Philadelphia Phillies

As we inch closer to the MLB offseason, teams are beginning to map out their plans for free agency. Rumors are starting to fly as organizations are looking for improvements both on the field and in the front office.

Here, we look at the latest buzz surrounding three MLB teams who hope to upgrade multiple areas this offseason.

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Yankees Likely to Retain Aaron Boone, Brian Cashman

After the New York Yankees lost last week's American League Wild Card Game to the Boston Red Sox, fans were calling for changes to be made, namely for the team to part ways with manager Aaron Boone and general manager Brian Cashman.

It looks like Yankees fans will not be getting what they wished for, though. Jon Heyman of MLB Network noted after last week's game that the GM "isn't going anywhere."

Heyman points to Cashman still having a year left on his contract and the team's success under his leadership as reasons he will be back next season. The Yankees have won four World Series titles with the 54-year-old as GM, and they've made the playoffs in each of the past five seasons.

As for Boone, Heyman added that he is "beloved by Cashman and the players," so it looks as though he will be back for another year as well. He has a .601 winning percentage in his five seasons as Yankees manager.

The Yankees were a streaky team this season that failed to find any consistency. If no changes are made to the front office or coaching staff, New York will have to be big spenders in free agency if it hopes to contend next season.

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Phillies Looking for Upgrade at Shortstop

This year's class of free agents is headlined by a strong group of shortstops. Carlos Correa, Corey Seager, Trevor Story, Javier Baez and Marcus Semien are all expected to hit the open market.

One team that will reportedly be in play for any one of those stars is the Philadelphia Phillies. Heyman reported there is no guarantee Didi Gregorius will be back as their starting shortstop

Heyman also noted Phillies owner John Middleton "wants to win," as evidenced by his recent spending in free agency. In the past three years, the team has made splashy offseason moves by bringing in Bryce Harper, JT Realmuto and Zack Wheeler, among others.

Despite the big-name additions, the Phillies failed to make the playoffs this season and have not played in the postseason since 2011. Philadelphia's 82-80 record this year was its first season with a winning record in 10 years.

The Phillies will also be seeking a left fielder and closer this offseason, according to Heyman.

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Ron Washington a Candidate for Padres Vacancy

The San Diego Padres fired manager Jayce Tingler last week after the team fell short of expectations with a disappointing 79-83 record this season.

After things didn't work out in two seasons with a first-time manager, San Diego might be looking for someone more experienced to lead the team.

According to Heyman, Atlanta Braves third base coach Ron Washington is a candidate the Padres will consider pursuing this offseason for the position.

The 69-year-old served as manager for the Texas Rangers from 2007-14. He led the team to back-to-back World Series appearances in 2010 and 2011 but lost to the San Francisco Giants and St. Louis Cardinals, respectively. He has a winning percentage of .521 as a manager (664-611).

Washington was in the running for the Padres position last time they had an opening, so he may have a head start on other candidates. Heyman noted that he finished second behind Tingler the last time around.

Philadelphia Phillies star Bryce Harper put together a stellar 2021 season, but his performance against the Atlanta Braves this week will likely haunt him throughout the offseason.

Harper went 0-for-11 in three games as the Phillies were swept by the National League East champs and eliminated from postseason contention.

"After those three games, I feel like I let my team down. I feel like I let the city of Philadelphia down," Harper said Friday night after Philadelphia's win over the Miami Marlins.

In his third season with the Phillies, Harper led the team in nearly every offensive category. He has a .308 batting average with 35 home runs, 84 RBI and 149 hits and compiled a 1.043 OPS.

In the two months prior to this week's series against the Braves, Harper carried Philadelphia. From July 23 through Sept. 26, he batted .354 with 19 home runs and 23 doubles in 262 plate appearances.

That all came to a halt against Atlanta, but Harper wasn't the only player who struggled. Philadelphia hit .138 as a team and scored six runs in three games.

"We ran into some really good pitching. And sometimes that happens," Harper added.

"As I sit here now and reflect on that series, you want to put that behind you as quickly as possible."

With Friday's win over the Marlins, the Phillies guaranteed their first winning season since 2011. But Harper isn't satisfied, and he doesn't want his team to be satisfied either.

"As we sit here, we have our first winning season in a long time. And that's great for the Phillies," he said. "But I don't want it to be like that. I don't want to just sit here and think to ourselves: 'Hey, this is great. We have a winning season.'"

Harper also said he thinks there's much to be done this offseason if Philadelphia hopes to improve.

