Discussion

Philsmania 2020-09-27 17:26:17 UTC #842

The cardinal failing of the McPhail-Klentak regime is failing to draft and build the pharmacy system. The issues with the rotation in 2019 and the bullpen in 2020 flow from that.

As I said yesterday, Middleton is next in the line of fire, although you can't fire an owner (unless the other 52% of the Phillies' ownership revolts and deposes him although that would likely mean having to buy him out at 48% of the significant value of the club now). The dysfunctionality troubled sports franchises typically starts at the very top with the owner. Middleton needs some serious self-reflection and to learn how to be a better owner, to hire better people and do a better job of staying out of their way. Perhaps a good talk with his buddy Jeffrey Lurie might help. Because, frankly, his leadership has run the organization into the ground.

LoneStarPhan 2020-09-27 17:37:36 UTC #843

Mediocre.

The rebuild has brought us 3 mediocre seasons in a row.

Is that good enough? I want better.

The current leadership is solidly mediocre. If that is not satisfactory, it is time for a change.

zambonir 2020-09-27 17:48:35 UTC #844

I believe Middleton and the Buck family both own equal shares, and it might be slightly more than 48%. Just under 48% according to articles in 2016, but at that time the remaining amounts were owned by Gillick and Montgomery. Montgomery's shares were likely split between the two partners and nobody is allowed to have a majority stake.

TLDR, he's obviously not going anywhere. The Bucks don't seem interested in running things and no reason to think they'd be better (or that Gillick would help them stage a coup). For all we know they, the Bucks, like their parents and the other now-dead partners, are part of the reason the team won't spend even more $.

I wouldn't say he has run the organization into the ground, I would say he's kept the organization operating in exactly the same way it has been for the entire history of this ownership group. There's been success but never sustainable success. There have been good people (Arbuckle, Gillick) making good decisions but never an organizational track record of good decisions (or innovation).

It's an incredible own-goal really, that Middleton said all the right things about change but then hired someone whose career highlight was a few seasons before the 1993 Phillies... and who then hired a GM who checked off all the boxes but simply wasn't as good as an entire generation of similiar GMs and assistant GMs, and hadn't been part of a great front office either. Combine that with some bad luck and the President, owner and GM not always being on the same page for big decisions and there you have it. The players can feel it, too.

zambonir 2020-09-27 23:28:30 UTC #845

Bryce Harper was asked if GM Matt Klentak should return in 2021. "I mean, I'm not an owner," Harper said. "I'm glad I don't have to make those decisions."
— Matt Gelb ( @MattGelb ) September 27, 2020

The most subtle, and best part of Bryce Harper's postmortem Zoom call, is him dropping how two or three teams in the NL East will try to sign J.T. Realmuto. It was an epic interview, and it sets the tone for a fascinating offseason.
— Matt Gelb ( @MattGelb ) September 27, 2020

teabag259 2020-09-27 23:47:36 UTC #846

Angels already fired their GM.

Dirk41 2020-09-28 02:02:56 UTC #847

How the Angels are wasting Trout and Ohtani, the demise of Pujols (say what you will, he was one of the best players of an era), and the generational defensive shortstop is astounding. You would think they would get good by mistake.

Austinfan 2020-09-28 13:20:20 UTC #848

Phillies made the mistake you see in all sports, teams that try to "win now" usually "win never."
This is why I've always said you should manage a franchise like a small money team, then use your money to resign your own players - imagine if the Marlins' had Middleton's money!

Instead, they keep trying to buy a championship, just like the Angels, with similar results.

They need to bring in a GM who can build a farm system, trade anyone they can for prospects, and finally do it right, if they spend 2-3 years in the wilderness, so what, is 70-92 any worse than 80-82 from a fan perspective?

