s, 4-2, and the race for the center field starting job was underway. It mostly involved trotting, though.