Phillies Minor Leagues - 2026 Season Discussion

[andyb]

Lehigh Valley roster here:

3/24/26 : Lehigh Valley Break Camp Roster

On schedules, Lehigh Valley's first game is Friday. Reading and Clearwater start next Thursday (4/2) with Jersey Shore bringing up the rear on 4/3. Lots of releases and 60-day IL moves the last few days also. Nothing really surprising as of yet.

[julio]

I was waiting for this!

26 players. But as of now, there are 43 listed on the milb.com Ironpigs roster - all listed as "Active." It will be interesting to see what happens to these guys in the next day or so!

[Squire]

Among others RHP Moises Chace and RHP Micah Ottenbreit will open the season on the 60 Day DL.

[julio]

Among others RHP Moises Chace and RHP Micah Ottenbreit will open the season on the 60 Day DL.

Yes - but neither of these two is on the AAA roster (Chace on AA, Ottenbreit on A+).

I assume some will go on the 7-day IL, and some will be transferred to the "Development List" - i.e., papered over. Some may get moved to AA (with possible cascade effects on other guys). Also...the AAA active roster limit is 28, so they could add two more guys to the opening day roster.

[zambonir]

Well, Crawford is still one of the 43 for one more day (or a few hours?). And there's five catchers (with a sixth possibly headed back down) so a few of those are probably going to AA or getting released.

[zambonir]

Phillies, Oscar Mercado Agree To Minor League Deal

[Squire]

Yes. My comment was just to the general thread discussion and not in relation to the LHV roster.

[andyb]

In yesterday's games the 3 squads are starting to look more like AA (group 1), A+ (group 2) and A (group 3) rosters. Note there still needs to be a pushdown of a bunch of players not on the Lehigh Valley roster and 15 players likely go to extended Spring at the bottom.

3/25/26 : Minor League game stats from 3/24/26

[julio]

Note there still needs to be a pushdown of a bunch of players not on the Lehigh Valley roster and 15 players likely go to extended Spring at the bottom.

Indeed. I'm wondering, though, whether some of the "pushdown" (at the AAA and AA levels) might instead involve releases of additional players they don't have room for at the high levels, but whose retention on single-A rosters just doesn't make any sense.

The alternative seems to be "storing" players on the Development List, which seems to exist largely because MLB has abolished too many minor-league teams, so they constantly rotate players on and off the Development List, as they have nowhere else to put them.

[andyb]

Clearly we have progressed to a time where the development list is just a code word for larger roster sizes.

Imagine there are 5-10 more releases though. I think they can only have 10 minor league 60-day IL placements and assume we will fill those with TJ surgery people.

I don't think I have seen any Francisco Renteria mentions so assume he is DSL bound though I would not be surprised if he has a good season and ends up the last month in Clearwater. In pre organizational roster limit days he would have started in GCL and maybe even had an early year brief appearance in Low A.

[Squire]

Anybody know the whereabouts and status of Gabriel Rincones?

[andyb]

Injured. Sore knees and tendinitis that showed up after offseason workouts. He is not really playing yet.

[zambonir]

LOL

IronPigs to host a barbecue rib buffet in honor of Zack Wheeler (who had a rib...

[andyb]

More game summaries. Anderson Navas and Titan Kennedy-Hayes both touching 99 and Brad Pacheco at 98 in a starting role. Those are the fun velocity breakouts this year.

3/26/26 : Minor League game stats from 3/25/26

[andyb]

Lehigh Valley preview from Matt.

2026 Lehigh Valley IronPigs Season Preview

Lots of roster moves too.

Signed - Sergio Alcantara, Oscar Mercado

60-day IL - Erick Brito, Daniel Robert, Mark Kolazsvary

Short term IL - Aidan Miller, Gabriel Rincones, Keaton Anthony, Andrew Bechtold, Michael Mercado, Jose Rodriguez

That's a pretty good team on the IL. Happy opening day!

[andyb]

DSL to FCL promotions. Kind of shocked that former big money signing Jalvin Arias is on this list:

LHP Yordanis Guerra - 19 years old - Dominican Republic
LHP David Hernandez - 18 years old - Mexico
LHP Aneury Montilla - 19 years old - Dominican Republic
RHP Jesus Montiel - 19 years old - Mexico
INF Jonathan Alcantara - 18 years old - Dominican Republic
OF/1B Jalvin Arias - 19 years old - Dominican Republic
OF Esterling Rodriguez - 20 years old - Dominican Republic

[andyb]

Lehigh Valley has started:

https://www.milb.com/gameday/mud-hens-vs-ironpigs/2026/03/27/816376/live

[BaseballCat]

Not sure what day, but will be making my way to Durham next week to see LV there. ️ Glad to have baseball back!

[andyb]

Box from last night.
https://www.milb.com/gameday/mud-hens-vs-ironpigs/2026/03/27/816376/final/box

4 hit day for Reyes. 4 BB day for De La Cruz. Game 2 at 4:35 this afternoon.

Here is the team page for rolling boxes tonight. We can probably wait until next week for full organizational threads.
https://www.mlb.com/prospects/stats/affiliates?teamId=143&date=03/28/2026

[Ryles]

Hard to believe they had 7,500 people at the opener in Allentown last night. I watched some on Service Electric TV & it looked more like 750.