The Faillies short circuited their rebuild way too soon. They saw a player struggle and gave up on them. They reacted as a fan would and not someone who runs a team. They traded their young core for a hodge podge of veterans. This unfortunately, saps your payroll and kills your depth. They can’t just plug and play like we can. They have to pay and play. This is the biggest error by them.
I agree with the guy a few post up and to steal HH saying that they have entered mediocrity purgatory. And they won’t escape it because there won’t be enough stupid money to build an entire team.
They need lots of pitching. A 3rd baseman. A second baseman. A catcher in 1.5 years. And a whole lot of relievers. Just not a great situation especially when you can’t justify a full year down with Harper and Hoskin and Nola on the books.
Coppy
You almost hear every winning team talk about how their chemistry is just awesome and that (fill in the blank with supposed malcontent) has turned the corner and loves playing with his new teammates. There are only a couple of teams in my years of fandom that I can recall relishing the fact that there was constant clubhouse rancor and that was the A's in the early-1970s and the Yankees' Bronx Zoo of the late-1970s.
jpx7 (07-05-2019)
i’m old enough to remember when some here said it was unlikely Dans would ever be even an average hitter.
"Well, you’ll learn soon enough that this was a massive red wave landslide." - thethe on the 2020 election that trump lost bigly
“I can’t fix my life, but I can fix the world.” - sturg
50PoundHead (07-05-2019)
I can remember the last time the juiced ball debate was going on and it was pretty much the same in that a lot of players were going to put up big numbers, but no one was going to threaten single-season records. About the only time I got a chuckle out of the insufferable Tommy LaSorda is when he was asked whether he had proof of his contention that the ball was juiced, his simple response was "Rafael Belliard." It's the guy with "warning track power" that is benefiting from the live ball.
Bohm is the Phillies' top prospect now and they would be absolutely nuts to move him.
I would say "not that good" instead of "really bad." If they still go out and get Bruce, Herrera is a reasonably priced guy (for 2019) who could help. He is better than Roman Quinn, who is "really bad" at baseball. Problem going forward for the Phillies with Herrera is that he's a 8-digit salary in 2021 and beyond unless MLB voids his contract for a behavioral cause, which I doubt they can do.
I can agree that we are clearly a better team then the Phillies and have shown it and should hold on to the division but it sure does seem like some of you are burying them and talking about them as if they are Finnish.
We still got a lot of games to play and injures and slumps tend to happen.
We are the city of Atlanta after all, not like we have a history of bad luck and collapses haha
it was pretty clear in the beginning of the season that, despite the splash moves made by Philly, they severely lacked depth not only in the rotation, but throughout the lineup and on the bench. it’s come back to bite them...and hard. they’re a poorly built team with a poor pipeline of players due to poor drafting and poor developing. they’re a poorly run franchise.
and they’re in a *really* bad spot for the future. what do you do? keep trying to sign guys? your farm isn’t bringing significant help. there’s no pitching. they can’t sign enough impact guys to be truly competitive any time soon. the best course of action would probably be to trade some pieces and try and re-tool. but they won’t do that after signing Harper, who signed presumably thinking he’d be signing into a contender for a while.
they’re an absolute mess. and it isn’t going to get any better. and i love it.
"Well, you’ll learn soon enough that this was a massive red wave landslide." - thethe on the 2020 election that trump lost bigly
“I can’t fix my life, but I can fix the world.” - sturg
I don't think the Phillies lacked position depth at all coming into the season. I'm not sure that their offense or defense is a major problem for them even after having the worst case scenario unfold in the OF.
It certainly wasn't obvious there was a problem when they had a five game league in the division before all the bad stuff started happening.
I tend to agree their future looks creaky as it's not exactly clear how much more money they have to throw around. They need to do something in the rotation to complement Nola.
they were starting Franco at 3B and Nick Williams and Aaron Altherr were their backup outfielders. that’s 3 terrible players. their backup infielder was....who? Sean’s Rodriguez is now time playing significant time.
one injury has led to their lineups being all out of whack. they absolutely lacked positional depth. i don’t think that’s even subjective with what’s happened with one injury. they’re currently 19th in wRC+ as a team. their offense is not good and is absolutely an issue for them...among all the other issues.
they had an early lead in the division...wowsers. so did Seattle. where are they? almost as if small samples don’t mean much.
"Well, you’ll learn soon enough that this was a massive red wave landslide." - thethe on the 2020 election that trump lost bigly
“I can’t fix my life, but I can fix the world.” - sturg
It is worth keeping in mind that most projections had the gnats favored in the division. The fillies were actually projected to finish behind the Braves up until they signed Harper. The Metropolitans were projected to be about equal to us. We have outperformed our projections and the rest of the East has underperformed so far. There is a lot of baseball to play. In the case of the fillies, losing 2 starting outfielders accounts for some of that underperfomance. It will be hard to overcome since neither Cutch nor Herrera is going to be coming back anytime soon.
"I am a victim, I will tell you. I am a victim."
"I am your retribution."
We can add to players the fillies are missing. Robertson was signed to pitch high leverage innings, but has been either ineffective or injured. Pivetta has missed starts. Vazquez got moved to the pen due to ineffectiveness. I think they have been hit harder by injuries/severe regression/suspensions than the Braves.
We caught a bit of a break to have Riley get off to such a hot start when he replaced Ender. That is mostly luck in my book and accounts for some of our overperformance.
We are deeper than the fillies as far as pitching goes. So what has happened with Folty, Gausman, Minter, Viz and O'Day has been less of a problem for us than the issues they have had with their staff. Plus we've made two acquisitions--Swarzak and Keuchel--that have helped quite a bit.
Last edited by nsacpi; 07-05-2019 at 04:15 PM.
"I am a victim, I will tell you. I am a victim."
"I am your retribution."