"We need to be better," Harper said. "As a team, as an organization ... looking ourselves in the mirror, wondering as a team, as an organization, what do we want the Phillies to be? How do we want to build it? How good can we be next year?"     

A bevy of problems have allegedly emerged throughout the Philadelphia Phillies organization, including a "toxic" culture within player development, according to The Athletic's Matt Gelb.

"There were people, both tenured and newer employees, who no longer felt empowered to coach," Gelb wrote. "Player development blamed scouting for a lack of talent and scouting blamed player development for a lack of progression."

He reported a partnership with Driveline Baseball, which has become more popular for its approach to talent development in recent years, proved to be an issue for the franchise:

The Phillies, a team executive said, discovered the Driveline culture did not embody the kind the Phillies wanted in their farm system. Feedback was handed down and rarely traveled up. Perspectives that challenged Driveline precepts were not considered valid and, worse, not respected. The Phillies made dozens of staff changes, but important holdovers were asked to do things they weren’t capable of doing, or just did not want to do because they had contempt for the person telling them to do it, according to team sources. Grudges festered both ways.

The Driveline dynamic was representative of wider organizational fissures throughout the Phillies. There was a general lack of cohesion from top to bottom in terms of how to approach player development and what tactics to use.

"There was no consensus buy-in to what the Phillies were doing," per Gelb. "They were pushing swing changes and modern pitching philosophies forward, but no one knew what direction was the right one."

He also wrote how Philadelphia's front office "over-invested in technology and under-invested in people."

The Phillies came under scrutiny earlier this month after USA Today's Bob Nightengale reported Advocates for Minor Leaguers was looking into allegations the team reprimanded minor leaguers who showed solidarity with peers demanding better pay and working conditions.

Harry Marino, executive director of Advocates for Minor Leaguers, said he had heard of "backlash" and "some troubling reports" after some Phillies minor leaguers wore wristbands that read "#FairBall."

Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski told Nightengale that "to my knowledge, no player got in trouble for this," though the wristbands had been addressed with the players.

On Wednesday, the Phillies announced the hiring of Preston Mattingly as their new director of player development.

Mattingly has a tall task on his hands. In addition to helping reform the issues laid out by Gelb, he'll have to replenish a farm system that Bleacher Report's Joel Reuter ranked 27th following the 2021 draft.

The Bryce Harper hype started more than a decade ago. The first time I saw him, he was cranking balls out of Blair Field in Long Beach, California, the same park where the Long Beach State Dirtbags play. It's a tough park for power hitters because of the marine layer that gobbles up deep fly balls and stops them in their tracks.

But Harper, not even 16 years old, didn't seem to have any problems hitting balls through the thick ocean air. 

A year later, he was on the cover of Sports Illustrated. Two years later he was drafted by the Washington Nationals first overall and his star continued to rise. Harper was an All-Star and the NL Rookie of the Year at age 19. 

A teenage phenom and the face of the game, Harper was everywhere. He made SportsCenter with his highlight-reel catches and monstrous home runs. "That's a clown question, bro," went viral. It's still a part of the sports pop culture lexicon today. 

Harper was named the NL MVP in 2015, solidifying his status as the face of the game. More outgoing and flashy than Mike Trout, Harper's playing style came with some controversy from some of the baseball purists, but it gained him a following with a younger generation.

But then an even younger generation emerged in baseball and the noise around Harper quieted down. Part of it can be attributed to his move to Philadelphia in 2019 when he signed a free agent mega-deal. The loudest noise we heard was Phillies fans booing their own when he got off to a slow start in 2019. 

But between the Phillies' inability to make the playoffs the last two seasons and the emergence of dynamic young stars like Fernando Tatis Jr., Ronald Acuna Jr., Vladimir Guerrero Jr. in the American League and Harper's former Washington teammate Juan Soto, his grasp on that "face of the game" status started to lessen. The hype died down. 

But now it's starting to return, and deservedly so. Philadelphia is hanging around in the NL Wild Card race in large part because of Harper's dominance. The nearly-29-year-old has quietly become a frontrunner for the NL MVP Award, edging Tatis as the San Diego Padres have collapsed in the final month of the season. 

DraftKings has Harper as a -145 favorite to win the award and a big reason why is his play since August. The Phillies were two games under .500 at the end of July, but they're currently 4.5 games behind the St. Louis Cardinals for the second NL Wild Card spot. In the second half of the season, he has slashed .350/.483/.743 with a 1.226 OPS and 18 home runs. 

Harper also leads the league in OPS (1.051) and slugging (.621). 

