Philly Front Office

With the emotions of the no-hitter in his last start still tugging at my heart strings, on July 31, 2015, The Phillies traded Cole Hamels to the Texas Rangers along with Jake Diekman for prospects Jorge Alfaro, Alec Asher, Jerad Eickhoff, Matt Harrison, Jake Thompson, and Nick Williams. It’s funny now, but this seemed like a good haul at the time. Texas was loaded with Top 100 prospects at the time. I remember being mad that we didn’t get Nomar Mazara, Lewis Brinson, or Chi Chi Gonzalez!

The Haul

This wasn’t just a load of prospects, there were 3 guys we were legitimately excited about.

• Jorge Alfaro (#45): The catcher of the future looked great until he had to actually hit the ball or play catcher. Neither was his strong suit despite being incredibly strong. After 3 seasons for the Phillies, we upgraded. He was packaged along with Sixto Sanchez for JT Realmuto. He is still kicking around the Brewers system.
• Jake Thompson (#83): Thompson was the Rangers best pitching prospect, had a mid 90s fastball, and a big durable pitcher body. He looked like a future #2 and was already close to the majors as a 21 year old. He crushed AAA then just never made it in the big leagues. He spent 3 years with the Phillies with bad results. He has bounced around Japan and Mexico ever since.
• Nick Williams (#97 Baseball America): Nick Williams looked like he would be a productive player based on speed strength and how he filled out a uniform. Then you watched him play. Oh my god he was infuriating. He couldn’t run the bases and he couldn’t play the outfield. His hitting numbers look fine, but that running gaffes combined with the heavy strikeouts led to his release after 3 seasons. He has been kicking around Korea and Mexico where he is still active.
• Jared Eickhoff: Does anyone remember when we thought Eickhoff was a thing? We weren’t crazy either. He came out and kicked ass from the start and put up 2 solid seasons. Unfortunately, he fell off a cliff before the next 3 years and fizzled into the abyss of injury and ineffectiveness. The guy knew how to give up a homer though, 81 HRs in 81 starts for his career.
• Alec Asher: Not the jewel of the deal. Asher made his big league debut for the Phillies and gave up 30 runs in just 29 innings pitched. Fantastic stuff. He did much better the next season, the absolutely abysmal 2016 season, sustaining a 2.28 ERA in 5 starts. Sounds great right? Why would we get rid of him? Well, he was on steroids and got himself suspended for 80 games. Nice try kid. He was sold to Baltimore in the off season for a player that was never named later.
• Matt Harrison: The Phillies spent about $33m for Matt Harrison to never play for them. No, it wasn’t a situation where Harrison believed the red pinstripes made him look fat, he was just hurt. The Phillies knew this but picked up his tab to offset some of the Hamels money Texas was taking on.

Ranger Cole

The Rangers were marginally in the hunt when they acquired Hamels at 50-52. After the trade they went on a tear to finish 88-74. Cole was a big part of that going 7-1 down the stretch in 12 starts, leading Texas to the playoffs. Cole had 2 starts in the NLDS and gave up only 2 earned runs. The problem was that Texas also had 5 unearned runs and he went 0-1 despite a 2.70 ERA. In the deciding game, Cole was into the 7th with a 3-2 lead when his defense had 3 consecutive errors to start the inning leading to 4 runs. They lost the series 3-2. Brutal.

Regular season 2 in Arlington went even better. In 200 innings, Cole put up 200 strikeouts, a 3.32 ERA and went 15-5 to earn 5.7 WAR. I was particular about saying regular season because the playoffs weren’t very kind. The Rangers were swept by the Blue Jays and Cole got bombed out of Game 1.

Cole pitched another effective season and a half in Arlington before being traded to the Cubs at the 2018 deadline. He was vintage Cole down the stretch with his 2.36 ERA leading Chicago to the wild card game. The Cubs would lose in 13 innings. From the looks of it, this is only the second time he ever pitched in relief, going two scoreless. We won’t talk about his last and only start with the Braves.

Like Brian Dawkins, I always thought Cole would just always play in Philadelphia. I know we had to trade him at the time, but I still wish we hadn’t failed him by being so bad. There are many reasons the 2015 Phillies were bad, but the team mostly just got old. The glory days were gone and only Cole Hamels remained. Then he was gone too. I was 32 years old when it happened but I was still like a little kid losing his favorite player. It still hurts that he wore another jersey. I couldn’t be happier when they brought him back after retiring.