Tom Filer, pitching coach

Tom Filer’s six-season major league career spanned 11 years and included stints with the Chicago Cubs (1982), Toronto Blue Jays (1985), Milwaukee Brewers (1988-90) and New York Mets (1992). He compiled a career 22-17 record with a 4.25 ERA and 115 strikeouts in 307.1 innings. 

Filer, a native of Philadelphia and graduate of Archbishop Ryan High School, was originally signed as an amateur free agent by the New York Yankees in 1978. He was a Rule V draft pick of the Oakland A’s in December 1980, but was returned to the Yanks before the 1981 season. He was traded to the Cubs in April 1981 and made his MLB debut with Chicago in June of the next season. His best season came in 1985 with Toronto, when he finished the year with a combined 14-2 mark between Triple-A Syracuse and the Blue Jays. He was 7-0 with a 3.88 ERA in 11 games for a Blue Jays team that won the American League East. He was sold to Milwaukee following the 1987 campaign and threw his only big league shutout for the Brewers the next season. In 1989 he was 7-3 with a 3.61 ERA.

Filer, 51, began his coaching career in the Yankees system in 1994, and spent nine years as a pitching coach at various levels. He advanced from short-season Single-A ball in ‘94 to Triple-A by 2002. From 1999-2001, he was in the Eastern League with Norwich. He spent 2003 as the pitching coach with Toronto’s Triple-A affiliate in Syracuse. In 2004, he came to the Phillies organization, working with the pitchers at single-A Lakewood. He has been Reading's pitching coach since 2005.

Filer is one of two Major League players to come out of La Salle University. The other was Lefty Hoerst, a left-hander who pitched for the Phillies (1940-42, 46-47). Filer graduated in 1978 with a B.S. in marketing. 

He and his wife Barb reside in Lansdale.