Wretched Phillies facing the reality of rebuilding

A scattered 26,162 fans - many decked out in Baltimore Orioles orange - welcomed the Phillies back to town Wednesday in the team's first game after a disastrous road trip. Ever since the October day when Pat Gillick expressed the team's plan to rebuild, everyone in baseball has known the Phillies would struggle this season.

But this poorly?

If they hadn't already, the depths of the 2015 Phillies' ineptitude set in during the last nine games. A 19-3 loss Tuesday in Baltimore, the organization's most embarrassing defeat in years, clinched the franchise's first winless eight-game road trip since 1883. Wednesday's 6-4 defeat cemented the Phillies' worst losing streak (nine) since 1999.

"We knew that we were not going to be necessarily challenging for the National League East title, but at the same time we need to see improvement and that's what we expect," Ruben Amaro Jr., the Phillies' beleaguered general manager, said Wednesday before the game at Citizens Bank Park.

"We're not seeing it right now, and I know things get blown out of proportion when you lose 19-3 and you have to have [outfielder] Jeff Francoeur finish off the game. But that doesn't necessarily epitomize our season. That was one game that didn't go well and we have to continue to concentrate on what we can do to continue to help these young players grow and hope that some of our veterans guys can turn things around."

Although they haven't fared well on the mound, either, an anemic offense underscores the Phillies' mighty struggles. They entered Wednesday having scored exactly 200 runs over 66 games, which comes out to just three per contest. Their 37 home runs going into Wednesday were 54 fewer than the major-league best held by the Houston Astros. The Los Angeles Angels' Mike Trout and Albert Pujols combined had as many home runs as the Phillies' roster.

The Phillies' brass all spring harped on how a team lacking power would need to find other ways to scrape across runs. Sandberg spent six-plus weeks in Clearwater preaching the importance of situational hitting. Accomplishing that at an efficient rate is much easier said than done, of course, when the team is hitting .236.

"It's historically bad right now. There's no question about it," Amaro said of the offense. "I understand that. We need to figure out ways to be better. I know that the challenges with having young players and some more veteran players that are not performing makes it difficult for [manager Ryne Sandberg]. I think we can be better. The challenge is to try to do what we can to improve."

The reality is that much of this is what happens when a team is rebuilding. Rather than pushing their prospects, the Phillies have filled innings by using journeymen stopgaps such as Jerome Williams, Sean O'Sullivan, and Kevin Correia. Despite the presence of ace Cole Hamels and the dependable Aaron Harang, the Phillies' starting staff entered Wednesday with a 4.84 ERA, fourth-worst in Major League Baseball.

A Phillies starting pitcher still hasn't won a decision since May 23.

On top of all that, the team hasn't played well defensively, either.

"This is not at all acceptable," Amaro said. "We need to play better baseball and we need to show some improvement. [Tuesday's] game cannot dictate how we continue to go about our business.

"Our job is to try to continue to get better. [Tuesday] was a tough game and in some ways was rather embarrassing. I mean, you don't want to have one of your outfielders pitch two innings in a game, but part of that was because we lost our starting pitcher [Williams] pretty early even though he had a very, very rough start to the game.

"The fact of the matter is we have to concentrate on the bigger picture here. And the bigger picture is to make sure that we're improving, and we're working to do that."

The bigger picture includes the Phillies' prospects who are working their way through the farm system. At the major-league level, 22-year-old third baseman Maikel Franco has provided fans one young everyday player on whom to hang their hopes. The problem is, until he is joined by enough up-and-coming talent for the team to contend, Phillies fans are in for many more losses like those we've seen lately.

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The Phillies are a dismal 7-28 in road games this season, putting them on pace for 16 or 17 wins away from Citizens Bank Park all season. Since Major League Baseball adopted a 162-game regular-season schedule in 1962, the record for road ineptitude is 17-64. Here are the worst road records since 1962:

YEAR   TEAM   RECORD

2010   Pittsburgh Pirates   17-64

1963   New York Mets   17-64

1962    New York Mets    18-62

2006    Tampa Bay Devil Rays   20-61

1964    New York Mets    20-61

2012    Houston Astros    20-61

2003    Detroit Tigers    20-61

1988    Baltimore Orioles   20-61

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@jakemkaplan