Roy Oswalt Retirement More Likely After Rough Start for Philadelphia Phillies?

Roy Oswalt followed perhaps his best start of the season against the Washington Nationals with one of his worst in a 6-5 home loss to the Florida Marlins on Friday night, giving up six runs on 12 hits in 5.2 innings before leaving to a chorus of boos.

There has been talk all season as to whether or not the 33-year-old right-hander will be able to pitch another season in Philadelphia, with Jim Salisbury of CSNPhilly.com saying Oswalt "has hinted about retirement after the season." Is this move becoming more and more probable?

Unfortunately, outside of that gem against the lowly Nationals last week in which he pitched eight shutout innings, he has allowed at least three runs in each of his other starts since June 7.

This number is slightly inflated, however, because he did not pitch at all in July thanks to back inflammation. Therefore, to put it more into perspective, he has allowed three or more runs in seven of his last eight starts.

That injury is also worth mentioning because of what Oswalt said back in June:

"

You throw as long as you can and when you can’t throw anymore you don’t. Hopefully it’s not to the point where I can’t throw anymore. If it’s at that point, you just have to accept it.

"

I also agree that I hope he is not at that point. However, he seems to be sinking into a trend of allowing more runs than he normally does in roughly the same amount of innings.

The Phillies have the option to buy him out for $2 million at the end of the season or pay him $16 million next year. It seems unlikely that the Phillies would pay that much for the injury-prone pitcher.

It will be interesting to see how this season finishes out for him.