A Critical Look at the Phillies Organization and Minor League Baseball
The Phillies optioned James McArthur to the minors today, earlier in the week they optioned Hans Crouse and Francisco Morales. This leaves 8 nominal starting pitches in big league camp, the 5 pitchers in the expected opening day rotation and then Bailey Falter, Cristopher Sanchez, and Nick Nelson. While critiqued by some, the Phillies expected … Read more
The Phillies entered the offseason with some very obvious holes (CF, LF, SS, RP), but also a real lack of depth. Not every move they made this offseason needed to fix the big issues, some of the little issues needed to be addressed and some of the basic housekeeping had to be handled. Yesterday the … Read more
On June 19, the Phillies called up outfield prospect Matt Vierling, adding him to the 40 man roster to replace Matt Joyce. Joe Girardi was quoted by the Inquirer on the call up. “They come up with confidence, and they come up with not sitting a lot,” Girardi said. “I think there’s an advantage to … Read more
Tomorrow is the deadline for teams to add players to their 40 man roster to protect them from the Rule 5 draft. Thanks to a deep college class in the 2017 draft, the Phillies had a lot of decisions to make coming into the year. They traded Addison Russ and then added Connor Brogdon, Mickey … Read more
The 2018 Phillies were a flawed team, and understandably so. They were young at nearly every position. They ran their rotation pretty ragged when all of their young arms stayed healthy all year. Their bullpen had some injuries, but ultimately could not get everyone healthy and effective at the same time. It was frustrating, but … Read more
The modern major league roster construction has bullpens made up of players with minor league options remaining. This means some of the young pitchers in camp such as Austin Davis and Yacksel Rios are functionally prospects, but not by service time and innings. There are no open competitions for the majors involving pitching prospects, but … Read more
Much of Spring Training excitement has been converted to Bryce Harper watch, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t games that are about to occur. Much of the Phillies roster is locked in place, but that doesn’t mean we won’t get a look at some prospects in games this spring. With the lack of camp … Read more
The Phillies offseason goals clearly revolve around the final signing location of Manny Machado and Bryce Harper. As much as the Phillies talk about it being a success if they don’t sign one of the two superstars, the truth is that it is very hard road to respectability without signing either. What the Phillies have … Read more
The Phillies made their first move of what should be a busy offseason by trading former first round pick and many time top prospect J.P. Crawford along with Carlos Santana to the Seattle Mariners for SS Jean Segura, RHP Juan Nicasio, and LHP James Pazos. For all of turmoil that got the deal to this … Read more
The final month+ of the 2018 Phillies system is going to hurt for a while. They squandered a bunch of chances due to poor play, poor management, exhaustion, and injuries. In the end they are going to beat their projections. It will feel like a Pyrrhic victory, because there will always be a bad taste … Read more