Can Orion Kerkering and Taijuan Walker step up after José Alvarado’s suspension and Aaron Nola’s injury?

A week ago, Orion Kerkering and Taijuan Walker were cruising comfortably below the radar. Their performances on the mound ranged from remarkable to ordinary to completely unacceptable.

The general success of the Phillies, both this season and the two seasons before, generally hid their continual ordinariness and occasional abysmal-ness. When the Phillies came a win from the World Series in 2023 and won the National League East in 2024, each of them played roles in how things ended badly.

» READ MORE: With José Alvarado suspended, the Phillies will need to boost the bullpen with a trade. But it will cost them.

This season, neither has pitched to his ceiling. Still, when the Phillies left Sunday night to visit the Rockies and A’s for seven games this week, they were 10 over .500, had won six of seven series, and were just a game behind the Mets in the division. The Phils had reached that point because José Alvarado was 7-for-7 in save opportunities and Aaron Nola had pitched somewhere between good and great in half of his starts.

Then, on Friday, some light was shed on Nola’s poorer showings when he landed on the 15-day injured list with an ankle injury.

Come Sunday morning, Major League Baseball dropped a bombshell: Alvarado had tested positive for PEDs. He is suspended for the next 80 games, and, after he returns late in the season, he will then be disqualified from participating in the playoffs.

This could be devastating … or, it could be an opportunity. A chance at redemption. A chance to step up.

What if Kerkering and Walker start pitching to expectations?

Let’s consider those expectations.

Before the 2023 season, Walker was signed to a four-year, $72 million contract with the understanding that he would be the No. 3 or No. 4 starter in a World Series-worthy rotation.

The problem: Walker’s ERA in his first two seasons was 5.27.

At the end of the 2023 season, the Phillies called up Kerkering from the minors. They consistently have called him a “high-leverage” talent, and usually have used him in high-leverage situations. They saw him as their closer of the very near future.

» READ MORE: Murphy: If José Alvarado took PEDs, he made a rational choice. Phillies are cooked either way.

The problem: Kerkering collapsed in his final three outings in the 2023 playoffs, was even worse in the Phillies’ playoff collapse against the Mets in 2024, and blew three saves in a catastrophic April.

With all of that, the Phillies remained one of the best teams in baseball.

Now, the Phillies need them both.

Ranger Suárez, the Phillies’ top left-handed starter the last three seasons, spent the first five weeks of the season recovering from his latest back injury. Walker, meanwhile, had lost his spot in the rotation with the arrival of Jesús Luzardo, and was slated to start the season in the bullpen. Suárez’s absence opened a spot in the rotation.

Walker gave the Phillies three outstanding starts and three un-outstanding starts. He finished those six starts holding on to a 2.54 ERA like a man whose fingers are slipping as he dangles off a ledge.

Walker needed 86 pitches to get through three innings against the Cubs on April 25, and the Phillies burned four relievers in the first game of that series. He couldn’t pitch around a one-out error against the Nationals on May 1 and gave up four runs. He’d given up zero runs in his first two starts, but since then, he’s been the same Taijuan Walker on whom the Phillies wasted $36 million the last two years. That’s why, instead of fiddling with a six-man rotation when Suárez returned, the Phillies sent Walker to the ‘pen.

There, Walker has been just as enigmatic.

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In his first outing May 7, Walker pitched the last three innings of a shutout of the Rays begun by Cristopher Sánchez. A week later, after throwing two more scoreless innings and preserving a two-run deficit against the Cardinals, Walker gave up three runs in his third inning, which blew the game open.

He starts Wednesday night in Colorado. The Phillies anticipate Nola will return soon thereafter, but if Nola isn’t completely healed, and if Walker is effective Wednesday, the Phillies might as well give Nola a few extra days. Even before he hurt his ankle, Nola sure looked like he could use all the rest he can get.

The Phillies entered the season betting that Alvarado, Matt Strahm, Kerkering, and free agent Jordan Romano, coming off an injury, would combine as the back end of a top-notch bullpen. For the most part, Alvarado and Strahm have delivered. For the last nine outings, so has Romano.

Kerkering has not.

Kerkering’s potential is one of the reasons the Phillies were comfortable losing setup man Jeff Hoffman to the Blue Jays via free agency. So was Kerkering’s price tag: Hoffman, 32, got $33 million over three years, while Kerkering, 24, is making $773,000.

He has not realized that potential.

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Through his first 16 games, Kerkering’s ERA was 5.14 and his WHIP — walks and hits per innings pitched, perhaps a more important stat for relievers — ballooned to 1.640, an increase of about 35% over last year’s 1.079. He’d been above the 85th percentile in metrics that measure soft contact and noncontact, but he lingered below the 40th percentile until the last two outings, both against the Cardinals.

He pitched a perfect eighth inning last Monday. Then on Wednesday, he relieved Alvarado in the eighth with one out and a runner on third, whom he stranded. However, in the seventh inning Sunday against the Pirates, Kerkering allowed a leadoff walk and a single but was saved by a bad bunt and a double play.

It’s a situation in which Alvarado might have found himself, and yes, Kerkering pulled it off.

He’d better get used to it. He’s no longer Alvarado’s wingman.

He’s Alvarado’s replacement.