Tatis and Soto are also in contention for the award. They boast similar numbers across the board and this stat about Soto says a lot about how remarkable of a season he has had on a team that decided to tear everything down to the studs midway through.

Juan Soto could make an out in his next 45 plate appearances and still have the best on-base percentage in @MLB. @Nationals

— Anthony Castrovince (@castrovince) September 22, 2021

But here is the problem with all three candidates: They all might miss out on the postseason. 

Voters, which are members of the Baseball Writers' Association of America, have typically been hesitant to vote for players on teams that did not make the postseason. While baseball tends to be about individual performances, voters still value team success highly. This particular award is often viewed as one given to the player that demonstrated the greatest value in getting his team to the postseason. 

It's possible Harper drags the Phillies into October, but the Cardinals are separating themselves from Philadelphia and San Diego in the standings.

St. Louis does not have an MVP candidate. Jesse Winker and Nick Castellanos have had fantastic seasons with the Cincinnati Reds and kept them in the Wild Card race as well, but the Reds might not reach the postseason either (4.0 games behind St. Louis). 

Max Muncy has been impressive with the Los Angeles Dodgers and he'll undoubtedly receive votes. But on a team as loaded as the Dodgers, does his season really compare to Harper's? Muncy's 4.8 WAR would suggest that it does not. A total of 10 other players in the National League are worth more wins than Muncy, including his own teammates Trea Turner (5.7), Walker Buehler (5.1). Max Scherzer has an identical 4.8 fWAR.

Three pitchers have higher fWAR rankings than Harper: Milwaukee Brewers ace Corbin Burnes, Dodgers left-hander Julio Urias and Harper's Philadelphia teammate Zack Wheeler. They're in contention for the NL Cy Young and it's possible you make the case that they are worthy of MVP Awards as well. 

However, a precedent was set by current voters in 2015 when Harper won his first MVP after the Nationals imploded down the stretch. In 2008, Albert Pujols won it over Ryan Howard, who helped the Phillies not only make the playoffs but eventually win the World Series (voting takes place before the postseason). Two years before that, Howard won it in a year in which Philadelphia was excluded from the Fall Classic. 

Barry Bonds won it twice in two down years for the San Francisco Giants. Alex Rodriguez won the AL MVP in 2003 with the Rangers and Larry Walker in 1997 with the Colorado Rockies.

More recently, Trout won two of his three AL MVP Awards in playoff-less years for the Los Angeles Angels. His teammate, Shohei Ohtani, is the favorite to win it this year, despite the fact that the Angels will once again sit out October. 

There is no hard-and-fast rule that says the award has to go to the best player on a team that makes the playoffs. Of course, Harper is doing everything he can to help the Phillies reach the postseason for the first time since 2011. In his last 10 games alone he's hit .394 with three home runs and a 1.412 OPS. 

At nearly 29, he may not be the kid phenom he once was. Harper is now a father of two and the face of another franchise. But it's clear he's hungry for more. After a brief hiatus, the Harper hype is coming back.
It should be here to stay with another NL MVP trophy. 

Some players for the Jersey Shore BlueClaws—the Single-A affiliate of the Philadelphia Phillies—have said they were disciplined by the organization for protesting against unfair wages and living conditions.

According to Bob Nightengale of USA Today, Advocates for Minor Leaguers Executive Director Harry Marino said the following regarding the allegations:

"We heard there was some backlash, some troubling reports, and we are definitely looking into it. We're very concerned. It's totally inappropriate to have any kind of backlash.

"There has been a response from the team side trying to suppress that speech, telling them they should be careful, not to talk like that, and think twice. Teams should be very careful trying to dissuade speaking out. The Phillies should know they’re being watched."

Nightengale noted that "10 to 25" players for the BlueClaws and the New York Mets' Single-A affiliate—the Brooklyn Cyclones—wore teal wristbands with the phrase "#FairBall" written on them last weekend during their season finales.

Advocates for Minor Leaguers reported no discipline from the Mets to their minor league players for demonstrating by wearing the wrist bands.

Meanwhile, Phillies President of Baseball Operations Dave Dombrowski denied that the Phillies reprimanded any of their minor leaguers:

"To my knowledge, no player got in trouble for this. Our staff met with the players the next day since it was the last day of the season, and an end-of-the-year meeting was planned.

"The wrist band topic came up, but it was for knowledge sakes. No player got in trouble or was scolded for wearing them."

The Advocates for Minor Leaguers website states that minor league players have no union and only receive seasonal salaries despite being contracted year-round. Additionally, most minor league players earn less than $15,000 annually.

