David Schoenfield, ESPN Senior WriterJun 1, 2024, 07:00 AM ET
The Philadelphia Phillies do not have a long, rich history of success. They once had a 31-year stretch with just one winning season. They made the World Series in 1950 and didn't return to the playoffs until 1976. From 1984 to 2006, they made one postseason appearance. The glorious stretch from 2007 to 2011 was quickly followed by nine consecutive non-winning seasons before their recent run of playoff appearances. Still, when you've established the chance to become the best team in franchise history, which is the case with the 2024 Phillies, the anticipation in a sports-obsessed city like Philadelphia only builds as a summer of baseball descends upon us.
The Phillies, of course, came close to winning it all the past two seasons -- although they have been more of a very good team than a great one. They won 87 games in 2022 and 90 in 2023 and upset the rival Braves in the division series both years, only to lose the World Series to the Astros in 2022 and then a National League Championship Series they should have won against the Diamondbacks last season.
When a team falls just short in the postseason in consecutive years, facing the grind of another 162-game season can turn into a test of mental fortitude. All you want is to return to the excitement and intensity of October baseball, and instead you're playing the White Sox in April in a half-empty stadium. The Phillies, though, have roared out of the gate -- unlike either of the past two seasons -- and are on pace for a 100-win season, accomplished in only the Mike Schmidt/Steve Carlton years of 1976 and 1977 and in 2011 by the franchise-best 102-win team.
The focus has been there. The pitching has delivered. Bryce Harper has been doing Bryce Harper stuff. But it also takes some emerging players to get off to this kind of start. With the Phillies hosting the Cardinals on "Sunday Night Baseball," let's look at some of the breakout players who have helped the Phillies go from good to great.
Ranger Suarez
Suarez finally lost his first game in his 11th start of the season when the Rockies knocked him around for five runs in the first two innings at Coors Field last Sunday. That dropped his record to 9-1 with a 1.75 ERA. He's the first Phillies pitcher to win nine of his first 11 starts in a season and the first to win at least nine of 11 starts with an ERA under 2.00 at any point in a season since Carlton in 1972.
While it's easy to dismiss this run as simply a hot streak, Suarez pitched at this level in 2021, when he posted a 1.36 ERA across 106 innings as a hybrid starter/reliever. That was the lowest ERA for a pitcher with at least 100 innings since Bruce Sutter in 1977. Since then, Suarez has added a curveball to his arsenal, and it's become one of his best pitches: Batters hit .143 with a 38% whiff rate against the pitch last season and are hitting .152 with a 34% whiff rate against it in 2024 heading into his Saturday start.
Suarez has also learned that a little less is better. His sinker has dropped from averaging 92.8 mph in 2023 to 90.9; his changeup has gone from 82.9 to 80.7. Mix in a cutter that he runs in on right-handers and a four-seamer that averages 92 mph and Suarez has a difficult five-pitch repertoire that keeps hitters off-balance and guessing. No, it's not blow-'em-away stuff like that of Tyler Glasnow or Paul Skenes, but it's the art of pitching at its best.
Line up Suarez alongside Zack Wheeler -- I'll stick with him as my Cy Young pick -- and Aaron Nola, Cristopher Sanchez (2.83 ERA, one home run in 60.1 innings) and Taijuan Walker, and the Phillies have a deep, outstanding rotation. Spencer Turnbull, who filled in for Walker in April, gives them a sixth starter if needed. It's the best Phillies rotation since that fabled 2011 group of Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee, Cole Hamels and Roy Oswalt. What's really interesting here is that even after re-signing Nola as a free agent, the Phillies pursued Yoshinobu Yamamoto, wanting a third starter to create a big three rotation. Turns out they didn't need him.
Alec Bohm
The third overall pick in the 2018 draft, Bohm reached the majors in the COVID-shortened 2020 season and hit .338 in 44 games, perhaps creating some unrealistic expectations for his future. He has been a regular since then and hit .274 with 20 home runs and 97 RBIs last season, but there were holes in his game that limited his overall value: He didn't walk much, he grounded into a league-leading 23 double plays and his defense remained subpar.
He's having his best season at the plate -- remember, offense is down across the sport, so Bohm's .308/.366/.493 heading into the weekend gives him an OPS+ of 144 and he ranked 20th in the majors in OPS, just behind Harper for best on the team. Bohm leads the majors in doubles and ranks in the top 10 in strikeout rate. It's kind of an old-school approach: Put the ball in play, hit line drives, don't sell out contact for power.
