Cal Stevenson has been used to bouncing around as a baseball player, with the Phillies being the sixth organization he has played for in just six seasons.

Just this season alone, Stevenson opened the year with Triple-A Sacramento before the Giants brought him to the majors in early May. By the end of the month, the Giants decided they did not need Stevenson and designated him for assignment.

All of this was going on as his wife was pregnant, and Stevenson was concerned about his playing career.

The Phillies plucked Stevenson off waivers and assigned him to Triple-A Lehigh Valley.

But before he had a chance to figure out Lehigh Valley traffic patterns around Coca-Cola Park, Stevenson was called into the office.

The Phillies needed to open a spot on the 40-man roster, and he was the odd man out and again was designated for assignment.

This time, after moving cross country, Stevenson went unclaimed on waivers and accepted an assignment back to Lehigh Valley. When all the roster shuffling was done, Stevenson at least had a job - but recent events showed him it was not exactly a secure job.

The Phillies already had a number of outfielders, and if they needed a spot on the IronPigs roster, he would likely get called into the manager’s office again for a piece of bad news. Plus, when he was activated by the Pigs, Stevenson was hitting .208. Before long, that number fell as low as .179 by July 20.

Over the next nine games, though, Stevenson started to settle in and felt comfortable with life and with his position with the IronPigs. He put together a nine-game hitting streak, batting .480 (12-for-25) during the stretch and by late August, he had hit in 19 of 21 games and had his average up to .254.

In addition to getting on base, the guy who had a career-high nine home runs as a member of the Double-A Montgomery Biscuits in 2021, had hit six homers in the span of 16 games - five of them in front of the home crowd.

Stevenson will wind up having played in just six major league games with the Giants this season, and will likely be back looking for another place to play in 2024. His contract with the Phillies is over at the end of the season, and although he’s had a good stretch of games with the IronPigs, there are no guarantees that they will bring him back next season.

STANDINGS UPDATE

… Lehigh Valley (38-25) split its six-game series in Buffalo (36-25) last week, which dropped them in the standings as Durham (40-23) took five of six in Charlotte (14-49) to give the Bulls a two-game lead over the Pigs and three over Buffalo for the top spot in the second half of the IL season. This week, Lehigh Valley plays six games in Rochester (28-33) before coming home for the final week of the season against Worcester (35-27). The Bulls are home against Louisville (30-33) before finishing the year in Gwinnett (31-30) against the Braves Triple-A affiliate.

NEW HOME RUN KING

… It’s always kind of bittersweet for a player to set a minor league record. It means you have spent a lot more time in the minors than you would have liked to. For Weston Wilson, he did get to make his major league debut this season with the Phillies, but still spent enough time at Triple-A to become the franchise’s all-time record holder for home runs in a season with 31. Wilson hit two homers Friday in Buffalo to set the season mark in his 113th game of the season, while Rhys Hoskins hit his 29 in 115 games in 2017 when he was the International League MVP in his only season at the Triple-A level.

COOL FOR AC

… Anthony Contreras picked up the 150th win of his managerial career with Lehigh Valley last Friday. Overall, he is 150-134 with LV as he counts down to the end of his second season. Just ahead of Contreras is Ryne Sandberg, who won 155 games in two seasons. The all-time wins leader is Dave Brundage, who won 286 games over four seasons (.497). Going by win percentage, Dusty Wathan has a .563 winning percentage but it was for just one season, Sandberg is at .540 and Contreras at .528 among IronPigs managers.