Overpaying for 30+ year old players is stupid, we know age curves, we know that if you're paying a 28 or 29 year old FA based on his peak production, you're buying his declining seasons at a massive premium (see Arrieta). You can't build a winning team that way, you might get lucky for a season, but you won't have sustained success with a de facto hard cap.

bigegypt0417 2020-09-28 13:58:44 UTC #849

You are saying the phillies tried to but a championship?

the rest of your post was really bad as well. The phillies won't go over the tax and spent no money in the one place they needed it the most...the bullpen. Your point is even more ridiculous if you were to consider if they hadn't blown 20 games where they had the lead...even if they won half of those, they'd be in the playoffs as the division winners.

This team doesn't need a rebuild...they need to actually spend the money to bring in more pitching.

You continue to live in a past that isn't even as rosy as you paint it...you must have loved the bill giles era.

Philsmania 2020-09-28 14:43:12 UTC #850

Austinfan:

Phillies made the mistake you see in all sports, teams that try to "win now" usually "win never."
This is why I've always said you should manage a franchise like a small money team, then use your money to resign your own players - imagine if the Marlins' had Middleton's money!

Instead, they keep trying to buy a championship, just like the Angels, with similar results.

They need to bring in a GM who can build a farm system, trade anyone they can for prospects, and finally do it right, if they spend 2-3 years in the wilderness, so what, is 70-92 any worse than 80-82 from a fan perspective?

Overpaying for 30+ year old players is stupid, we know age curves, we know that if you're paying a 28 or 29 year old FA based on his peak production, you're buying his declining seasons at a massive premium (see Arrieta). You can't build a winning team that way, you might get lucky for a season, but you won't have sustained success with a de facto hard cap.

Herein lies the question that I keep posting. Yes, the Klentak rebuild has failed. But, do we blow it all up now and start over again or do we do everything in our power to pry open a window of opportunity for a couple of years--create another 1993 situation, if you will--and then blow it up and rebuild? For the sake preventing Philadelphia baseball from achieving generational irrelevance and to prevent ourselves from totally urinating away the massive money we spent and promising young players we traded away (Crawford, Alfaro, Sanchez, maybe Seabold), I say we try to get something out of this nucleus rather than concede that it and all the losing that preceded it was for nothing. It may well end up as a quixotic quest but I would at least like to see them try. One could make an argument that in hindsight, we may have been better off canning Thomas after '92 and starting over again. 1993 ended up buying Thomas four more years, three of which (1994-96) were spent in a futile effort to recreate '93's magic. But, what a sugar-high that '93 season was and, for one season, it got Philadelphia interested in baseball in a big way.

bigegypt0417 2020-09-28 14:51:45 UTC #851

The rebuild did not fail...that's simply not a factual statement. Klentak failed in filling the major league lroster with enough talent in the bullpen.

We can keep discussing the failure but any semblance of a capable bullpen and the phillies are winning the NL East even in this exhibition season.

Philsmania 2020-09-28 14:53:33 UTC #852

Look at the farm system. Bad farm system + losing ML team = failed rebuild. We got some guys on the ML roster who are good but whatever success this team enjoys will not be sustainable.

bigegypt0417 2020-09-28 14:57:54 UTC #853

again...the rebuild didn't fail in creating what is a good ML roster. I hate the game of "ifs" but any semblance of a bullpen and we are in the playoffs.

The farm system is not where it needs to be but we also had 3 of the last 4 first round picks on the ML roster this season.

Klentak needs to be gone but to say we're back to a rebuild is not a factual statement.

andyb 2020-09-28 15:08:16 UTC #854

The problem was not the $200 million payroll or the willingness to spend that. The problem was what they chose to spend the $200 million on. There were many ways they could have given themselves more flexibility (like my favorite of keeping JP Crawford).

bigegypt0417 2020-09-28 15:11:56 UTC #855

That I agree with, 100%!

fish 2020-09-28 15:28:15 UTC #856

The discrepancy in points of opinion may be in if you consider that, without the money spent on free agency, this team would be realllllybad. If your rebuild didn't net enough internal talent to be a .500 team on it's own, then i'd say it was a failure.

bigegypt0417 2020-09-28 15:31:25 UTC #857

Again...that is a strange hot take.

