There's always a morning after the mourning.
Tuesday offered a somber, almost funereal atmosphere at Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia following the removal of Phillies manager Rob Thomson. The club's 9-19 start proved too much for the 62-year old-skipper to overcome. Phillies players, feeling responsible for their former skipper's firing, carried the weight of his sudden absence.
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But while Thomson's job could not be saved, Philly's 2026 season remains alive under interim manager Don Mattingly.
Crucially, the Phillies actually won a darn game on Tuesday. Jesús Luzardo tossed seven shutout innings. A struggling lineup collected seven runs on 11 hits. Beleaguered third baseman Alec Bohm played his best game of the year. Trea Turner went a crisp 4-for-5. Free-agent addition Adolis GarcÃa cranked a huge, two-run RBI double. The night was a useful, much-needed reminder of what this ballclub is supposed to be.
Baby steps. Even after that victory, the Phillies are nine games under .500 and six games adrift of a playoff spot. Their 10-19 record remains tied for the worst in MLB. Only the similarly discombobulated New York Mets are keeping Philly company in the cellar. Their playoff odds have been sliced in half since Opening Day. And while there are 133 games left to fix this thing, it's getting late early in Philadelphia.
Let's zoom out and assess the situation in Philly.
Why have the Phillies been so bad?
Don't blame the old guys. They've been good.
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This has so often been the hypothesized downfall of this era of Phillies baseball: that the core of Bryce Harper, Trea Turner, Kyle Schwarber and J.T. Realmuto would age out of being offensive difference-makers. That's a reasonable worry, sure, but not one that has come to fruition just yet. Harper and Schwarber are both OPSing around .850. Turner started slowly but has heated up. Realmuto, who should be back from the IL soon, was performing capably before he got hurt.
The young bucks have been the real issue. Phillies position players in their 20s are currently hitting a combined .205/.259/.293 for a league-worst OPS of .553. That mark is nearly a full 100 points lower than that of the second-from-the-bottom Mets. Frankly, it’s an embarrassing number. The main culprits? Bohm, second baseman Bryson Stott and fill-in catcher Rafael Marchán.
Things are less dire on the pitching front, where the Phillies have been supremely unfortunate in regard to batted-ball luck. Some of that has to do with a middling defense, but a rotation with this much talent won't shoulder a 5.52 ERA for much longer — especially now that Zack Wheeler is back and Taijuan Walker is unemployed.
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What's their biggest problem?
The bottom of the lineup has to figure things out. It's really that simple. Bohm, Stott and GarcÃa need to find a way to be closer to average than downright unplayable. Something resembling a bounce-back from that trio is crucial because the Phillies have almost zero minor-league depth.
Since president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski took over in December 2020, the Phillies have matriculated just three of their own draft picks to the majors: Orion Kerkering, Andrew Painter and Justin Crawford. To be fair, signing big-ticket free agents like the Phillies do regularly comes with the ceding of top picks. Still, this organization's inability to backfill some of its own holes has exploded into a real issue.
Earlier this year, for instance, the club called up a 25-year-old Dominican outfielder named Felix Reyes. The gargantuan slugger, because of swing-and-miss issues, did not rank on any major prospect list this past winter. He went yard in his very first at-bat but has just two hits since then, giving him a .167 average. Last weekend, Reyes hit in the cleanup spot against a left-handed starter.
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What's worse? Nobody except for Realmuto is on the IL. Reyes, fun as he can be to watch, should not be Plan A, B or C for a team with World Series aspirations. His inclusion on the big-league roster right now is a sign that the Phillies lack the organizational depth that contenders usually have.
Is there any good news?
Yes: the schedule.
Philadelphia’s recent woes are very much connected to its recent run of opponents. From April 13-26, the Phillies played a combined 13 straight games against the Braves and Cubs, two very good ballclubs that were absolutely on fire at the time. Now, there's no excuse for going 2-11 in that span, but things will certainly get easier for the Phillies as the calendar flips to May.
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They've got two more games against a very flawed San Francisco Giants team before a trip to Miami for four against the 14-16 Marlins. After that, the 15-14 Nomad A's and 13-17 Colorado Rockies come to town.
There aren't any gimmes in this league, but that's a much kinder stretch of the schedule for a team that really needs a favorable bounce or two.
