Philadelphia Phillies dire needs dictate Odubel Herrera trade
By Rick Soisson
The Phillies most significant needs will dictate an Odubel Herrera trade.
The Philadelphia Phillies, we are told, have a “good” problem. Since trading for Carlos Santana and apparently bumping Rhys Hoskins into left field, Philly seems to have too many starting outfielders.
From oldest to youngest, they are Aaron Altherr (27 by Opening Day 2018), Odubel Herrera, Hoskins, and Nick Williams (24 for most of the coming season).
Arguably, all are everyday major leaguers. All have home run potential, as outfielders should, but the only one to show doubtless power consistency is Hoskins, who hit 18 homers in 50 games last season.
Thus, one might argue that the Phillies should keep all this young talent, just mix and match against given starting pitchers, and they may well do that. Some even claim this should happen. After all, new manager Gabe Kapler may want to see for himself, in person, what he has in these four players.
This would be the wrong idea, however.
The first counterargument here involves the Phillies’ woeful team on-base percentage despite this promising talent. For the past three years, the Phillies have been 29th, 29th, and (last year) 24th in OBP. The highest figure posted was in 2017, merely .315. All four of the coming season’s outfielders have contributed to these woeful rankings.
Altherr has a .326 OBP for parts of four seasons. Williams has a .338 OBP for one full season. Herrera has .344 in three full seasons, and Hoskins .396 for only 212 plate appearances – he alone in the group is quite a useful pitch selector.
Third baseman Maikel Franco and first baseman Santana need to be factored in here as well to get this argument. Their career OBP figures are .300 for Franco (.281 in ‘17, the second straight seasonal drop) and .365 for eight years for Santana – the latter for a team not called the Philadelphia Phillies.
Hoskins and Santana are somewhat versatile. Both play first base and the outfield. However, Santana has played more games at third base than he has in the outfield, so why not trade Franco, move Santana to third and Hoskins back to first?
The problem with this notion is that Santana hasn’t played third since 2014. And while his initial reviews at third were positive, his overall fielding average was a mere .909 at the position.
To begin with, let’s consider again for a minute why we are we trading anybody. Beyond the obvious problem with team OBP, the Phillies are a last place team right now, whatever the promise in some of their young talent.
An only slightly more subtle point that this is the Philadelphia Phillies don’t have enough starting pitchers to compete anytime soon. Not just in ’18, but beyond that.
Of the eight formerly promising starters now on the active roster, only Aaron Nola had a winning record and shown any likelihood of ever throwing a complete season with an ERA near or below 3.00.
If you remove Vince Velasquez from this group, assuming he becomes a set-up reliever or closer, the median ERA of the remaining seven starters is Jake Thompson’s 4.86. The aggregate MLB won-lost record of The Remainders – Zach Eflin, Jerad Eickhoff, Mark Leiter, Ben Lively, Nick Pivetta, Nola, and Thompson – is 67-88.
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Excepting Nola, which of these starters will step up to become a winning starter this year? Who knows? I’d bet no money on any of them moving to even one game over .500.
Thus, the Phillies need to trade a starting position player (and maybe a current “starting pitcher”) to get at least one starter capable of MLB service this year.
If the one they get doesn’t work out, they can trade him or waive him at the end of June. However, a position player has to go, and I’d suggest Herrera.
He ends up on the wrong base now and then; he looks disengaged sometimes; he has the most offensive and defensive trade value of those the Phillies would part ways.
Altherr and Williams can cover center and right, respectively, and Hoskins can stay put in left instead of hopscotching back and forth to first base in the name of variation for its sake.
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Best of all, this plan would still leave the Philadelphia Phillies with another fourth outfielder – Dylan Cozens, a player who hit 40 homers in Double-A ball in 2016.