Reds prospect and minor league strikeout-leader dominates after winning weekly award

Even after the recent debuts of Hunter Greene, Nick Lodolo, Graham Ashcraft, and Brandon Williamson, the Cincinnati Reds still have some talented pitchers in their farm system.

The dominance of their top pitching prospect, Andrew Abbott, has been on full display as he has put together back-to-back shutout performances, not allowing a in his first two career starts. Chase Petty has shown flashes of superstar potential as the Reds No. 8-ranked prospect according to MLB Pipeline.

But perhaps the most overlooked prospect in the team's farm system was the player to be named later in the Eugenio Suarez and Jesse Winker trade. Typically, fans will look right past the PTBNL in a trade, but Connor Phillips has the potential to be the best piece of that deal with the Seattle Mariners.

Connor Phillips dominates after winning Southern League Player of the Week Award.

Phillips, who was named the Southern League Pitcher of the Week last week, began this week with another statement performance. Phillips shutdown the Rocket City Trash Pandas, going going six innings while allowing just two runs and striking out 12 batters.

Phillips is in just his third season of professional baseball, and the 2023 season has been his best one yet. His dominance in Double-A has been impressive, considering he is striking out over 15 batters per nine innings.

Phillips was nearly perfect in his lone start last week. The right-hander threw seven innings and allowed just one hit while punching out 10. Phillips has posted double-digit strikeouts four separate times this season.

Over his last 50 innings of work, Connor Phillips has struck out 89 batters while walking just 18. This kind of dominance should see a call up to Triple-A Louisville rather soon. Phillips, who's just 22 years old, now has 101 strikeouts through 58 innings with the Chattanooga Lookouts this season.