The Phillies’ set-up man, once untouchable, has been getting touched a lot lately.
Relief pitchers are, by their very nature, volatile.
There is a reason guys like Aroldis Chapman, Andrew Miller, and Wade Davis make a lot of money pitching just a handful of innings per week. They are consistent relief pitchers, largely immune to the ebbs and flows of production that seem to grip many short-form pitchers. And those guys are rare.
For the first couple months of this season, Hector Neris looked as if he was on his way to becoming one of those guys, a future closer in the making.