Philadelphia Phillies 'Hit Pause' on Career of Their Star Pitching Prospect

The Philadelphia Phillies are taking a different approach with one of their star prospects.

Jul 8, 2023; Seattle, Washington, USA; National League Futures starting pitcher Mick Abel (25) of the Philadelphia Phillies pitches to the American League during the first inning of the All Star-Futures game at T-Mobile Park / Steven Bisig-USA TODAY Sports

For a long time, the Philadelphia Phillies were considered to have one of the worst farm systems in all of baseball. When Bryce Harper came on board, he implored them to start building the pipeline to have homegrown options who could become Major League stars.

That has happened for them.

Alec Bohm, Bryson Stott, Ranger Suarez, Cristopher Sanchez, Orion Kerkering, and Johan Rojas are the most recents results in that change of philosophy.

In the meantime, though, the Phillies have quietly kept stacking young talent on their farm who they hope will develop into impact players at some point during their careers.

Philadelphia now has some superstars in their pipeline, headlined by Andrew Painter, Aidan Miller, and Justin Crawford, players who are all 21 years old or younger.

Mick Abel was considered to be in this tier just a couple seasons ago, but after struggling mightily at the Triple-A level this year with an ERA of 6.66 across his 17 starts, he has slipped a bit in the minds of evaluators.

To try and get his career back on track, the Phillies have moved him to the Development List per their team's transactions page, citing that this move "allows both the club and Abel to hit pause in an attempt to right the ship moving forward."

This is something new that was created by Major League Baseball in 2021 which allows teams to monitor usage and development of different prospects. They can stay with their team, being allowed to watch and continue learning, but aren't going to be put into games.

For Abel, that could be exactly what he needs.

During the early portion of his career, after being taken No. 15 overall in the 2020 draft out of high school, he looked like the real deal. Even though his ERA wasn't miniscule, the right-hander still showed the ability to strike batters out at a high clip in his early 20s.

But things have fallen apart for him this year.

Not only has he gotten shelled for an ERA of 6.66, but he also has walked 58 batters in 77 innings and has given up 14 homers.

What comes of this will be seen, but clearly Philadelphia is alarmed enough by what has taken place this season that they feel like this is the best course of action for his career going forward.