2019-2020 Phillies Offseason News and Speculation

[baseballoldie]

I'm on the over on 86 wins. I'm thinking 90 wins for this year. I expect they will play much better against the Marlins this year than last year (can't be any worse, right?). Take care of division play and the rest takes care of itself.

[andyb]

Arrieta (1.6) Eflin (1.0) VV (1.1) Pivetta (.9)

This is the key here. We are basically projected to have 2 good starters and then 4 more 5th starters. They need Arrieta to be healthy and give them 180 innings of sub-4 ERA. Then basically 2 of the other 3 starters to step forward and all of those starters (Eflin, VV, and Pivetta) are projected as mediocre.

Those Fangraph projections also have Hoskins at 3 WAR which is already hoping for a decent bounce back from last season. This of course needs to happen too, though there is a real chance he does not do this also.

[VoteForKalas]

I agree, 86-88 wins is what I expect as well and we'll be right on the cusp of a wild card at the end. I cannot see if we grab one of not, crystal ball is fuzzy.

Also agree Arrieta and Eflin are the keys - offense should be better as I see Hoskins bouncing back, but the pitching is still iffy even when healthy.

[andyb]

It is not just Arrieta and Eflin. Eflin, Velasquez, and Pivetta are all projected to be mediocre. Eflin probably has the lowest floor of that group, but is no more likely to be a 2+ WAR pitcher than the other two who have better stuff and higher ceilings.

Arrieta has a track record and absent his health problem he was decent in both 2017 and 2018. His projection includes the injury, so without that there is hopefully more upside. I have no clue which of the other three will be any good. Hopefully we have a better pitching coach to get more out of each of them. I just have no confidence that Eflin will be any good. He had a FIP last year of 4.85 and his career FIP is 4.82. He has a pretty low K rate which is bad in today's 3-outcome game. He has strengths, but so do Velasquez and Pivetta. We just need two of them to succeed.

[andyb]

And the Fangraphs ZIPS projections came out today. Pretty close to the ones Z quoted above:

2020 ZiPS Projections: Philadelphia Phillies

ZIPS does like Ranger Suarez for some reason. Didi also.

[fish]

ZIPS does like Ranger Suarez for some reason. Didi also.

If Ranger was able to pitch at his reliever velocity as a starter, I could see the potential for some real value from him. Otherwise i'll be happy if hes a good 6-7th inning pitcher.

[andyb]

I am guessing the projections get thrown off a bit by his very good stats and I agree that he is probably best suited to a bullpen role where his stuff plays up. Suarez is actually the prototype of my hope for 2-inning relievers on the Phillies. With an all-right handed starting staff he would get favorable matchups for 2 innings. We really need to get 80+ innings out of relievers if we are getting fewer innings from our starters.

Maybe the Phillies should tandem the 3-5 spots in the rotation among 6 pitchers: Eflin, VV, Pivetta, Arrieta, Suarez, and Irvin.

[zambonir]

They just need the starting rotation to keep its head above the water until July. We survived with Ben Lively and Eflin in 2018. Last year was rougher but that was also on the bullpen, which was built to prop up a weak rotation. So long as they're in the thick of it on July 1 our rotation on August 1 could include two guys who aren't here yet (Howard and a trade).

[zambonir]

Phillies cut 1 pitcher to add another in bullpen competition

Kelley out, Reggie McLain in.

The ZIPS projections are hard to argue with IMO. The gambling line in my state is 85.5. I'd take the over, but probably wouldn't if it was 86.5.

I think most of us would be hard-pressed to disagree with these thoughts:

But it’s hard to shake the feeling that the Phillies could have used one more player. Andrew McCutchen is a risk given his age and injury last year, and whether center field ends up manned by Adam Haseley, Roman Quinn, or To Be Determined, I’d prepare to be underwhelmed. Scott Kingery, despite a solid 2019 campaign, is likely still a better fit as a versatile role player in heavy rotation, getting 400 PA per year and playing multiple positions. The Phillies missed out on a real impact addition to the offense and in this division, they could come to regret it.

Just like the lineup, it feels like both the rotation and the bullpen are missing a name.

But they've made a decision, about both money, and the upside of Bohm, Haseley. Plus the hope that more than one of the arms can meet the expectations we had for them after 2018.

[andyb]

Kind of figured that Trevor Kelley would not make it through the winter on the 40 since he is more of a control guy. McLain looks like he has a little better stuff. His results certainly improved when they switched him to the bullpen in 2019.

[Austinfan]

Anyone who'd move the needle over our current starters would cost $20+M or so.
Cutch/Bruce in LF isn't a bad one year stopgap, with Kingery able to move to CF and Haseley to LF.
Moniak and Stephen in Lehigh as options in the 2nd half of the season.
And Williams could always take a step up.

Phillies aren't going to make a lot of noise unless Bohm, Howard and a couple other young players step up, but you can say that about just about every team stuck between 80-90 wins, you need either a couple young kids or a Morton to come out of nowhere.

I think the key is the new pitching coach, teach someone like Pivetta to throw a decent changeup and you suddenly have a young pitcher who's as good as most the FA pitchers who were available. Or a Suarez refines his 3 pitch repertoire and becomes the LH starter to balance the rotation. How often do we read about a pitcher who struggled for years, then turned the corner because he refined his mechanics/improved a secondary pitch with a new grip/developed a new pitch?

