With the Phillies reeling, Joe Giglio says he would bench Trea Turner for Wednesday's game against the Miami Marlins.
“Rob Thomson has to send a message to this baseball team that this isn't going to work anymore...I would bench Trea Turner tonight," Giglio said on Wednesday's 94WIP Midday Show with Hugh Douglas.
"One, Trea Turner has been one of the ten worst hitters in baseball since the All-Star game. So performance wise he doesn't deserve to be out there every day, I don't care what his salary is. He's been bad. Second thing is, he brings it out to the field. It's one thing, hitters go through slumps and streaks, we know this. But last night that error was horrendous and his defense has been pretty poor since the minute he got here...Sunday in Arizona, it felt like he didn't run out fully the ball that was hit to third base and he got doubled up. And yesterday, Topper said he's tentative still with the hamstring. If you’re not hitting and you’re not fielding and you’re not running everything out, you’re not playing.”
"The other part of this, every day I watch Edmundo Sosa sit on the bench. He's been like their fifth best hitter the whole year. They can't hit! I want Edmundo in the lineup tonight."
Giglio later proposed this lineup for tonight's game:
Turner, who is batting .297 in 79 games this season, is hitting just .168 over his last 22 games with 20 strikeouts and just five walks. Sosa is hitting .276 on the season with a .788 OPS, good for fifth best on the team (excluding Rafael Marchan's 17 games).