According to Nightengale, Advocates for Minor Leaguers are pushing for increased salary since the national poverty level is $12,880 per year, which equates to about $250 per week.

Major League Baseball has resisted an increase, noting that it raised the minimum minor league salaries at each level this past year.

Currently, the minimum salaries are $700 per week at Triple A, $600 per week at Double A and $500 per week at A. The previous minimum for Class A players was $290.

MLB has denied any punishments have been handed out to minor league players for speaking out and added in a statement that "improving the working conditions and pay for minor leaguers is among the chief goals" of Major League Baseball on the heels of its minor league reconstruction.

Philadelphia Phillies star J.T. Realmuto is day-to-day after exiting Sunday's 7-4 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks with an ankle injury.

Manager Joe Girardi told reporters Realmuto rolled his ankle on his final swing of the game. He finished the contest 1-for-2 with a walk. Realmuto—who was playing first base—was replaced by Brad Miller. 

The 30-year-old is hitting .264 with 58 RBI and 14 home runs through 106 games in 2021 to lead the Phillies to a 66-64 record, putting the team 4.5 games back of the Atlanta Braves in the National League East and four games behind the Cincinnati Reds in the NL Wild Card race.

Realmuto's production isn't a surprise. He posted career highs in RBI (83) and home runs (25) upon joining the Phillies for the 2019 season, and he is coming off of a .266 average with 32 RBI through 47 games in a pandemic-shortened campaign last year.

The three-time All-Star has already missed time in 2021 with a bone bruise on his left hand, an injury that sidelined him for approximately two weeks back in May.

If Realmuto misses time, Rafael Marchan should see increased time behind the plate, though he's certainly no long-term solution at the position. Marchan has a total of 16 career MLB appearances on his resume. He does, however, boast a .290 batting average in 13 games this season.

Rhys Hoskins' 2021 season is over.

The Philadelphia Phillies first baseman will miss the remainder of the campaign, telling reporters Thursday he'll undergo abdominal surgery next week. It's a brutal blow for the Phillies, who led the National League East as recently as Aug. 14.

Entering Thursday, they trailed the Atlanta Braves by five games and were five games back for the second wild-card spot after a 2-7 skid.

Rhys Hoskins says he’s done for season. Abdominal injury surgery next week.

— Jim Salisbury (@JimSalisbury215) August 26, 2021

Hoskins said he expected to have surgery anyway. Gave it a shot. Injury would not allow him to continue

— Jim Salisbury (@JimSalisbury215) August 26, 2021

Hoskins ends the year with a slash line of .247/.334/.530 with 27 home runs and 71 RBI.

The 28-year-old was activated from the 10-day injured list Sunday, hit three home runs in his first three games back and then reaggravated the groin strain that caused him to miss time in the first place.

As Matt Snyder of CBS Sports noted, the Phillies are six games over .500 with Hoskins in the lineup and six games under .500 when he doesn't start.

Brad Miller is likely to fill in at first base, though it's unclear if he'll hold down the middle-of-the-order spot Hoskins handled. Through 105 games, Miller is slashing .218/.310/.414 with 12 home runs and 34 RBI. He has hit all over the lineup—once at No. 2 and multiple times in each of the Nos. 5, 6 and 7 holes—since Hoskins was injured Aug. 5 and landed on the IL five days later.

Miller will have to improve quickly if Philadelphia is going to continue challenging for a playoff berth.

The club has opportunities on the horizon. The Phillies host a four-game series with the last-place Arizona Diamondbacks starting Thursday before playing six games at the Washington Nationals and Miami Marlins—the fourth- and fifth-place teams in the NL East.

The entire month of September breaks Philadelphia's way, in fact, with just two over-.500 opponents on tap—three games at the Milwaukee Brewers and three at the Braves that could decide the division.

Between those two pivotal sets, the Phillies play the Colorado Rockies, Chicago Cubs, New York Mets, Baltimore Orioles and Pittsburgh Pirates. They will finish the regular season with three games at the Marlins.

A path to the postseason still exists for Philadelphia. It just got significantly tougher with Hoskins out for the year.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Sarah Netburn has ruled that the Philadelphia Phillies may continue to use the Phanatic mascot amid a multi-year legal battle between the team and Harrison/Erickson, the design firm that created the mascot in 1978, per the Associated Press.

As TMZ Sports noted in 2019, the Phillies said they paid the company $215,000 in 1984 to have rights to keep the mascot forever. Harrison/Erickson argued that the deal did not give the Phillies permanent rights and hoped to renegotiate the contact.

