Taijuan Walker’s outing on Thursday against the Mets ended abruptly in the top of the fourth inning, when a single hit by Starling Marte deflected off of his left foot. The right-handed starter was looked at by assistant athletic trainer Joe Rauch and tried to walk around the mound, but was limping.
The Phillies announced a few minutes later that Walker left the game with a left toe contusion. He said after the game that the X-rays came back negative for a broken toe. He is day-to-day.
“It feels better now than when it first happened. I tried to walk it off a little bit, but it kept getting kind of hot and numb and started hurting,” Walker said. “But it definitely feels a lot better. Especially after getting the X-ray, and everything was negative — that made me feel a lot better. But it is definitely sore, bruised, and starting to swell a little bit. But could have been a lot worse.”
The Phillies starter was in the midst of just his fourth major league start this year. He began this season on the 15-day injured list with right shoulder soreness. Since returning to the Phillies on April 28, Walker had posted a 4.91 ERA through his 22 innings with 16 strikeouts and six walks. He characterized this latest setback as “frustrating.”
“I tried so bad just to try to throw a pitch and see how it felt … I’m very frustrated about it,” he said. “Because I felt good [on Thursday]. I thought my splitter starting to come back a little bit, and felt really good with that, and started throwing it more, and then this happened. So, again, I’m glad it’s not broken. I guess it’s kind of day-to-day and see how much pain I can tolerate and see how fast I can get it going.”
While he was rehabbing, Spencer Turnbull pitched in his place and recorded a 1.67 ERA.
Turnbull has since been moved to the bullpen, but the Phillies have made a point of trying to keep him stretched out. He pitched three innings in relief on May 15 against the Mets, for example. It’s still unclear whether Walker will need to miss any time, but if he does, they have some depth behind him, in Turnbull.
Manager Rob Thomson said they should have more information on Friday.
“We’ll just have to see how he comes in tomorrow,” Thomson said. “Don’t know about his next start. We’ll find out a little bit more tomorrow.”
