Phillips Finally Gets Promotion to Dunedin

The Lansing Express is pulling out of the station once again. This time, it will have closer Paul Phillips on it as a passenger as Phillips learned after earning his 11th save on Friday night.

Phillips was told he would be leaving for Dunedin and reporting to the D-Jays for Saturday’s game against the St. Lucie Mets.

Although this promotion was long over due, Phillips has always taken a positive approach when asked about his repeat performance of the Midwest League this season.

“I was sent back here to work on some things and it took me the first half to work on them,” stated Phillips. “In the meeting, they told me that they felt I did what I needed to do and it was time to go”.

Work on them he did. After a 2006 season that saw Phillips earn 14 saves, and a 2.01 ERA in 31 appearances, it was a bit of a surprise that Phillips even started the year in Lansing. His statistics this season were pretty much a carbon copy of his performance of 2006 as he has 11 saves in 25 games with a 2.45 ERA. Still when asked earlier in the season about his repeat, Phillips seemed to indicate that there was a numbers game that led to his repeat as well.

“Our organization has a good problem in that we have a lot of great pitchers and there is not a whole lot of movement," stated Phillps. “There are great pitchers that are in Dunedin that should probably be in New Hampshire, there are great pitchers in New Hampshire that should probably be in Syracuse and so on."

The move to Dunedin should be familiar for Phillips. After all, he did spend some time there mid season last year before being sent back to Lansing to finish his season. The experience was one of learning for Phillips as he struggled in his time in the Florida State League attaining a 1-3 record with an ERA of nearly 7.00. Hitters in the FSL seemed to have Phillips number however as they hit a lofty .314 against the right hander, something that Phillips remembers vividly.

“Every level you go up, they hit your mistakes harder and father”, said Phillips.

“I can get away with some mistakes here better than I could last year. Last year down in Dunedin I was very inconsistent. This year, I’m going to work on my consistency and throwing my pitches down in the zone and hopefully I have a lot better results this time around.”