Phillies Hot Stove 2022-23

[EDmuch]

And I think we can be pretty sure that DD will have a free hand to do whatever he thinks is best. Another starter (Perez from Rangers ), one of the shortstops (I have switched my preference from Turner to Swanson ) and some relief help (this is always the hardest to gauge ). I think we see Painter in the rotation by the All Star break.

[Austinfan]

They got beat in six games by a great team. What they can learn from Houston is the key to sustained excellence is the organizational pipeline - unless Middleton wants to lose stupid money with the luxury tax - the most important offseason move is to continue to pour resources into scouting and development rather than throw money at free agents approaching 30 and the inevitable aging curve decline.

They need pitching depth, none of their starters are "horses," all benefit from an extra day of rest now and then, especially if you get back to the post-season. Six reliable starters and a deep bullpen, and better defense (which protects a pitching staff) is more important than another bat.

[allentown]

Nola and Wheeler are 'horses'. Even horses have limits. Guys who can throw 200+ innings in a season are rare, especially in modern baseball.

What I took from the playoffs is that other good teams have been successful in creating a new breed of super-spin-rate pitchers and our hitters can't handle these guys. Houston signed theirs cheap out of LA at advanced age. We need to have development/scouting staff who can find and develop guys like this. I am not dismissing the possibility that this ability comes in a bottle or tube. We need to study that possibility as well. Our hitting coaches need to prepare our hitters to do better against this type of pitcher. Valdez was simply deadly.

Other thing for post-season when pitchers are tiring: guys who have long ABs are deadly to the SP. They may not do direct damage but allow other hitters to do so. A reason to keep playing Hoskins and Stott (as a non-platoon guy) next season and another reason. The 2022 version of Castellanos is death to an offense. Hopefully a bounce back. If not, welcome to the bench.

[Philsmania]

Hopefully, we can get back to this level; history says it likely will not happen which is why opportunities like this need to be cherished, but this team has many elements in place and should continue to do well. If we can shift Stott to 2B and land one of the good SS, all the better. Get Harper back in RF and let's roll.

I am not going to predict this will be a one-off and I certainly hope that it won't be. But, at the same time, I wouldn't say that the organization is where we need it to be, particularly in terms of the scouting and development system.

After 1993, even if we were injected with truth serum, how many of us would have said they didn't see the Phillies having a winning season for until eight years later, not making the Postseason until fourteen years later and not playing in the World Series again until another fifteen later?

I am hoping for more but, at the same time, bracing for the possibility that this may have been a case of a team barely making the Postseason and then catching lightning in a bottle.

[DurhamBull]

Talking about exposed flaws, the NY Times noted this fact --

The Astros...collectively induced 71 strikeouts from the Phillies, a World Series record. Philadelphia’s .163 batting average is also the lowest for any team in a World Series of at least six games.

The 2022 Phillies were built around offense, and the Phils won the WS games where the offense asserted itself. I think one way the Phillies could improve is to swap some power for hitters who make contact. That's one reason I'm reluctant to see Segura leave the team. Despite hitting below his career average in 2022, he still had the lowest K% of anyone on the team. (https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/PHI/2022-batting.shtml)

On the subject of Castellanos, I feel like he fell so far from his career mean in 2022 that the Phillies have to let him see what he can do in 2023. He's only 30, not young in baseball terms but neither is he at the age where players typically see a precipitous decline. If in June he's still the .700 OPS player that the Phillies had this season, bite the bullet and trade him, even if that requires picking up most of his salary. That would be really expensive, which is why I don't feel like the Phils have the luxury of making that move immediately.

