Nola stays consistent

AFTER A LONG week, Pete Mackanin was ready to tackle the weekend with vigor when he arrived at the ballpark yesterday.

"I woke up in a good mood this morning," the manager said, "because the Mets left."

The Mets had indeed left town Thursday night and the Padres, a team his Phillies swept in San Diego three weeks earlier, had arrived in South Philly. A bonus: the interim manager got to begin the series with the 22-year-old kid who has been the team's best starting pitcher since arriving from Triple A Lehigh Valley last month.

Aaron Nola is far from a loud personality with an electric repertoire who's going to turn every five days at Citizens Bank Park into an event, like, say, Matt Harvey of the Mets in Flushing.

But what Nola has been is remarkably consistent.

He's gone at least five innings in each of his starts and he's never allowed more than four runs. Nola had allowed three runs or fewer in five of his first seven starts entering yesterday and was coming off eight shutout innings in Miami five days earlier.

Nola continued his impressive first big-league campaign against the Padres. The rookie righthander held San Diego to one run in seven innings, outpitching veteran Ian Kennedy in a pitcher's duel that would eventually turn into a one-sided, 7-1 Phillies victory.

Nola didn't allow a hit yesterday until Justin Upton hit a one-out solo home run in the fourth inning. He would allow just one more hit all night.

He ended the Phillies' four-game losing streak. From fresh-faced rookie to certifiable stopper in a little over a month?

"I think it's a little premature, but I'll take five just like him," Mackanin said of whether the 2014 first-round pick could be considered a stopper. "The guy throws strikes down in the zone, his breaking ball has improved since he's been here. He's got movement, deception and a very good presence on the mound. He's fun to watch pitch. But I don't want to jump to any conclusions yet. But he's been doing great job for us."

Nola has a 3.26 ERA through eight major league starts. He has struck out 40 and walked 14 in 52 2/3 innings.

The Phillies have won six of the eight games he has started.

"It's definitely good that they have confidence in me," Nola said. "I'm going to do everything I can every time I step out on the field to do everything I can to win and help these guys win."

The 2-1 lead Nola departed with was quickly fattened by a few of his fellow rookies.

After Odubel Herrera led off the eighth by legging out an infield single, Aaron Altherr tripled to right to make it 3-1. The three-base hit was Altherr's seventh extra-base hit in eight games this season.

Altherr is the first Phillies player to begin his big-league career with seven consecutive extra-base hits since the Elias Sports Bureau began keeping track in 1900. He's the first major league player to do so since Carlos Gonzalez (Oakland, 2008).

"I'm just trying to find a way to get the barrel on the ball and have good things happen," said Altherr, who has four doubles, a triple and two home runs so far. "It's awesome. It's the big-league life, you know? It's everything you've ever dreamed of. Hopefully I can stay here for a while and keep doing well."

Altherr's only blemish since arriving from Triple A a little more than a week ago: In the fifth inning, Corey Spangenberg turned a routine single into a double when the Phillies' rookie rightfielder casually fielded the ball.

"He's got some pretty good speed," Altherr said of Spangenberg. "I can assure you that won't happen again."

Three innings later, Altherr made up for it with a triple that gave the Phillies an insurance run. Later in the inning, Cameron Rupp ripped a three-run homer to put the game away. Rupp has homered in five of Nola's last six starts and has six home runs in 14 games this month.

Rupp entered August with one home run in the season's first four months (43 games played).

"[Hitting coach] Steve Henderson has worked with him consistently and has tried to get him to stay on top of the ball," Mackanin said. "He always had that little loop, [he] undercuts the ball, gets underneath it. In order to drive the ball you have to stay on top, you can't let that back shoulder drop.

"He's been working extremely hard on that and I think he's getting the hang of it. It shows. He's definitely got above-average power potential, well above-average power potential. He hits the ball a mile in batting practice. Now he's starting to do it in the game."

Exactly four weeks since being officially acquired in the Cole Hamels trade, Alec Asher was announced as the newest member of the Phillies' young starting rotation. Asher, 23, is replacing Jerome Williams in the rotation tomorrow.

Asher is the fourth rookie in the rotation, joining Nola, Adam Morgan and Jerad Eickhoff; Eickhoff was also acquired in the Hamels trade. Williams is moving into an overworked bullpen, but he could return to the rotation before long, as the Phillies are planning to move to a six-man rotation to ease the workload on their rookies as the season winds down.

Asher, the Texas Rangers' fourth-round pick in the 2012 draft, is a 6-4, 230-pound righthander from Lakeland, Fla., who went 2-0 with a 2.08 ERA in four starts with Triple A Lehigh Valley.

"He's a big, physical righthander," said player development director Joe Jordan. "He's got arm strength, gets up to 94 [mph], maybe touching 95 . . . He's pitched with confidence, so we've liked what we've seen a great deal."

Asher was rated the 13th best prospect in the Rangers system by Baseball America prior to the 2015 season.

The Phillies will make a corresponding roster move for Asher prior to tomorrow's game. The team did make a roster move yesterday, placing lefthanded reliever Elvis Araujo on the disabled list with a left groin strain and recalling righthander Nefi Ogando to take his spot on the active roster.

Outfielder Nick Williams, one of the other prospects the Phillies received in the Hamels trade, was placed on the seven-day concussion DL at Double A Reading yesterday. Williams got into a collision at first base while running the bases on Wednesday night.

Jordan said that Williams would be "fine" and expects him back by next weekend, before the Eastern League playoffs.

"He had a headache after [Wednesday's] game," Jordan said. "It wasn't totally gone the following day. So just standard protocol anymore is seven days after a concussion DL. We don't expect it to be an issue. He didn't get hit in the head by a batted ball or pitched ball."

Williams had been one of the most productive bats for Reading since his arrival earlier this month: The team entered yesterday 17-5 since he was added to the roster. Williams is hitting .326 with a .902 OPS, four home runs, five doubles and three triples in 21 games at Reading and .304 with a .849 OPS and 17 home runs in 118 Double A games overall this season.

While Williams heads to the DL, another significant piece of the Hamels trade returned this week: Catcher Jorge Alfaro, the 22-year-old power-hitting, big-armed catching prospect, has played in back-to-back games for the Gulf Coast League Phillies while rehabbing his way back from an ankle injury.

"He threw a runner out in the first [inning] yesterday, and I got some 'wows' from the guys in Florida," Jordan said. "The first impressions are very, very good. He needs some at-bats and he needs to see live pitching."

Alfaro will play in the Venezuelan Winter League in the offseason, Jordan said.