Phillies Off-Season 2024-2025 (Hot Stove)

[zambonir]

Sosa's not going anywhere I reckon. He's just not that valuable to another team as an everyday player vs. his value to the Phillies as an 80-game player. The only real issue with him is he doesn't provide a platoon alternative to Bohm or Turner, but neither of those guys are sitting much at this point.

It's still possible Turner moves off SS before someone else is ready (since Stott isn't that great a SS either), but probably not.

This year it just wouldn't make the line-up better (defensively or offensively) to start moving pieces around. Easier to add a LF than a better SS than Turner (or a better bat at SS than anyone they could add in LF).

[Dirk41]

Would the Angels trade Ben Joyce??

[jimbomill]

Would the Angels trade Ben Joyce??

Unless it was a boatload of prospects, unlikely

[Philsmania]

Would the Angels trade Ben Joyce??

Maybe more likely they trade Trout to get rid of the contract though I doubt we want that contract. However, if we sent them Casty and Walker in exchange, that would negate the first two years of that deal. Of course, we would have to send more than that.

[bkeich]

Would the Angels trade Ben Joyce??

Maybe more likely they trade Trout to get rid of the contract though I doubt we want that contract. However, if we sent them Casty and Walker in exchange, that would negate the first two years of that deal. Of course, we would have to send more than that.

As crazy as it sounds I bet the Angels would jump on that deal. Trout has extreme negative value now also, he is just a PR success, but since he only plays a few games a season his baseball value is gone.

The Angels would take a big PR Hit, but they would trade him to anyone silly enough to take him at this point I bet.

[zambonir]

Of course, he has a full no-trade clause and neither he nor the team has shown any inclination to make a move, ever. But it's hard not to think it won't happen eventually, and obviously he'd come to Philadelphia.

He may yet be productive as a LF or DH but I'd rather see him show that for a year first.

[Callison]

Good call, bk, on the negative trade value for Trout... almost everywhere his age and injuries make him nearly untradeable. OTOH, if the Phils think they can keep him healthy and they can reach the Angels, Trout might fix the Phils in a heartbeat. I'd think the Angels would try to accomodate Trout's interest in a title. I'd think Trout would welcome the opportunity to play with the Phils. Games when Trout plays for the Phils would likely cost some $20 more than the others.

[Philsmania]

Another thought on my modest Casty & Walker (and perhaps a Mick Abel to let the Angels save some face) for Trout proposal. As I said, the Casty & Walker contracts would negate Trout's contract in 2025-26, meaning the Phillies would only have to pay Trout $37.116 million per year for four years (2027-30) and that would be after both Schwarber and Realmuto ($50 million combined in 2025, $25 million for Realmuto in 2026) are off the books. If Trout can find a way to to stay healthy, it might not be so pie-in-the-sky.

[bkeich]

It is funny how some cities do a better job of “bringing” their superstars into the city. Mike Trout is the best player that has ever and will ever (for a long time) play for the 2nd class in their own town California Angels. Do you see him at LA sports games? No, he is in Philly.

Now look at Jason Kelce, a guy who was a hardcore Cleveland Sports fan. He lives in Philly, is still involved in community events and is truly and almost universally loved.

Philly Fans get a bad reputation, but LA (and other cities) that truly don’t care about their sports really deserve that reputation. LA is funny, they love the Lakers but that is about it, and honestly if the movie / music industry stopped supporting the Lakers when they start losing the public will follow very quickly.

[zambonir]

Well, the Angels are almost as far away from the Staples Center as the New Jersey Devils are from CBP. Nobody in LA proper cares about the Angels or Trout, he probably wouldn't even get courtside seats.

[bkox]

Can you imagine the franchise having to tell its fans that they traded one of the greatest players ever for the worst pitcher in the NL and Nick Castellanos, whose numbers would dip even further in Anaheim? But calm down Angels fans.. we got a former top 100 pitcher who cant find the strike zone most of the time.

[Taudawg]

Fair point. Trout for Castellanos and Walker should be favorable for the Angels longterm - gets them out of what appears to be a looming bad contract. The optics for them, not so much. No way they can do that deal. Not that I think this has a snowballs chance, but if the Phillies included Bohm in the deal, that starts to look better for the Angels. The fans there hate Rendon, and Bohm supplants him. Rendon if healthy can DH. Since we need to force some baseball entertainment for the next little while, let's say the Phillies the pencil in Buddy Kennedy at 3B. Trout the mentor in LF and his protege at 3B. What fun. From fan POV, that deal works for everyone.

[zambonir]

You are still going to have to give up a couple of prospects (one good one and one decent one) at minimum to get Trout. Bohm doesn't do anything for them since he'll either be too expensive or leaving or both before the Angels get good again (and if he's not, he'll be in decline).

And neither does Casty, who would actually be worth more to another team with the Phillies picking up some salary (i.e. we could get prospects or a useful different player).

Walker is just someone you throw in instead of making the Angels apply that $ to the portion of Trout's salary they would still have to pick up.

What we are talking about here is also the Philliies future. Are Bryce and Trea really going to finish their careers here? What will the Phillies end up getting for them/how much $ will they be on the hook for if that's the way it goes?

