Philly Front Office

What are we doing? I think we all know that the Phillies as presently constructed are not going to win the World Series. The Phillies aren’t bad, they just aren’t great. I don’t know if there is any guaranteed way to make them great either, but things need to change. Let’s address the problems and try to give some solutions.

Problem #1: CFs Brandon Marsh and Johan Rojas Stink

Both of these guys are very likeable people, but very unlikeable baseball players. Please stop fooling yourselves that both will come around. Marsh gets hot once in awhile and that bolsters his regularly below average stats. This season he has been dreadful. He has only 4 hits against lefties but that is somehow better than his performance against righties! How is that possible? He is a 4th outfielder. Rojas is a 5th outfielder, only good as a defensive replacement. If he could at least hit lefties as a right handed hitter there would be more value, but he is equally bad from both sides. Stop it with both of them.

Solution: Call up Justin Crawford

There are no trades for CFs out there. Luis Robert is a flashy name and I suppose he could bounce back in a more competitive environment, but he has been even worse than Marsh and Rojas for two years now! The only way I want him on the Phillies is if he gets released by the White Sox or costs basically nothing in a trade.

Crawford is the 21 year old, left hitting, center field playing, son of former big leaguer Carl Crawford. The knocks on him are that he hits the ball into the ground too often and the infield hits he beats out in the minors will be outs in the majors. That may be true, but it ignores the total lack of production the Phillies are getting from their major league centerfielders. Would you rather Crawford get to the majors and possibly prove everyone wrong or have the other two prove everyone right every day? There would be little to no drop off in defense and would give the team its first rookie position player since…Rojas two years ago? Calling up Crawford now at least gives him a jump on the job next year. If this season is dead in the water, I want something productive to come from it. It literally can’t get worse than the other two.

Problem #2: The Bullpen is Two Arms Short

The bullpen needs depth. They are barely getting by right now. Jordan Romano has been better than his numbers show, with only the A’s game blemishing an otherwise great May, but Orion Kerkering and Matt Strahm have become undependable in their roles. All 3 are playing a position up. The term “closer” is antiquated in baseball now because that role doesn’t always come up in the highest leverage spots. The Phillies need a guy who can come in and lock down a tight game against the best the other team has, they need a “fireman.” That was Jeff Hoffman last year and was Jose Alvarado this year. Kerkering is who they want for the job, but he isn’t that. Outside of those 3, no one else is even thinking of coming in for a close game. More depth is needed. Seth Johnson was just called up, which is exciting, but we are still operating at a deficit.

Solution: Starters Need to Be Converted into Relievers

The Phillies have too many starters and not enough relievers. Recently it was announced that Taijuan Walker would go to the bullpen fulltime with Mick Abel taking his place in the rotation until Aaron Nola comes back. That’s a start. I have no idea how Walker will do in the pen, but he is better than the slop they have now…hopefully. But what happens when Nola comes back?

Full disclosure, I do not trust Nola at all. I’ve held out hope that he could avoid his regularly scheduled blow up inning for years, but he can’t. The Rav 4th inning is as inevitable as Thanos to him. This year more than ever it seems he simply can’t make it through a whole start. I KNOW the Phillies will not move him to the bullpen, but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t. I don’t know if he loses focus when he pitches or what, but he regularly gets pounded his second time through the order. In his career, he has given up 46 3rd inning homers (surprisingly, the 4th is not his kryptonite (I know, I’m mixing comic metaphors)), significantly more than any other inning. At least for this season, it is time to give him a different responsibility, they cannot keep hoping for different results from the same process.

Why Nola? Because he is clearly the weakest link in the rotation. Zack Wheeler, Jesus Luzardo (Saturday’s blowup aside), Cristopher Sanchez, and Ranger Suarez have been far and away the best starters. Why on earth would one of them get sent to the pen? Ranger has been in the bullpen before, but he looks like the 2nd best starter right now. Moving him to a position of less use is counterproductive, even if he’s done it before. Everyone saying Nola has never pitched out of the bullpen before had no problems doing the same thing to Taijuan. I mean, never put Nola in with runners on, but let him try to provide value instead of taking it away.

