Last year around this time, I began a Google Doc that would eventually become the team’s post mortem. They had just lost Game 1 of the 2024 NLDS to the Mets in one of the most excruciatingly torturous
ways possible: their ace was on the hill, owning the opposition while the offense got an early lead, then died. The relief made a few bad pitches and suddenly, the Phillies were in a hole. Even if there was still a glimmer of hope that the Phillies would rebound (after all, they couldn’t all look that bad at the same time, right?), it felt at least appropriate to start thinking about what happens beyond a loss in the NLDS. No one wanted to acknowledge the fact that the Phillies might lose at that time, but it was a distinct possibility, particularly since they had just lost in nearly the same fashion as they had lost in the 2023 NLCS.
Now I find myself in the exact same position. It’s post Game 4, it was another horrendous loss and I can open yet another Google Doc and the cursor just blinks and blinks and blinks. It would be easy to begin with the exact same question I had asked myself to begin that same piece: where do they go from here? It’s the best way to begin dissecting how and why and all the other basic questions about the team, but the best thing to do is take a step back and look at this team and organization from a 10,000 foot view.
This is a good baseball team, a well run organization and an owner that has as much of a burning desire to win as any other in the sport.
Think about how many other teams can say that about their organization. We can look at teams like the Pirates, the Rockies and the White Sox from afar and cast easy aspersions on them, some with a fair amount of derision. One of them has a generational talent on the mound every fifth day and yet has done almost nothing to build a team around him that is worthy of it. Instead of spending the money necessary to make sure that that talent isn’t wasted, the ownership group has tightened purse strings, the general manager has subsequently been hamstrung and the team is going nowhere. In Colorado, the aimless, rudderless ship that is the Rockies has no idea what to do. To say they are in the stone ages in terms of baseball knowledge would probably be a massive understatement. The White Sox? Let’s not even go there.
In Philadelphia, there are many things that fans of other teams would kill for. The roster has warts, yes, but there is a lot of production up and down the lineup and in the rotation and out in the bullpen. We can probably count on multiple fingers how many players the Phillies employ that other teams would gladly take on their own roster. The president of baseball operations has pushed chips in each season to make this team one that is able to compete for a trophy. Risks are taken with trades and free agent signings and all other modes of player acquisition, and for the most part it has worked out. You can’t win a World Series trophy if you aren’t in the playoffs and Dave Dombrowski has shown the fortitude to make deals that helps the roster be able to do that. John Middleton has given money when needed, resources when needed, support when needed to make sure the roster has what it needs to win.
All three of these things are really, really good things to have when starting a baseball team.
And the Phillies still lost.
It’s the cold, hard reality of the playoffs in baseball that if you as a team are not playing well, your stay in the playoffs will be short. It doesn’t really matter what a team has done over the long 162 game season. What matters is did you win your last game. That’s what so many teams are judged by – were you the last team standing when the final curtain on the season dropped. That mentality is fine, but it also obscures a fact that there will only be one team standing at the end. That means 29 other teams have not had a successful season if the only basis for whether or not a season is successful is World Series glory.
I happen to not subscribe to that theory.
2025 was a successful season for the Phillies in that they managed to increase their win total yet again for the seventh straight season. They managed to produce a Cy Young candidate in Cristopher Sanchez, an MVP candidate in Kyle Schwarber (along with Trea Turner if fWAR is your bag) and won a division by 13 games. That is a successful season, no matter how you cut it.
They just happened to run into a buzzsaw in the Dodgers and did not have the breaks go their way.
Some say that we create our own luck and what the Phillies did was do almost the exact opposite of that. Whether that be managerial decisions that put the team into a position that was the opposite of winning, whether that be the team’s bats at the top of the order going stone cold at the exact wrong time, or whether that be the bran farts of all brain farts happening at the worst possible time, it seemed that all the breaks went opposite the Phillies’ way. Did they make that luck go that direction? Maybe, but they would hardly be the first team to not get the breaks.
All of this is small consolation to a few. The fact is that they did not win and now they have to try and figure out why. The calls for drastic change are loud and demanding. Running it back is not something that they can do for 2026 and it’s likely that the team recognizes this. Some of the pieces that take the field next season will be unfamiliar. Standing pat is sometimes worse than doing nothing and falling into that trap has to be avoided at all costs. The changing of the guard on more than a few crowd favorites is probably going to happen, but the idea of moving on from a few pillars of the franchise is logistically not in the cards. While someone like Trea Turner showed this season why he can still reach MVP-level heights when his game is clicking on all cylinders, perhaps enticing a buyer or two, the remaining part of his contract will cause other teams to pause. The Phillies would need to pay a lot of money and if they are going to pay money to have a player off of their roster, that money is probably earmarked for a certain right fielder.
However, we can’t lose sight of this being a good team. They are still a good team. They have pieces in place that will help them remain among the five or so best teams in the game. Might there need to be a dose of luck breaking their way? Of course, but that happens each year with each team. Are there likely to be more of those questions next season than in season’s past? Sure. The rotation as constructed this year, the foundation on which the team was built, is now looking at two members not being a part of the roster on Opening Day with Zack Wheeler’s health in question and Ranger Suarez likely being too expensive to keep That places some pressure on Andrew Painter to be good right away and on Aaron Nola to bounceback from a truly bad season. The bullpen finally has the piece it needs at the end of games, but what about getting there? Do they even have enough to get a lead to Jhoan Duran on a consistent basis? The offense might lose 50+ home runs and, at least internally, they don’t have anything near good enough in the minor league pipeline good enough to replicate that.
It’s going to be a work in progress this offseason, but without the pieces they have in place – Bryce Harper, Turner, Cristopher Sanchez, Jesus Luzardo, Duran – that work might prove to be more difficult. Instead, they are an attractive team for free agents that has spots to fill and money to spend.
Was the ending to the season a disappointment? Absolutely yes. They didn’t get that job done. The season they had was still a successful one. Let’s not lose sight of that.