This is probably the biggest reason players/teams show so much variance, outside of a few outliers, the talent gap is pretty small, it's the tweaks and adjustments that separate many starters from AAAA players. Pivetta for example has a hittable 95 MPH FB, a plus curve when he can locate it, and no viable third pitch. Teach him how to get movement on his FB and he's a solid RP, teach him a changeup and he's a SP.

[zambonir]

Anyone who'd move the needle over our current starters would cost $20+M or so.
Cutch/Bruce in LF isn't a bad one year stopgap, with Kingery able to move to CF and Haseley to LF.
Moniak and Stephen in Lehigh as options in the 2nd half of the season.
And Williams could always take a step up.

But in 2021 Cutch will still be the starting LF potentially, Segura will still be the starting 2B potentially, and we'll need a SS (or 2B) again if Kingery plays CF. Maybe Klentak can offload one of those salaries (or afford to carry one of them as a fancy bench piece) but they'll probably need to add another salary, whether in trade or free agency (and will be able to, with Arrieta and Didi coming off the books).

But we're talking about this year. $15 million+ is pretty much the price of a really good everyday major league player if you can't develop them yourself, and we're already paying three guys just that (as well as Harper of course). The question is are they the right guys?

If the Phillies could still do it - never mind that both the CBT and the state of the farm says otherwise - a Bryant, Arenado or Betts would certainly move the needle, but only from wild card to NL East contender, not a team that's certain to make noise in the NLCS and World Series (though the Nats were not certain to do that last year either).

I feel like those guys might still get MIddleton's attention though. The trade price on Betts isn't going to be high (complicated by the Sox wanting to include Price maybe). Arenado is tricky because he has an opt-out on the one hand and a one of $ on the other. Bryant's the easy one really.

We can't keep trading the future (and also need to sign JT) but if the Dodgers get Betts and Bryant goes to an NL East team we're not likely to be relevant. Our best hope is probably that these deals don't get done, and we can be players at the deadline.

[Austinfan]

Our best hope is to tweak some of our young pitchers and have them take a step up.
We've spent up the wazoo and maybe added five wins?
Sure, you can buy the "right" player, but the history of FA is that for every bargain, there's a long-term overpay, and often the same team (Dodgers for example) do both.

In the end, with the salary cap, you MUST develop your own talent or make brilliant trades for overlooked young talent or salvage low cost veterans to compete.

[andyb]

There are still multiple ways to win. Our biggest problem is that we have not developed lots of good young talent lately or we have traded it. If we still had JP Crawford we could have spent the money we gave Gregorious and Segura on something else. That is close to $30 million a year.

For better or worse, management has decided that they were not going to exceed the luxury tax in the offseason. That limited our options. A decision of whether to trade for another star was put off to midseason. If we are tied for the division lead in July though, I could easily see us making a big trade and exceeding the luxury tax. At that point though it is far more likely we would want to add something on the pitching side as opposed to the hitting side.

[EDmuch]

Morton did not "come out of nowhere". He was an All Star pitcher in the season before he became a UFA. Not getting Morton was a screw up by Klentak.

[zambonir]

Morton came out of nowhere on the Astros, when the Phillies opted not to to keep him the first time. At that point he was a respectable mid-rotation pitcher with a lot of injuries and a mixed bag of seasons, not a CY contender.

Still doesn't bother me that the 2019 Phillies didn't want him as a more proven, older, more expensive pitcher. Astros didn't want him back either. And who knows if he wanted pitch here. Clearly the Phillies preferred Corbin and Happ but also wouldn't meet their terms. As it turns out Happ would have been a mistake.

Either way, we wouldn't have Wheeler now. Water under the bridge.

[julio]

Not getting Morton was a screw up by Klentak.

Are you arguing that Klentak "screwed up" by not exercising the club option (at $9.5 million) in November 2016? Or that he "screwed up" by not signing Morton after the 2018 season?

[zambonir]

Ed clearly means last year.

And the 2016 option was mutual, btw. While it is possible that Morton would have exercised his end of it given his injured status, we don't actually know that. He may well have been able to get a $10-11 million one-year deal on the open market. What he actually got from the Astros was 2 years $14 million guaranteed, and he wound up earning another $4.375 million in incentives (out of a possible $5 million). He also got to sign with a contender (even though the Astros actually missed the 2016 playoffs). Had he stayed with the Phillies in 2016 he surely would have been traded at the deadline; had he been healthy in 2015 he would have been traded at the deadline, before the option even came up.

[Austinfan]

Morton was what Arrieta is this season, a veteran pitcher who threw well in the past but was plagued by injuries.
If Arrieta is 100% and is close to his peak years, we'd have the "pitcher out of nowhere" we need.
But good luck predicting WHICH injury plagued veteran pitcher will turn it around.

[phillychuck]

I agree with your last sentence, but Morton isn't at all like Arrieta. Morton's best season prior to his last three he was basically a 1.5 WAR pitcher; a 4th/5th starter. Arrieta was a Cy Young winner. Morton had never thrown well in the past when he went on this three-year run. Arrieta was the best pitcher in baseball for a couple of years. They have the similarity that both were injured, that's about it.