Philly Front Office

When we went to sleep last night, Kyle Tucker was a Dodger and most of the baseball world was upset. I say most because the Phillies were looking in good shape. Toronto was out on Bo Bichette and we looked primed to scoop him up. We were the only game in town and motivated.

Fast forward about 14 hours and things could not have gone more wrong. Bo Bichette is a Met after signing a 3/$126m contract with opt outs each year. Apparently last night he asked the Phillies for 7/$200m and the Phillies said yes. After having that in hand, the Mets made their shorter term offer and he’s going to Queens instead of Philly.

Let’s be clear, financially he made the right decision. Next year’s free agent class is horrible. After pocketing $42m from Steve Cohen, he gets to re-enter free agency next year as the likely number 1 bat as the top option. Another season like last year and he’ll top the Phillies offer no problem. It still sucks.

Steve Cohen might be a shitty human being, but he uses that to the benefit of Mets fans. He wanted to embarrass the Yankees last year with Juan Soto and he did. This year he missed out on Kyle Tucker, so he threw that money at Bichette to burn the Phillies. They don’t need a 3rd Basemen, but that didn’t matter. I might hate him, but I respect that type of ownership.

The Phillies, feeling left out, seemed to panic and immediately pivoted to catcher JT Realmuto. He signed for 3/$45m shortly after the Bichette news broke. JT is 35 and his bat has fallen off a cliff the last few years. There is no chance he’s going to go back to being the BCIB. We apparently offered him 3 years earlier in the off season, presumably at $10m AAV. Considering he didn’t have any other offers and we didn’t have much of an alternative, this seemed fair. He didn’t take it. The minute they lost Bichette they gave him what he wanted. Awful. There’s a strong chance he’s negative offensive value for the length of this deal. $15m in budget lit on fire.

Speaking of that budget, can we pivot to another bat? Nope. Alex Bregman is a Cub. No one left. How about pitching? We can use that money on Ranger right? He signed with the Red Sox. Bichette was going to be the Realmuto money ($15m) plus that of Alec Bohm ($10m). We are running it back

So now what are the Phillies? A $312m aging fringe playoff team with no chance to fix their hitting woes. Perpetual malcontent Alec Bohm is still going to be hitting clean up, providing no protection in the batting order. Assuming Zack Wheeler comes back, we still have pitching at least. Pitching hasn’t been the problem though. This lineup is weak, at least a bat short, and everyone knows it. Just like we knew Kevin Patullo was the problem. Speaking of which, the Phillies had the chance to fix the Eagles hole in our hearts. Instead, they made it worse. What a nightmare.