[allentown]

Trout was consistently excellent through his age 28 season. Rapidly downhill after that. This past season, the Angels got 1.1 WAR for $37 million. Prior season was 2,9 WAR for $37 million. A good year before that with 6.2 WAR, but his new contract began with two seasons of 1.1 WAR. So... 3 out of 5 years he cost $34 million per WAR. Just be thankful the Phillies were able to sign him after his prior contract would have lapsed. He has been a disaster The Angels are on the hook through 2030. That's a team-destroying contract. The Phillies will face the same with Harper and Turner. Why in the world would we want Trout now. It shouldn't be that difficult to find a corner OF who can provide 1.1 WAR. Trout would be a serious downgrade from Marsh. And we're supposed to trade a serious prospect for 'didn't you used to be Mike Trout'?

And why should the Phillies be willing to trade Bohm. On a team which stunk batting with RISP, Bohm produced 97 RBIs and 3,0 WAR. Trade him and you weaken the team,

[zambonir]

The Trout thing is just fan fiction (and for Eagles fans as much as Phillies fans).

But I understand the argument for trading Bohm - he really did have a poor second half (.681 OPS) even if you throw away the September injury month (and I'd argue if you did that when looking at his entire season you also throw away the extreme positive outlier of April) and it's pretty unusual to bench an All-Star in the playoffs. And if the Phillies are going to change anything they are going to have unload a younger player, not a veteran albatross. But it would only be for an equally good and ideally even younger player. Not someone like Trout.

And the team didn't stink with RISP, at all. Harper, Schwarber, Rojas, Turner, Marsh and Castellanos were all solid to great along with Bohm in the latter category. As a team they were 7th in MLB (in both BA and OPS). During the times when the entire team stunk with RISP Bohm was no exception.

That does seem to be his primary skill set but he's also no better than Nick as one of the free swingers (and with less consistent power). His contact skills matter but they are also BABIP dependent (to his advantage in the first half and his disadvantage in the second half, which is how you end up with just a solid major league regular).

[BostonRoss]

I have hit on the solution for next season.

According to baseball-reference, Nick Castellanos has the 17th lowest dWAR among rightfielders in MLB history. No surprise there. Actually he's tied for 17th with Ken Griffey (I'm sure you don't need to ask which Ken Griffey). But Nick can easily move up (down) the list. If he puts up another -1.7 next year, he'll move down (up) to 11th. And he has more years left! He is destined for greatness.

What if the Phillies moved Nick to left field? Here are the ranks (from the bottom) in dWAR among left fielders in the Phillies' best seasons:

1950 - Del Ennis (18th worst out of 500)
1976-1980 - Greg Luzinski (5th worst)
1983 - Gary Matthews (7th worst)
1993 - Pete Incaviglia (113th worst, but he had a shorter career than the others--if he played the same number of games as Sarge, he'd be in the top 40)
2007-2008 - Pat Burrell (30th worst)
2009-2011 - Raul Ibanez (10th worst)
2022-2023 - Kyle Schwarber (34th worst and counting though he's being stymied from true awfulness by playing only five games in the field this year)

And if you want to go there...
1964 - Wes Covington (27th worst)

The problem is obvious: They put a Gold Glove candidate out there in LF. What were they thinking?

The solution is obvious: Put Nick out there! (Or maybe put Schwarber back...)

[Austinfan]

I wonder if DD mostly runs it back, figuring by the Allstar break he'll know if he needs to make a major move, and whether his top prospects are ready. It's not just the big name prospects, guys like Kemp, Kennedy, Marchan, etc. might also be ready to be promoted at that point. Same with the pitchers.

[zambonir]

Or we could put Schwarber back there and let Nick DH!

Certainly they never intended for him to play RF. When they signed him he and Schwarber were supposed to split LF and DH equally because we had a full-time RF. Never completely understood how he ended up there for Detroit given 3B to LF seems like a more natural move.

Also, given all of the above, it's hard to believe Hoskins didn't work out there (given he was never a plus at 1B either).

[allentown]

That does seem to be his primary skill set but he's also no better than Nick as one of the free swingers (and with less consistent power).

Does Bohm have less, or less consistent power? He has a lot of doubles, leading to more x-base hits than Castellanos in fewer PA and ABs. Bohm had a very good first half, tailed off in 2nd half. Castellanos was the reverse in regular season, but that isn't a sign of more consistent power.

[zambonir]

Well, okay, Nick has more home run power. But also a career .470 SLG. Bohm is just .416. And, second half of 2024, Alec slugged .382 with a .681 OPS while Nick was .494/.839. It's easy to predict that Nick is never going to have a better season again, let alone slug .570 or .600 (which he has!), but Alec will never slug like that either. I'm just not convinced he has another level (let alone the level Nick reached when he was Bohm's age). But then I certainly didn't think he'd do what he did this year either.

And that's okay. They are both pretty good! And both terrible in the field. The Phillies can live with them, but replacing one of them with a different type of hitter might make the team better, and deciding which one to replace comes with myriad variables (both the trade return and how you get the replacement, since it won't necessarily happen in the same deal). I would also sooner lose one of them than Marsh or Stott, who seem less redundant/more valuable (and are both still younger/further away from free agency than Bohm. Nick, of course will just leave when his deal is up).