GDT 6/29/25 Philadelphia Phillies (Suárez, Ra) @ Atlanta Braves (Strider)

[VoteForKalas]

Well, I'd argue that his declining bat does matter when you already have 4 other mediocre bats in the lineup.

Your points about him as a catcher and our strength continuing to be starting pitching are valid. Our pen, however, is not as good and Realmuto cannot make up that gap alone.

[zambonir]

I would still put Kennedy on waivers again and Kemp. if they wanted Kennedy that badly they would have been trying him in left field

[zambonir]

JT is paid, and the roster was built, on him having more of an elite bat, But it's pretty normal for the catcher, the center fielder and at least one middle infielder to be lesser offensively. Just doesn't work if LF and 3B don't give you power, plus we've got Nick and Iadown here for Harper on top of that.

[EDmuch]

How do we possibly let Ranger walk ??? A playoff starting rotation of Wheeler, Suarez and Sanchez would be pretty ominous to any team facing us.

[zambonir]

And what do Nola and Luzardo and Painter do? No question, Ranger is clearly our second-best pitcher now. But the durability questions are still there. And salary constraints seem to exist. The easy move would be to trade Nola, or you find the money for one year knowing Luzardo will be leaving (or you trade him before he does). But it's not cut and dried, whether because Ranger is going to get the payday he's been working towards or because we still don't know how this season ends.

[EastFallowfield]

Had 'em all the way, Harry!

We moaned about losing 3 one run games to the Pirates in PGH, but that Mets sweep was ridiculous...

(The Pirates) won each game by at least seven runs, which according to the Elias Sports Bureau is just the third time in franchise history they’ve done that in a series of at least three games, the most recent being May 13-15, 1935, against the Phillies.

[zambonir]

My question is will the All-Star game be Skenes/Wheeler/Suarez? Will Ranger be on turn to get the chance? Wheels is going to want to pitch (in Atlanta).

I bet the Mets don't have a better team ERA than us anymore.

[Lucky_Beagle]

My question is will the All-Star game by Skenes/Wheeler/Suarez? Will Ranger be on turn to get the chance? Wheels is going to want to pitch (in Atlanta).

Schwellenbach

[EDmuch]

Is Nola tradeable?

[phillychuck]

I'm tired of hearing complaints about JT, which doesn't mean I'm in the camp of resigning him at any cost. True his bat has declined but his importance to this team is what is the strength of this team. The strength of this team is its starting pitching. JT is an outstanding pitch caller which is not a measurable stat but is what is keeping the Phillies in 1st. I don't really care if his bat has declined as long as out starters are the best in baseball.

I’m not anti-Realmuto, I’m in favor of giving him more rest.

I read a lot of comments about this, that Reaalmuto is elite at calling games, but there isn’t a lot of evidence for this. The Phils' pitching is just about as good or as bad with his back-ups over his time in Philly. I’ll conceded that he’s not a bad pitch caller, but I don’t think there is actual support that he’s elite at it. What we do have evidence for is that his batting needs to improve a bit--maybe rest will help.

[phillychuck]

Is Nola tradeable?

Not with his contract. And the staff is a bit too left-handed without him.

[zambonir]

I don't think he can get the homer start over Skenes or Wheeler. When you have the Braves' record that's also just the way it goes. Skenes transcends that.

[zambonir]

Of course Nola is tradeable in some way. For all we know he's going to have as good and long a career as Charlie Morton, and he's still three years younger than Wheeler now, and has been durable forever. But he can't be traded in July, no.

[EastFallowfield]

Suárez has a 1.19 ERA over his past 10 starts. That's the lowest ERA by any Phillies pitcher over a 10-start stretch since Cliff Lee in 2011. In fact, going back to when the mound was lowered in 1969, the only other Phillies with a sub-1.20 ERA over any 10-start span within a season are Roy Oswalt (2010) and Steve Carlton (1972).

And they used to score more plays errors instead of hits like they do now.

[phillychuck]

Ranger has been routinely undervalued by the Phillies’ fans. His only real problem is health--when he’s healthy, he’s Cy Young. I’ll really be sad if they let him walk.

[bkox]

this will be the last year that Nola will be easily tradeable. Next year his 10-5 no trade rights kick in

[mdougherty12]

this will be the last year that Nola will be easily tradeable. Next year his 10-5 no trade rights kick in

Nola will hit 10 years service time sometime in the middle of July. I would imagine his 10 and 5 rights kick in as soon as he hits the service time threshold, but I could be wrong.

[andyb]

Frankly Luzardo is the one that we might want to trade if we keep Ranger. One year deal and he'll return almost as much as we gave up for him and possibly more if he has a good second half.

[VoteForKalas]

Frankly Luzardo is the one that we might want to trade if we keep Ranger. One year deal and he'll return almost as much as we gave up for him and possibly more if he has a good second half.

I agree, move him for max value and find a way to keep Suarez. That gives you 3 RH (Wheeler, Nola, Painter) and 2 LH (Suarez, Sanchez) for the rotation moving forward.

Luzardo is attractive because he is younger, cheaper and controllable for one more year before FA, but outside of SO/9, Suarez has better numbers.

[zambonir]

Presumably Nola did not get a NTC because both sides figured it would be moot. Trading him would be the easiest swap for Ranger (probably year-for-year and dollar-for-dollar at this point) but probably not gonna happen coming off of this particular season for Nola even if they wanted to do it.

If the Phillies want to go all-out to keep Ranger, trading Luzardo is the easy move. They could also keep him until Painter seems settled. I just still feel like they already decided last year that Boras's ask was going to be too big, and the durability question still too real. The former certainly hasn't changed, maybe the latter has.

But it still really comes down to whether Middleton wants to play in the same economic ballpark as the Mets and Dodgers. Even if you trade Luzardo Ranger would add about $13-15 million more than Luzardo to next year's payroll when, on paper, they really only have enough to replace (or re-sign) the other FAs (JT, Schwarbs, Kepler, Romano, Ross). Replacing Kepler with Crawford and/or Bohm with Miller (regardless of exact position) saves you another $20 million I guess, but will they do the latter? And if they do the former would we still rather have this kind of rotation but the same feeble OF (Marsh/Crawford/Casty because no money to spend on anyone else).