I was perusing team-by-team stats recently and saw something that really stood out to me: the Phillies pitching staff has given up a huge number of homeruns. Through Thursday they had given up 56 long balls in the span of 32 games – about 1.78 per 9 inning game. The next closest team in the NL was the Cubs, with 40 homers given up to date or an average of 1.23 homers per 9 inning game. That disparity is huge.

It’s so huge, that the Phillies are on a pace to give up 287 homers this year, which would shatter the MLB record of 241 given up by the woeful Detroit Tigers staff of 1996, and the Colorado Rockies’ pitiful 230 homers allowed during the 2001 season (per Baseball Almanac).

But guess what? It’s not the ballpark. Citizen’s Bank Park had the reputation of a band box with homers sailing out in 2007, but actually is a pretty neutral park. The starting staff, in fact, has given up slightly more homers per 9 innings on the road (2.1 away vs 2.0 at home).

But look at that stat – the starting pitchers are giving up 2.08 HR per nine innings, more than twice the league average of 1.01 HRs per nine innings. The surprising thing (to me at least) is that the best Phillies pitcher at avoiding the homer is journeyman Chan Ho Park:

• Jamie Moyer – 2.80 HR/9
• Joe Blanton – 2.10 HR/9
• Brett Myers – 2.09 HR/9
• Cole Hamels – 1.78 HR/9
• Chan Ho Park – 1.32 HR/9

The bullpen, on the other hand, is only giving up 1.30 HR/9 innings (16 HRs in 111 innings pitched). But even that is misleading, because closer Brad Lidge has been awful with a team-worst 3.07 HR/9 innings – not something you want to see if you’re a Phillies fan with the game on the line. The relief corps, without Lidge is (surprise) close to the league average with a 1.03 HR/9.

I took a look at each home run given up by a Phillies pitcher this year using Hit Tracker Online and trended by week to see if the homer parade was waning any, but it seems pretty consistent except for the lull over the last four days where the pitching staff has only given up three homers. Also four of the last five homeruns given up were shots that would not have made it out of most parks (HitTracker actually looks at each homer and figures out in how many of the 30 major league ballparks a homer would have cleared the fences).

So maybe there is hope, but a lot of the ugliness has come at the hands of 47-year old Jamie Moyer (3-3, 8.14 ERA, 1.84 WHIP), struggling to notch his career 250th win. You sort of wonder that once Moyer gets that coveted milestone, how much more patience the Phillies will have before turning to the younger JA Happ (only 1 HR allowed in 19.2 innings) or make a run for someone like Pedro Martinez (a relative spring chicken at 36) to shore up the staff before they fade in the NL East.

Other Interesting Stats

• Cole Hamels has only pitched 3.2 IP on the road, the remaining 26.2 IP at home
• Are these guys too old and lost their stuff? This isn’t a young pitching staff – they lead the NL with an average age of 32.3 years old – and in fact it is the oldest pitching staff in Phillies team history.