In addition, the firm threatened to terminate that agreement, to the point where the team would not be allowed to use the mascot after June 15, 2020 barring renegotiation (the firm eventually did terminate the deal).

Kevin Kinkead of Crossing Broad attempted to explain the situation in brief.

"The short version is that the Phillies think they have license to use the mascot perpetually, while Erickson and Harrison claim a legal right to take back their copyrighted work after 35 years, based on some technicality."

In the meantime, the Phillies made changes to the mascot in Feb. 2020, which the Associated Press outlined.

The Phillies unveiled the redesign of the green mascot in February 2020, a new look featuring flightless feathers rather than fur-colored arms, stars outlining the eyes, a larger posterior and a powder blue tail, blue socks with red shoes, plus a set of scales under the arms.

Those changes are the keys to the Phillies being allowed to continue using the mascot. The following is from the judge's 91-page ruling, per Eriq Gardner of the Hollywood Reporter.

“To be sure, the changes to the structural shape of the Phanatic are no great strokes of brilliance, but as the Supreme Court has already noted, a compilation of minimally creative elements, ‘no matter how crude, humble or obvious,’ can render a work a derivative."

Gardner summed up what that meant: "Ultimately, she accepts the newer version falls within the Derivative Works Exception, which if now accepted by the District Court, would mean that the Phillies won’t lose their mascot."

Thus, the Phanatic will be allowed to continue its antics at Citizens Bank Park.

After collapsing on the field during Saturday's game between the Lehigh Valley IronPigs and Rochester Red Wings, second baseman Daniel Brito underwent a second surgery. 

Philadelphia Phillies assistant general manager Bryan Minniti told The Athletic's Matt Gelb that Brito's procedure was done on Sunday morning to treat a "medical emergency." 

“This is a special kid,” Minniti said to Gelb. “A lot of people are worried.”

Lehigh Valley is the Phillies' Triple-A affiliate. 

Per Sal Maiorana of the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, Brito appeared to suffer some type of seizure in the bottom of the first inning and was transported to Strong Memorial Hospital after receiving medical attention on the field, including being administered oxygen.

The Phillies issued a statement yesterday announcing Brito had surgery at the hospital: 

Daniel Brito suffered a medical emergency and collapsed during Triple-A Lehigh Valley’s game at Rochester. He is undergoing surgery. This is a statement from the Phillies: pic.twitter.com/nfS4jutaxn

— Matt Gelb (@MattGelb) August 1, 2021

Saturday's game between the IronPigs and Red Wings was suspended indefinitely and Sunday's game was postponed. 

Brito has spent his entire professional baseball career in the Phillies organization. He was signed as an international free agent out of Venezuela as a 16-year-old in 2014. 

Philadelphia promoted Brito to Triple-A on July 22 after he posted an .820 OPS in 63 games with Double-A Reading. The 23-year-old is hitting .286/.375/.607 in eight games with the IronPigs. 

The Philadelphia Phillies are reportedly eyeing the bullpen of the Chicago Cubs as Friday's trade deadline approaches.

Jon Heyman of MLB Network reported Saturday that the National League East team is interested in Craig Kimbrel, Andrew Chafin and Ryan Tepera as potential trade targets to bolster its "beleaguered bullpen."

Kimbrel is one of the best closers in the league.

He has a resume that includes the 2011 National League Rookie of the Year Award, eight All-Star selections and a World Series title in 2018 with the Boston Red Sox. The right-hander has also bounced back this season with a 0.51 ERA, 0.68 WHIP and 61 strikeouts in 35.1 innings after posting a 6.00 ERA and 1.53 WHIP across 2019 and 2020.

While Kimbrel would be a major addition, Chafin and Tepera are also talented options who may not cost as much.

Chafin in particular has a 1.37 ERA, 0.74 WHIP and 37 strikeouts in 39.1 innings. The southpaw hasn't allowed a run since a May 7 victory over the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Tepera has a 3.02 ERA, 0.82 WHIP and 48 strikeouts in 41.2 innings. He hasn't allowed a run in four straight appearances since struggling at the end of June.

It is no surprise, then, that Chicago is fourth in the majors in bullpen ERA, per FanGraphs. That stands in stark contrast to Philadelphia, which is 22nd with a 4.64 ERA.

The bullpen struggles have prevented the Phillies from making significant strides in the National League East. They are 48-48 and four games behind the New York Mets for first place.

Improving their bullpen with any of the Cubs options could help them close that gap.