Is it for real? That remains to be seen. He hit .366 in April but slid back to .243 with just one home run in May. He has cut down on his chase rate a bit, so he's swinging at more strikes, and that has led to more consistent contact. He has hit .390 with runners in scoring position, leading to an impressive RBI total, and even though he's not a big home run hitter, manager Rob Thomson has moved him into the cleanup position. I like that move: With Trea Turner (once he returns from the injured list) and Harper hitting in front of him, he's going to continue to get a lot of RBI opportunities, and if he hits .300, Bohm is going to easily surpass 100 RBIs for the season.
Matt Strahm/Jeff Hoffman/Orion Kerkering
A quick history lesson on Dave Dombrowski, the Phillies' president of baseball operations. Having won World Series with the Marlins in 1997 and the Red Sox in 2018, plus building World Series teams in Detroit and Philadelphia, Dombrowski is a future Hall of Fame executive. That's no throwaway comment: Only six executives have been elected to the Hall of Fame for their work in a traditional GM role: Ed Barrow, Branch Rickey, Larry MacPhail, George Weiss, Pat Gillick and John Schuerholz. Only Gillick and Schuerholz plied their trade after 1960.
Dombrowski's teams have always been built around star power while sometimes lacking in depth. That was always the problem in Detroit, when his teams featured the likes of Miguel Cabrera, Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer but were thin at the bottom. Even his best team, the 2018 World Series champion Red Sox that won 108 regular-season games, was a little soft in the bullpen. In the postseason, manager Alex Cora compensated by using starters in relief and obscure free agent pickup Ryan Brasier got hot down the stretch.
Anyway, that stars-with-some-holes style has been the case with these recent Phillies -- and that gets us to the bullpen. The 2022 team had an OK pen (18th in the majors in ERA but had acquired David Robertson) but no go-to closer. The bullpen did get hot in October, at least until the final game of the World Series when Yordan Alvarez tagged Jose Alvarado for the series-winning home run. Last year, the pen improved to 12th in ERA, but entering the postseason, everyone knew closer Craig Kimbrel was a wild card after an inconsistent regular season. Kimbrel lost Games 3 and 4 of the NLCS in a series the Phillies ultimately lost in seven games.
Dombrowski has continued to chip away at the bullpen and might now finally have constructed one that can win a World Series. Strahm signed as a free agent in 2023 and is having his best season with a 0.81 ERA and a sterling 32-3 strikeout-to-walk ratio -- the two earned runs he allowed came in his first appearance of the season. As an extreme fly ball pitcher, Strahm has certainly benefited from the less lively ball, but he's pounding the zone and increased his strikeout rate.
Hoffman also signed as a free agent last season -- after the Twins let him go in spring training. The former first-round pick eventually became one of the Phillies' top setup guys with a 2.41 ERA, and he has been just as impressive this season, picking up four saves to go with a sub-2.00 ERA. Kerkering was a fifth-round pick out of South Florida in 2022, reached the majors last season and made the postseason roster with just three games of big league experience. He throws his sweeper 58% of the time and he's tough to elevate. Indeed, this trio has combined to allow just one home run in 64 innings.
Kerkering's quick rise to a key bullpen role highlights something the Phillies have made major strides on in recent years: player development. Bohm, Nola and Bryson Stott were all first-round picks; Suarez was signed out of Venezuela way back in 2012; center fielder Johan Rojas is another homegrown product. Sanchez and Brandon Marsh came in trades for prospects Curtis Mead and Logan O'Hoppe. The Phillies are no longer just about the star power of Harper, Wheeler, Nola, Turner and Kyle Schwarber. This is a deep team.
Despite these breakouts, there are still some questions to consider:
How much of their record is just the Phillies taking advantage of a soft schedule? They've played the weakest schedule in the majors so far, with just 16 of their first 57 games against teams currently with a winning record. As good as Suarez has been, only three of his 11 starts have come against winning teams.
Will Alvarado be a lockdown option as the closer in October? He has been Thomson's primary closer, but he hasn't pitched as well as Strahm, Hoffman and Kerkering. He can still be wild at times and his strikeout rate has dipped from over 37% the past two seasons to 25%. Much like last season with Kimbrel, this is a question that could remain unresolved until the postseason, and that's an uncomfortable position. It's also possible that Hoffman eventually slides in as the ninth-inning guy with Strahm and Kerkering as the primary seventh/eighth-inning relievers with Alvarado more of the fourth option.
What about center field? Rojas hit .093 last postseason with two runs and no RBIs in 45 plate appearances. He has struggled at the plate and his defense has been nowhere near as stellar this season (+15 defensive runs saved in 59 games in 2023, minus-4 in 2024). The Phillies can slide Marsh over to center, except Whit Merrifield hasn't hit at all. This feels like a potential trade, either for a center fielder or left fielder.
In the meantime, the Phillies have pulled away from the Braves as they chase their first NL East title since 2011 -- and maybe more players will emerge on the way to what could be the best regular-season team in franchise history.