Every single winning roster in the majors is a combination of your own players (hoskins, nola, haseley,bohm) and players brought in to augment that talent (wheeler, harper, gregorious)

Every single team has to bring in talent and veterans.

allentown 2020-09-28 15:32:53 UTC #858

Yes, the problem is the pharm, all three arms: draft, international signings, player development. Of the three, steps have been taking to boost all but international. Sixto was the only real hit from international market since Sal found Ruiz. We aren't a team which has held back on international spending. We've had our academy for years. we have (had) two DR teams and were the last team to depart VZ. We've paid some big bonuses: Ortiz was one of the largest for any of the July 2 guys for any team. Our scouts just haven't gotten the job done and development/injury prevention among signees seemed spotty.

FA signings haven't been a problem, in temeselves -- $ spent and roster spots. The problem with some of our FA signings has been not limiting ourselves to noncomp FAs, other than the truly exceptional guys, like Harper. Trading minor league talent for vets hurt more than FA signings. We lost some #2 and a #3 pick, but the cushion for that is that we have drafted poorly, so a draft choice for the Phillies has, unfortunately, been worth less than a draft pick for the leading teams.

They need to be able to re-sign their own FAs, like Nola. Really not many others at this point (Realmuto this year), again unfortunately and the result of development. Beyond a long-term budget plan to deal with re-signing those plus, internal FAs, I still advocate spending up to cap with non-comp FAs.

I think the best example of jump-the-gun expenditure of resources, prior to being strong enough to advance, was Realmuto. We traded a big piece of future to get him, rather than spending the $ on a concomp FA -- or two, or three. I think we rushed on Realmuto, because we wanted a star, but from a baseball standpoint, because we thought he would make the pitching better and generally add leadership. Not really much sign of those last two. If 2020 had been a normal season, then Realmuto/Harper/Wheeler would have substantially increased revenue.

I have no idea how the relievers whom Klentak traded for could have all gone as totally south as they did after the trade. It's all very SSS, but still something TPTB need to think about, along with how the team totally crumbled at the end of the season. They haven't don well on the road, but without fans in the stands, how much excuse is their for that? It seems indicative of something lacking.

fish 2020-09-28 15:39:41 UTC #859

Definitely jumped the gun, but after 4 years of rebuild with little to show for it and being unwilling to replace the decision makers that were responsible, the only other options were to tear down and start again, stay a 75-80 win team, or try and jump start the process.

It wasn't necessarily a move that was destined to fail, just one destined to fail with Matt Klentak in charge. And for the love of God I really hope the Klentak decision doesn't become another globe trotting fact-finding mission for Middleton to poll opinion on Klentak before making a decision in a month.

allentown 2020-09-28 15:41:26 UTC #860

That's not a question I want MacPhail/Klentak to be allowed to answer. They have failed and if they stay, that answers the question: they have been given one more season to save their jobs -- it makes no sense to charge them with a new rebuild, since it will be another 5 years until we know the results of the new effort and neither deserves to stay that long.

So dump them and allow a new top team to make a dispassionate decision about: is there a realistic chance that we can advance in playoffs if we stick with present team for two more seasons? How much can we expect to get if we trade our vets? Which vets are worth saving for 4-5 years from now? If we trade vets, how many dead $? Realistically, how long until we can get some significant help from the pharm? The new team will have to quickly assess our whole roster and the minor league prospects, including at the lowest levels, to answer these questions.

I don't think we win 95 games, without a strengthening of the baseball-side non-players, especially scouting and analytical. My vote is to rebuild on the fly.

allentown 2020-09-28 15:46:39 UTC #861

No, those were not the only options. I think my option was best (doesn't everyone): don't trade young talent for veterans, but do add FAs (both lose-a-pick stars like Wheeler and Harper as well as enough noncomp FAs to fill holes, up to lux cap, with provision for extending our FA in long-term budget). It was the trades which mortgaged the future, and were basically Klentak's attempt to save $ by acquiring reasonable contracts, as if $ were our scarce resource, rather than a profound dearth of young talent. That is where MacPhail/Klentak weren't on the same page as Middleton and where they needlessly squandered our scarcest resource, and ironically hurt future budgets in the process.