An Unimpeachable Championship: Houston Astros Win World Series

[zambonir]

The Astros were supposed to be the team the Phillies modelled their rebuild after. Not only were the Phillies unable to draft their equivalent of Springer, Correa, Bregman and Tucker (Altuve was already there) but the Astros continued to develop so well that they've replaced two of those guys already, while also adding Alvarez and all those pitchers (while also letting Morton and Gerrit Cole walk. And wasting the Appel pick to boot!). The sign-stealing tends to paper over how good they actually are (and the '18 '19 and '21 teams weren't exactly bad teams either!). It's even more remarkable - and perhaps infuriating - really, that they changed GMs and managers (and also seemed to have a really rotten culture in general in '19 when that assistant got fired for harassing the journalist) and didn't miss a beat. I don't know that we'll see A.J. Hinch win anything again, and Luhnow's out of baseball.

Middleton and Dombrowski seem to understand that the culture and the organization are what really matters; it's just too bad it took the better part of 10 years - or at least the four-five they wasted between Amaro and Dombrowski - to get here.

[Philsmania]

The Astros with Correa and Pena remind me of the Nationals with Harper and Soto. Develop a superstar but eventually lose him via free agency but develop his replacement who gosh darned turns out to be better.

As for your greater analysis of organizational culture, the Astros always had the competence part but seemed to lack an ethical compass. The Phillies had trouble with the competence part until Dombrowski came in.

And the Astros also wasted the Brady Aiken pick--two straight 1-1's--though the comp pick they got for failing to sign him turned into Kyle Tucker.

And also see how many good LA players the Astros have.

[EDmuch]

Something that seems to be overlooked is that the Phil’s now have a highly competent coaching staff with Cotham & Long to provide a more guided approach than during the flailing around oh the Klentak era. Plus we have 3 young starting pitchers in our system who are filled with potential.

[Philsmania]

Our hitting and pitching coach positions--probably the two most important positions on the staff after manager--were a revolving door for several years. Five pitching coaches from 2017-21 and five hitting coaches from 2017-22.

Klentak really turned out to be an egghead. Surely an intelligent guy with a degree from Dartmouth and probably had plenty of good ideas but his application of those ideas ended up being absolute incoherence.

[zambonir]

Yeah the Astros knew exactly what they were doing with the Aiken pick.

Not really feeling like Kevin Long is some kind of genius right now personally (small sample/recency bias)

But it speaks to the larger point - the coaches and manager don't really matter if the culture is good. And having good players isn't enough if the culture - and front office savvy - is bad. From Harper and Hoskins and Nola to Wathan and Thomson and Figueroa, many of these guys were already part of the Klentak/Kapler years.

I think Cotham is the bigger revelation, but not because of him per se. The hiring of Brian Kaplan this year appears to have been a bigger deal, both at the major league level (he's the guy that seems to take point on the nitty-gritty of the match-ups and scripts) and because of his accompanying minor league role.

Klentak's failure was MacPhail's Phailure. Klentak should have been what Sam Fuld is now. Just as well MacPhail was not hands-on, though instead Middleton filled that void.

[phillychuck]

The main difference between the Astros' organization (outside of a completely mis-aligned ethical compass in Houston) and the Phils' is competence in Latin America. We do not handle our own Latin American prospects well, nor do we deal well with major leaguers from Latin America. Maybe Dominguez and Alvarado and Suarez are signs that we are improving, but we have a long way to go to catch the 'Stros in terms of the contribution from LA players.

[Austinfan]

Think the major difference is the Phillies were a (dis) organization for an extended period with no consistent coaching through the system, and it seems a general disconnect between scouting, minor league development and major league coaching. If Dombromski does one thing that matters, it will be to create a coherent organization.

They don't need better contact hitters, they need more disciplined hitters. And hitters who learn to make adjustments with two strikes like Harper has learned.
We'll see if Castellanos is due to decline or health, but he has to learn the strike zone.
I've given up on Hoskins, he reminds me of later career Howard, keeps reverting back to his pull happy self and smart pitchers take advantage. If he could field decently, you could live with it, but not when he's that bad.

The kids on the other hand, just need time, I think they all lost close to a year of development to COVID and then were rushed (Marsh with the Angels, the other this year). Stott struggled in the post-season, but also had two ABs that showed his potential. Bohm is just starting to tap into his potential. And so on.

