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Philadelphia Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski

After a rough start to the season that led to the firing of manager Rob Thomson, the Philadelphia Phillies have been one of the best teams in baseball since Don Mattingly took over. Now, 40-34, the Phillies would be in the second wild card slot if the season ended today.

The Phillies’ success had largely been built on their starting pitching. In the season, the Phillies are tied for first in the MLB with nine shutouts and second in strikeouts. Cristopher Sánchez and Zack Wheeler have been pitching like Cy Young candidates. 

The bats, on the other hand, have been erratic. While Kyle Schwarber and Brandon Marsh are among the tops in the league with home runs and batting average, respectively, as a whole, the Phillies’ offense has struggled. They rank 29th in batting average, 26th in OPS, and 28th in OBP. The lineup imbalance has been a plague on the Phillies the last few seasons, partially due to a series of ill-advised one-year deals.

$103 Million

The Phillies took another swing this offseason on a veteran bat in Adolis García, signing him to a one-year, $10 million deal. While García played excellent defense and was starting to turn around his hitting, the deal ended up being another in a line of disappointing one-year deals after García landed on the 60-day IL with a torn right latissimus dorsi muscle. García will likely miss most of the rest of the season. 

García is just the latest band-aid free agent signing for the Phillies, a trend since Dave Dombrowski became president of baseball operations back in 2020. Matt Gelb of The Athletic, in his June 16 article, wrote about the phenomenon of the Phillies giving out one-year deals every offseason, and just how much they’ve spent.

“The annual baseball adage goes: There is no such thing as a bad one-year deal. This is true; these contracts have not hamstrung the club. In fact, the Phillies have released eight of the 19 players on one-year deals before the contracts expired,” Gelb wrote. “They were often reluctant but not afraid to move on from a player on a one-year deal if it was not working.”

“So maybe there isn’t such a thing as a bad one-year deal, but there is such a thing as a good one-year deal. The Phillies have had trouble landing one.”

From outfielders to infielders to relief pitchers, the Phillies have swung and missed on their fair share of one-year deals.

Revolving Door

Names like Josh Harrison, Max Kepler, Whit Merrifield, and Brad Hand are just some of the names the Phillies have brought in and ultimately flamed out in their tenure with the Phillies. Matt Gelb dove into the full extent of their impact.

“Since Dave Dombrowski became the Phillies’ president of baseball operations in late 2020, the team has spent $103 million on one-year deals for MLB free agents. Those contracts have yielded a total of 2.3 WAR, according to FanGraphs,” Gelb wrote.

Now, the Phillies are faced once again with needing to add another right-handed bat to their lineup.

Desperate For An Outfielder 

The Phillies, after the injury to Adolis García, added Chicago White Sox outfielder Derek Hill via trade. Hill, though at 30 years old and a .227 career batting average, isn’t expected to be an impact player for the Phillies. The Phillies are still searching for that impact player in the outfield. 

Bob Nightengale of USA Today, in his June 14 article, wrote about how desperate the Phillies are to acquire an outfielder.

“The Phillies are desperately looking to acquire an outfielder at the trade deadline with Adolis Garcia expected to miss the rest of the season with his torn lat, and have Angels right fielder Jo Adell and Cubs right fielder Seiya Suzuki on their radar,” Nightengale wrote.

After last season’s trade for Harrison Bader, the Phillies will once again try to patch their outfield and lineup together in the hopes of another playoff run.