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For a moment, they seemed to have a shot.
The Phillies caught fire to begin the 2018 season, recording a 31-23 lead at the end of May, a two-and-a-half-point lead over NL East at the end of July, and a better season performance with 15 games remaining. over .500 on August 7th. They collapsed after that, a story that could be the worst of the first for Cinderella and turned into abominable truths about the team's many holes that continued to torment the team.
The Phillies opened last season with the ninth lowest baseball payroll, lagging behind traditional heavyweights like the Royals and Reds. Several young inexpensive players responded with a large number of players at the beginning of the year, to turn into pumpkins at the end of the year. Now, the Phillies intend to spend a lot of money to fill some of these gaps.
They can easily afford it. The Phils signed a new television deal four years ago, which not only pays $ 2.5 billion in fees; Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia also represents a 25% stake that could be worth billions of additional dollars.
- Result 2018: 80-82, third place at NL East
- Major free agents: No
- Needs: Short stop, third base, outside field, starting pitch, emergency pitch
No team has been more frequently related to free agents this winter as the Phillies. Manny Machado and Bryce Harper are the best players available this winter. they are two of the most desirable free players in the history of baseball, considering their combination of mid-twenties, skills and potentially untapped potential; and they could also fill probably the two biggest position holes on the list. Given the weakness of the short stop, third base and right field last season, you can expect a potential improvement of five wins if the Phillies sign one of two free agent superstars.
Even if they spend $ 400 million on one or the other player, it may not be enough to push the Phillies to conquer the east of the NL. The World Series contenders need more than a very expensive free agent to compete in a good month of October. The young talents must make their appearance, so that Harper or Machado become the last piece of the puzzle, rather than just a player who pushes the Phillies to over .500 in the margins of a wild card race.
Consider the last three winners of the World Series. The Cubs ended their 108 – year drought by first building a young and dynamic core led by Kris Bryant, Anthony Rizzo and others. Only later, they threw a lot of money to Jon Lester and Jason Heyward to try everything. The following season, the Astros raced local stars Jose Altuve, Carlos Correa and George Springer, completing them with the A + vans, Gerrit Cole and Justin Verlander, and won their first Classic Fall in franchise history. The Red Sox of 2017 were already a good club, worn by Mookie Betts, Xander Bogaerts, Andrew Benintendi, Jackie Bradley and others. The $ 110 million collector, J.D. Martinez, proved to be the last piece of the puzzle.
Do the Phillies have that kind of player infrastructure in place to allow Harper or Machado to push them beyond their goals? It's a tough one to answer.
We now know that Aaron Nola is a real ace, his 2018 season should allow him to rank among the top three at Cy Young. The second season of Rhys Hoskins was not as impressive as his debut as a rookie, but he still managed to score 34 home runs. After that, we have a series of interrogation points for the murderers.
The combination of youth, skill and cheap contract of the center player, Odubel Herrera, has made it one of the most sought after products of all baseball games. But it's hard to know what to do with him now, coming out of a second catastrophic period .214 / .279 / .342. The second baseman, Cesar Hernandez, has never been considered in the same category as Herrera, but a brutal second half has denied a solid start to 2018 (and a possible playoff season). Should we evaluate right-handers Nick Pivetta, Vince Velasquez and Zach Eflin in their mid-twenties based on their robust slaughter rates and other powerful devices that made them above average launchers in 2018, on the based on figures independent of the field? Or were their inverted electronic auctions between 4.00 and 4.00 more revealing of their abilities? And what should we do with J.P. Crawford and Scott Kingery, two once-vaunted hopefuls who struggled terribly at the start of their major league career?
To answer these questions, the Phillies might want to do something even more daring than just signing a superstar: they might want to continue even after a potential signature of Machado or Harper. Even though Gabe Kapler, an analysis-driven rookie manager, would have liked to make fantastic baseball players mad with his unpredictable use of the pen, it's hard to look smart when your pen ranks 23rd in the world. EER adjusted to the park. This could prompt Philly to shop for more help after signing a multi-year contract with Tommy Hunter and Pat Neshek last year. A left-handed veteran like J.A. Happ could make a lot of sense as a way to disassociate the armada from the team of young right-handed (and always unpredictable) starters. Hell, if the Phils want to make a bag that could help the rotation and With the pen, perhaps they could get a discount in their hometown on veteran Charlie Morton, a tough throwing veteran, who said he wanted to get closer to his wife's family home, in Delaware, before the release.
With the alluring success of the beginning of 2018 in their minds, its gigantic war chest and countless needs, the Phillies could be the main buyers this winter. But the path to Hot Stove Gold could also be difficult to navigate. With mega-market teams like the Yankees, the Dodgers and the Giants dodging carefully under the luxury tax threshold last season, the calculation of spending is starting to make a lot more sense for these teams to return to their spending ways. . If this happens, the Harpers, Machados and even the Mortons may have more trouble landing than the Philly Phaithful could hope for.
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