The key to the future is to get more out of LA. They've improved their drafting and it seems their player development.
But they need to find guys like Sanchez and Suarez on a regular basis, and have one of those million dollar bonus infielders actually become a solid ML starter.

A lot of things can't be fixed in one season, some pitchers need tweaks, some hitters modified mechanics and a focus on what they can and can't do (if you can't hit high FBs, stop swinging at them, etc.).

[andyb]

Which makes one wonder if they should just go for Trea Turner and not care about losing a million dollars in international money. That is really the lineup upgrade. I could get the Japanese guy to play LF and push Schwarber to 1B with a Hoskins trade too. Hoskins is really ill suited to bat second in the lineup.

We can all wish for a huge, sustainable international pipeline, but it ain't here yet and the chances of it 2-3 years from now seems slim.

We are stuck with Castellanos. Best move there is for him to improve.

[Austinfan]

Trea Turner

Turner would scare me, just posted his worst season in the last 4, turns 30 next summer, and will get 5yr, $125M+?
And that was with a BABIP of .342, but a BB% of only 6.4%.
Nor can you blame Dodger stadium, his home/away splits were pretty evn.

Seems a candidate for a major fall off the next few years, fielding tends to be the first to go, then average/OBP, and finally power.

[andyb]

Every free agent kind of scares you.

What would you do then? Stand pat? I just don't think the fans would be happy if we re-signed Segura and Eflin. Added a couple minor bullpen pieces. And then just hope the young players will improve. They need to do more than that IMO since there is not much immediate help if any coming from the farm. We'll have a starting pitcher or two, but that might be more second half than first half of the year.

[zambonir]

If they don't sign Turner and they don't go after the Japanese OF they could still find another LF if they move on from Hoskins (and they could keep Segura). I mean, we're probably not signing Judge, but - just going off Bowden's Top 25 - there's Nimmo (whose ability to still play CF would be a bonus), Benitendi, Conforto, all of whom would also be cheaper/shorter than the four shortstops. There's also three 1B/DH types (Rizzo, Abreu, Bell) though the Phillies really don't need to do that.

Still not nearly as down on Rhys as some - he was still our fourth-best offensive player by most measures in addition to being #2 in WAR (Harper and Segura probably both pass him with full seasons). Signing one of the shortstops would replace/upgrade Segura but you'd be putting a lot on at least one of Bohm and Castellanos to make up for the loss of Rhys's production.

The round pegs and square holes extend to Hall and Schwarber as well - two guys who can't share 1B or DH. Nick is the guy you gotta put there. Or Bohm. (in that scenario you keep Segura and Turner or Bogaerts or whomever plays 3B).

Obviously if they sign a LF you just move Schwarber to 1B. And you can't rule out spending money on a starting pitcher.

Logic says the Phillies will - and can - get back under the tax but Middleton might not be using logic this off-season, and that's okay too. I would also not rule out trading one of the Big Three for someone controllable. That's probably better than moving one them next July.

[Dirk41]

Would Verlander come here?

Always been intrigued by Sonny Gray

[Taudawg]

No way Dombrowski runs it back with (mostly) same squad next year. He’s a smart guy, knows the Braves are a better team, and the Mets may spend 300 mil next year. The Phillies run from 6th seed to World Series isn’t the path to try and duplicate. The Phillies will attempt to build a division winner.

[zambonir]

Let's take Bassit from the Mets!

I don't think I'd want to throw Verlander or DeGrom a multi-year deal (due to age and injury respectively). Assuming the $ is more focused on a hitter/fielder and the bullpen, I think they probably have enough starting pitching to get to the deadline (at which point they'll have a call-up and a trade acquisition, or both). Could still see them re-signing any of the three incumbents on cheaper one-year deals (unless Bowden is right about Eflin) or finding someone similar.

[Dirk41]

That makes sense. Not having another starter killed us this postseason and down the stretch. Maybe Painter will be the guy