(there are more bullpen related solutions to follow, but here is a list of potential trade candidates)

Problem #3: Wasting Andrew Painter

It is assumed that Andrew Painter will not be making his MLB debut until after the All-Star break, July 18th-ish. He threw 81 pitches his last start and is sitting in the upper 90s. He’s ready. So, what the hell are we waiting for??? I get it, they want to limit his innings. I am all-in on that plan but pitching him in the minors doesn’t limit his innings, it wastes them. The team doesn’t want him to go too far over 100 innings this season. He is currently at 28.

Keeping him down has two potential outcomes. He could pitch 5-6 more times before his mid-July call up. This would add about 25-30 innings to his workload, bringing his total to around 50-60. That leaves only about 60 innings tops to play with in the majors. Why use your limited ammunition at the range? The other possibility is that they skip some starts and he only pitches 2 or 3 times before July, maybe getting 10-15 innings. That limits his load, but it also means we are keeping a lifeboat on the ship while the team is drowning. Yes, they would then be able to deploy him without restriction when he gets up here, but how many needless losses will the team sustain in the next 6 weeks because we are an arm down?

Solution: Let Painter Open Games or Unleash Him Early

I get that pitchers like schedules and that they want to be cautious with Painter, so why not let him open games? Every 6th day have him piggyback a start with Mick Abel or Aaron Nola. Let him go 3 innings against Major League pitching. That is the same 15 innings you get from one of the above options while also saving the bullpen a day AND giving your starters an extra day of rest. People always want to label openers as dumb, but isn’t wasting Andrew Painter in the minors worse?

By the end of the season, he will not likely be in the rotation no matter what the team says. If we make it to the playoffs, you only need 3-4 starters. WE HAVE THAT ALREADY. There is the possibility that Painter bumps someone down a peg, but that really isn’t likely. Do you think the team will have him start over Wheeler, Luzardo, Sanchez, or Suarez? Even Nola? Probably not. So why not let him get into the rotation now and put him in the pen when his innings get to 100. That way he is still available for the playoffs. This team should be on a modified 6-man rotation anyway. Let Wheeler go on regular rest and have everyone else pitch with an extra day.

Just get him up here already!

Problem #4: No Trade Chips

The Phillies are currently trying to do a Golden State Warriors two timelines approach to team building. They see themselves as a World Series contender now, but do not want to bottom out the next few years by trading the farm. Andrew Painter and Aiden Miller are simply not available. Justin Crawford is probably available, but might also be the CF of the future. Mick Abel is a now promising starter under control for 6 more years. Eduardo Tait is the only promising catcher in the system. If the team wants to continue contending, it needs these guys to become cheap stars for the next few years. You can’t have a full team of free agents and expensive vets. Aroon Escobar has burst on the scene this year and could be expendable. Dante Nori and Griffin Burkholder are recent draftees, but neither are impressing. How do we get a leftfielder or reliever?

Solution: Trade Ranger Suarez

With Taijuan Walker now in the pen for good, this leaves the team with 7 viable starters. The old adage in baseball is that you can never have too much pitching, but the Phillies are struggling to sort out their starter surplus. Ranger is in the final year of his contract and will not be resigned. I love him, but they traded for Luzardo so he would be in the rotation next year too along with Wheeler, Sanchez, Nola, and Painter. Now Abel is here too. If they hold on to Ranger, he will likely score them a comp pick in the draft. On the other hand, he will probably be the best available starter on the market this summer. He could really get us something useful.

I wrote an outfield trade target list recently, but the only two guys I would want are Ryan O’Hearn and Steven Kwan. I don’t think Ranger is a viable chip for either (Mick Abel though???). The problem is because Ranger is a rental he would only be appealing to other contenders and they might not want to part with players on their big league club. It would need to be surplus for surplus. How about SF though? The Giants need a starter and have bullpen arms for days. The Cubs too could use a starter and might be willing to trade from their pen or…gulp…for Seiya Suzuki? He is crushing the ball right now, but the Cubs have enough offense. He would fit very nicely in this lineup.

