With José Alvarado sidelined due to his 80-game PED suspension, the Phillies are scrambling to find reliable bullpen options. On Tuesday—just two days after news of Alvarado’s suspension broke—they made their first move by signing 31-year-old right-hander Lucas Sims to a minor league deal, per Matt Gelb of The Athletic (subscription required).
While fans are hoping the front office swings a deal for a top-tier reliever ahead of the July 31 trade deadline, it’s still early, and according to MLB.com’s Todd Zolecki, the team is more likely to focus on low-risk depth additions for now.
Still, this latest move suggests that Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski is ready to experiment with a range of bullpen options, hoping something clicks in Alvarado’s absence.
Phillies’ desperate bullpen search begins with minor league deal for former Braves’ first-rounder Lucas Sims
Lucas Sims, once a highly touted first-round pick by the Atlanta Braves in 2012 and their top prospect in 2014 per MLB Pipeline, has had a rollercoaster of a career. After spending several years among the Braves’ top five prospects, he eventually found more consistent success in Cincinnati’s bullpen. His last solid season came in 2023, when he logged 67 appearances for the Reds, finishing with a 3.10 ERA and 76 strikeouts over 61 innings.
His most recent stint, however, was far less successful. Sims signed a $3 million deal with the Washington Nationals in February but was released on May 10 after a rough start to the season. In 12 1/3 innings, he posted a 13.86 ERA and 2.27 WHIP, with 13 strikeouts, 12 walks, and seven wild pitches.
Over his MLB career—spanning back to his 2017 debut with Atlanta—Sims has compiled a 4.86 ERA with 366 strikeouts in 318 1/3 innings. He’s consistently missed bats, with a career strikeout rate of 26.5 percent, but his 12.5 percent walk rate has often been his Achilles’ heel.
According to The Athletic‘s Matt Gelb, Sims will now report to the Phillies’ pitching lab in Florida, where the organization hopes to unlock better results. Notably, he shares some history with Phillies pitching coach Caleb Cotham from their time together in Cincinnati during the 2019 and 2020 seasons.
Sims primarily works off a mid-90s four-seam fastball and a sweeping breaking ball around 85 mph. He also mixes in a variety of other pitches—curveball, sinker, cutter, and slider—though with varying effectiveness.
Whether Sims can recapture his Reds form under Philadelphia’s pitching development system remains to be seen. But one thing is clear: president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski and GM Preston Mattingly aren’t done turning over every stone in their search for bullpen reinforcements.
