Not true at all. Middleton said from the start that we needed to develop our own young players in order to succeed. That, and implementing advanced analytics in a way that improved the team at prospect/player evaluation and development as well as in the day-to-day major league operations were the twin charges initially given to Klentak. He failed at both, which is why he is gone. The last two years, hew as charged with building a winning MLB team. He failed at that as well.
The FAs in no way hampered the Phillies rebuild. In fact, we'd be in a better situation if we had done no trades, kept our prospects, and signed more FAs. FAs should have been a way to be respectable while building a core of young plus players in the minors and major league team control years. Trading the young future guys for the present was the third biggest error after errors in prospectplayer evaluation and player development.
And the Phillies are not a small market team.
At least we lost nobody in the MLB rule 5. I had hoped for a pitcher, who might make the pen. Holder is touted for defense, but had only OPS .742 at Trenton in 2019, is not a base stealer, and will be 27 this year. Unfortunately, 9 of the 10 guys drafted ahead of us were pitchers. We took nobody and lost Reggie McClain in the Triple A phase of draft.