How about a trade with the Yankees for Cody Bellinger? He seems to always be on our radar and he would fit well in left field. Strangely, he hits lefties much better than righties but knows how to work a walk from both sides. To bring in Ranger, the Yankees probably wouldn’t mind eating some of his salary either. Assuming the money ends up the same, the Phillies might even get more with this trade since Ranger is the superior player.

Problem #5: Platoons

It’s time for everyone to stop blindly defending Bryson Stott. For years we talked about how he needs more playing time against lefties. No. That’s not a thing. We love him, but he is not an everyday player. He should lead off against righties but not see the field against lefties.

Leftfield simply does not have a viable option against a lefty. Max Kepler was brought in to play everyday, but that is very clearly not a serious option. He is a $10m replacement player. Kepler is hitting better than the rest of the slop, but that doesn’t make it good. Weston Wilson stinks. He is supposed to hit lefties but isn’t hitting anything right now. For some reason the Phillies tried Sosa out there for like 1 game, he made an unbelievable catch over the wall, was part of a game losing miscue, and we never saw him out there again. Thanks Topper. If you aren’t going to platoon Stott, why not put Sosa in left?

Solution: Start Edmundo Sosa against lefties as a full platoon partner with Stott. There is no drop off in defense and would allow the team to get more use out of one of their better backups. Too much Edmundo is a bad thing, but not enough might be worse. Stop messing around. This one isn’t hard.

Last year the team traded for Austin Hays and it went horribly. The team seemed to ignore that he was playing with a debilitating kidney disease and made no effort to resign him. He has picked up his lefty killing this season. Who is this year’s candidate? Rob Refsnyder. The Red Sox are lying in the weeds of contention, but might be happy to take someone off our hands for their 4th outfielder. I cannot imagine it would take more than one of Nori or Burkholder. If it isn’t Refsnyder, then I’m sure there are others out there. Kepler, Marsh, and Wilson are all not options against a lefty in the playoffs.

Next Year’s Problem: Trea Turner Can’t Play Shortstop

Trea Turner simply is not a good defensive shortstop. He isn’t horrible, but the loss on Sunday was clearly on him after he bobbled an inning ending grounder. I hope he bought Kerkering dinner that night. There is no solution for this one right now. At least he is hitting consistently.

Solution: Move Him to the Outfield

Turner still has 8 years and many many millions of dollars left on his contract. He is not going anywhere. Plus, he is still a very productive player. We do not want to get rid of him. Let’s stop putting him in position to fail though. His fielding and his throwing are sub par, but he is still fast as all hell and can track a ball in the infield like no other.

The best thing for him and the team is for Turner to be playing either left field or center. That is a spring training fix though, not a mid season one. If Crawford proves himself this season and looks to be the CF of the future, then move Turner to left. Turner in left field with Crawford in center means we are covering a ton of ground and no longer have the left field black hole in the lineup. If Crawford is traded or simply isn’t ready for the CF job next season, then Turner has the wheels to take the position. It also means Aiden Miller is coming up to play shortstop. At every level Miller starts slow, but he is now coming around and lighting up AA. He will be in AAA by the end of the year and pushing for his major league debut next spring. Let’s make it easier to get him here.

So What Do We Have?

• Justin Crawford in center, stop playing Marsh and Rojas
• Painter and Abel in the rotation, move Nola to the pen
• Trade Ranger for bullpen or leftfield help
• Find a better platoon for left
• Sosa and Stott strict platoon
• Play Marchan more…I didn’t get to this, but there has been no effort at all to limit how much JT is playing and he has been awful at the plate. Not that Marchan is offering an improvement, but he is not as bad as you think and JT needs to get off his feet.