Phillies Off-Season 2024-2025 (Part 2 including Spring Training)

I am just pleased to see there was no drama with Bohm or Suarez. I think both sides probably knew no good could come of it in Bohm's case. The Phillies knew he'd earned the nearly double salary both on merit and service time; at the same time Boras probably knew they could make the case against him if he tried to hold out for an extra million.

Siedman's article has been updated to report that Edmundo Sosa has reached agreement, at $3 million.

andyb - Jose Ruiz agreed to a $1.22 million deal some time back (last sentence in the Seidman article).

As requested by @dcsman

Funny that it worked out that way.

I'd say both this:

And this:

Worth noting here as well (though Campbell still just a minor leaguer).

They have managed to keep the younger Middleton far away from Phillies business since his initial penchant for tweeting. First I've seen about this almost five years late. New story is paywalled but says he's been ordered to sell his LA home to pay the crisis PR firm he stiffed. He's still suing the Hollywood Reporter for defamation too.

Doesnt bode well for the future. Wow, don’t realize this disaster might hit someday. Really hope not

I would like to think his father is prepared to not just have the kid inherit de facto control of the Philliies if he doesn't have his act together, but there is already a family history of both inheritance and disputes over it. Can't help but wonder if the introduction of new investors is also with the longer-term picture in mind (as Middleton did reduce his ownership share slightly, most of it came from the Buck side).

II. PECOTA, the Baseball Prospectus projection system, pegs the Phillies for the second National League wild card with 87.6 wins.

III. If that seems low, PECOTA forecasted 84.4 wins for the Phillies last year. They won 95 games and the NL East crown.

Either the Phillies were trying to refute that Amaro chatter about Suarez's conditioning, or he simply couldn't maintain it once the season started, as Gelb has mentioned this twice.

Suárez was more prepared than ever last spring, then dominated in April and May. He was far less effective by the summer.

The Phillies were thrilled with how prepared Suárez was entering 2024. They could better throttle Suárez in April and May this season.

Saw the opening day presser with DD and Topper.

Nothing newsworthy came out of it, but hope springs eternal as everyone reports.

I still think we'll be hard pressed to win the division. The playoffs is likely, but I'm not sure how long they would last.

We're on a 2009-11 trajectory right now and we remember what happened in 2012. This will not be that bad, but it is headed in that direction if DD does another off-season of inaction and denial like this one.

Let's see if they actually get out of spring training with six pitchers (including Walker but not Painter) first. If they do - and Walker is serviceable - he can be traded.

The other difference between this team and the previous era is they haven't gone crazy with free agents or trades to try and keep it going/up the ante. Turner was the last FA to cost them compensation and big $; Nola was internal and Wheeler was an extension. And the deals have only been for relievers, depth SPs or controllable players (going back to the 2022 deadline). Part of the reason the last era fell apart was because of how many win-now trades and FA signings they made, even though most of them were for good players.

Anyway, it's three different seasons. First half, second half playoffs. This team is wildly better on paper than last year's team on Opening Day, even if nobody (odds makers, PECOTA) thinks it will be that much better, than people thought last year's was on paper let alone as good as the team actually was.

Was funny to me that DD said he kind of regretted not getting a 5th starter as they would have won more than 100 games, but would that have actually changed their playoff trajectory?

You can never have too much starting pitching.

That was my point, the organization is stuck and have put themselves in that situation due to their decisions and actions.

They have committed to this roster as one who can win the WS when the last 3 seasons show it has not worked. Did they get close? Sure, but their competition has improved as they stand still and rearrange the deck chairs.

They needed to be more aggressive this off-season to fix the roster flaws and bring in different talent that will be more productive at certain positions. When the team fails short again this season, we'll see what they say and do, but I'm afraid that is the most likely outcome.

But how do you build a team that can win the World Series? Playoffs are still a small sample with a lot of randomness and luck. Did the Dodgers really "fix" their 2021-2023 approach or did they just finally catch the right break to go all the way? And MLB is riddled with teams and Hall of Fame players who came up short and small in them, until they didn't. Would replacing Alec Bohm actually have been guaranteed to make the team better in October? Replacing Nick Castellanos would almost surely make the team better overall but he had a 1.059 OPS in the Mets series, and a 1.796 OPS in the 2023 Braves series, or 2023 would have been just like 2024. Never mind what he played like next because that just proves the point. Had they not blown that series he might have still been World Series MVP, or the other two guys who came up small could have been.

But most of all,what did the Phillies miss out on that would have actually been good moves, both for the players they'd get and what they'd have to give up? Luzardo deal seems much more judicious than Crochet would have been. None of the FA outfielders besides Soto were that appealing, big or small, and Kepler was actually one of the few who meets the team's stated goal of adding a different type of hitter (whereas Santander or even trade option Robert are just more of the same). Not sure Bregman really was either.

The future of the Harper/Turner core is a huge concern, and so is what do after this season over the last two years of Wheeler's contract (as decisions are made on Schwarber, Realmuto and replacing Nick). But mostly running back a team that probably would have won 100 games doesn't seem like a bad thing. If they lose in the NLDS or NLCS again that's just baseball. A bigger concern would be if they have a 2025 like the Diamondbacks' 2024 (or the Braves for that matter, they were barely a playoff team).

Now, we can certainly have this conversation again on August 1. We know they will add a relief pitcher then if they have to, and the stakes are also high enough that if they need a position player nobody will be off the table (to get or give).

They know that they need changes, but they are at their max budget. It's the third highest budget in MLB and way beyond past Phillies teams. The farm wasn't producing much and they wanted to win now, so they built the team around costly FA. I think last year was the peak regular season wins for this cycle and likely the best Phillies team of this cycle. As in the 2008 cycle, the strongest team of the cycle was not the WS team this cycle. If we continue to follow the 2008 cycle, then this season will be the crash and burn year. I'm not expecting that, but I do expect the regular season win total to fall to 88-89. That will get them in the playoffs and if they get hot they can do well. Still, despite the third largest payroll, they are not among the top 3 teams in baseball.

It was a very weak off-season, but that reflects reality. This is not the time to bring in more costly FA.