Who will disappear from the Phillies before spring?

As Major League Baseball drives toward the World Series with two pairs of pretty evenly matched teams, it is the season for all good baseball writers to play general manager of some team or another. In the case of the Philadelphia Phillies, the skeleton baseball staff covering the team for Inquirer.com has already delivered itself of their opinions (two) about which players should stay and which should go.

Consider the following a discussion with Scott Lauber and Matt Breen, the de facto baseball staff for that news organization.

Breen and Lauber put together their recommendations to fans and the Phillies front office on Oct. 14, both “deciding” on each player on the 40-man roster except most of those not yet eligible for arbitration. That cut out 11 players, but they also commented on Alec Bohm, who isn’t arbitration eligible until 2024.

None of the 11 excluded is clearly an important team piece yet with the possible exception of promising reliever J.D. Hammer, a hard throwing right-hander (read, he should not be traded except for very good value).

So, we’ll keep Hammer – who else should stay – or go? Perhaps the who’s going question is the best approach here since Lauber and Breen, who have been covering MLB for a combined 24 years, see a lot of players on the way out the door.

Lauber would excise 11 of the ’21 Phils; Breen would get rid of 12.

After all, the team barely had a winning season despite their expensive, star-led line-up. And it’s hard to argue with these writers’ general approach since the Phillies had the probable league MVP in right field and the arguable league Cy Young awardee starting every fifth day.

Changes are needed. Among those the Inquirer writers would jettison, there at six players on both their lists – Odubel Herrera, Roman Quinn, Matt Moore, Ian Kennedy, Archie Bradley, and Cam Bedrosian.

All of these players likely can be replaced by six equivalents among the 318 free agents listed by Sportrac.com Oct. 20, so Breen and Lauber get no argument from me on any of them. The oft-injured Quinn is an unfortunate case, and Bradley might be kept if he could be impressed with the need to cut down on men he puts on base.

Otherwise, Moore, Kennedy, Bradley, and Bedrosian are black marks on the 10-month-old record of the front office team led by Phillies president Dave Dombrowski and GM Sam Fuld.