SAN DIEGO -- Following struggles in his second big league season, Alec Bohm was optioned to Triple-A Lehigh Valley on Sunday as slugger Rhys Hoskins come off the injured list.

Bohm had started in only three games in the past two weeks.

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Phillies general manager Sam Fuld said Bohm was sent down to get the 25-year-old more consistent playing time.

"We just got to a point where we felt like this was a combination of the best thing for him [and] the best thing for us,” Fuld said. “He had some recent struggles that didn't give him an opportunity to play every day, and [there was] sort of cycle there where he didn't get a lot of opportunities over the last week-plus. That didn't give him a great opportunity to bounce back. …

“I think this would be the best for him [to] give him an opportunity to get regular reps [and] get back to being the player that we know he can be.”

The player the Phillies hope to see return at some point is the Bohm who batted .338 with an .881 OPS in 2020 and finished as National League Rookie of the Year co-runner up (with the Padres’ Jake Cronenworth).

Over his past 10 games, Bohm had just one hit in his 17 at-bats. He was batting .217 in August. 

There is no timeline for when Bohm could reappear in the big leagues or any set target in terms of numbers that he needs to put up before he gets the call again.

With less six weeks left in the regular season, could that return come this year?

"It's difficult to say,” Fuld said. “But I think as we've seen, a lot of things can happen over the course of the season, especially now in the COVID era, where players, unfortunately, can be out of action en masse. We don't hope that by any means, but the reality is that it's really difficult to predict.

“Five or six weeks is a lot of time to prove yourself. We know that we are going to be the kind of team that we want to be with him in the middle of the lineup and playing to his abilities.”