The Phillies started the year looking amazing on paper, as they have for the last four seasons. This year has held extreme relevance for the Philadelphia Fightin Phils as they hosted the All-Star Game and its festivities for the first time since 1996. Even though the Phillies had six selected players to participate in the events, it seems the hype of the All-Star weekend has leveled the Phils’ team spirit.
Kyle Schwarber’s heroic Home Run Derby performance was all to waste as the hometown hero was knocked out in the final round of the Derby to a Kyle Walker derby-clinching walk-off. In the All-Star Game, Phillies starting pitcher Cristopher Sanchez, who started in the game as well, walked one and allowed two hits and three earned runs on a 2-run single from eventual All-Star Game MVP Cody Bellinger. The American League would lose this game to the National League 4-0 in a pathetic showing from our six hometown picks. Did the Phillies party too hard during the mid-summer break?
Phillies interim manager Don Mattingly has led the team to a cold 3-9 start after the All-Star break. A team total batting average of just .256 is the main root of the team’s struggle. The Phils lost two of three games against the Mets, Dodgers, and Yankees, and were swept in Miami by the Marlins. When will the post-break hangover end? According to Baseball Reference, the Phillies’ pitching gave up an absurd 54 runs and a .271 batting average in those three series alone. For perspective, the Phillies are 43-16 when their top three pitchers (Wheeler, Sanchez, and Luzardo) start for them, which results in a .729 win percentage (118-win pace), but when any other pitcher starts for the Phillies, they are 14-33, equal to a .298 win percentage (48-win pace). The last team with the highest difference between these two numbers was the 2001 Arizona Diamondbacks with a Win percentage difference of .326.
But there is hope on the horizon for this bizarre stat. The 2001 Diamondbacks won the World Series in a dramatic game seven walk-off victory against the Yankees. So can the Phillies survive long enough to make it to the playoffs and potentially make a deep run like what we saw in 2022? After this horrendous 12-game stretch, the Phillies are seven games back from the NL East first-place Braves. So what exactly do they need to get back to the 100-win team we saw last season? My answer belongs to one man: Dave Dombrowski. Known for his historical lacklustre attempts at signing anyone at the trade deadline, the Phillies’ Head of Baseball Operations is the answer to help propel this struggling Phillies squad to the 1 seed in the playoffs. First Baseman Bryce Harper states on ESPN, “I think we need some help. But I think we’ve proved pretty much all year we’ve done a pretty good job. But anytime you can get some help in here and reinforcements, I think it helps.”
Monday, August 3, marks the trade deadline. With the Sixers recently acquiring LeBron James and Jaylen Brown out of free agency, Dombrowski surely feels the pressure to create a “golden age” of Philadelphia sports much like the teams in the 80s. With available player targets like long-time Philadelphia fan Mike Trout and former Cy-Young winner Tarik Skubal, will Dombrowski work his magic and pick up another key player to finally help deliver a World Series Championship to a starving fan base? Or will he once again fold under the pressure of a toxic and insufferable fanbase who constantly look through rose-tinted lenses, chasing a long-lost “golden era” of the unreachable past?
Junior Sam Mahood is a Contributing Writer. His email is smahood@fandm.edu.