Cora and 4 coaches sacked!

[moonslav59]

2 hours ago, Maxbialystock said:

Agree on the weak lineup and on over-reliance on Anthony.  

Cora was offered the Phillies job as soon as they fired their manager, who may have been fired because Cora was available.

I'm beginning to think the problerm is with Breslow.  He's not to blame for Story and Yoshida, both overpaid, but last year he dumped two good bats in Devers and Bregman.  

Bregman's strong suit is pitching, which is coming apart at the seams.  

 

The Phillies have the same record as we do and a GM who had a ton of money locked up in aging stars. 

How is DD wanting Cora proof that Brez in the problem?

[drewski6]

26 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

The Phillies have the same record as we do and a GM who had a ton of money locked up in aging stars. 

How is DD wanting Cora proof that Brez in the problem?

Id rather have aging stars than no stars.

[notin]

3 minutes ago, drewski6 said:

Id rather have aging stars than no stars.

So… Story?

[mvp 78]

15 minutes ago, notin said:

So… Story?

That's a star? 😬

[moonslav59]

47 minutes ago, drewski6 said:

Id rather have aging stars than no stars.

I'd rather have our roster and budget outlook than the Phillies.

Sooner or later, the Philly ownership will realize their spending has put them into a corner.

Some of these "stars" are signed until their late 30's. We'll be seeing the Nick Castellanos situation repeat itself to varying degrees on 1 or 2 of these "stars."

You want Nola the star? (95 ERA+ since 2023) Brez would be roasted for that contract.

Wheeler has been great but has 25 GS since opening day 2025.

Turner is a helluva player who I'd love to have, but his OPS+ has declined from 120 w WSH to 116 w PHI and he has a lotta years left after this age 33 season.

Is Realmuto a star you'd want?

Harper and Schwarber look worth the money, and I'd like to have Wheeler, too, but...

 

[JoeBrady]

4 hours ago, notin said:

Duran’s baserunning advantage is nullified by his .231 OBP…

Only if one thinks Duran won't have positive regression.

[JoeBrady]

2 hours ago, drewski6 said:

Id rather have aging stars than no stars.

Only if you have 2026 in mind.  Philly has already spent $236M in 2027, and we spent $180M.  And they spent $172M in 2030 (mostly for 37 year old players) while we have only a $110M obligation.  These things matter.

[notin]

2 hours ago, mvp 78 said:

That's a star? 😬

Is Schwarber a star?

Story has more Silver Sluggers than Schwarber and more top ten MVP finishes with only one less All Star appearance.

And remember, the ask was for aging stars.  Story certainly qualifies as an aging star…

[vegasbob]

Watching the opening road trip i commented that the players did not look ready for the season

The WBC participants should have been ready for real competition

The 6 game opening trip was extended ST and the guys wanted to get home.

Crochet allegedly said he was saving himself in ST and consequently was not built up to be a power pitcher in April.    

Cora had enough of Breslow's dictating lineups and who played.  He backed his coaches because , frankly, AC had nothing to lose financially .    He is a known Coach's manager.  Why would AC want to put in an entyire season of misery like us fans will now do.    Enjoy PR , Alex.    But you should have had them ready, that was your failure.

[FredLynn]

1 hour ago, vegasbob said:

Watching the opening road trip i commented that the players did not look ready for the season

The WBC participants should have been ready for real competition

The 6 game opening trip was extended ST and the guys wanted to get home.

Crochet allegedly said he was saving himself in ST and consequently was not built up to be a power pitcher in April.    

Cora had enough of Breslow's dictating lineups and who played.  He backed his coaches because , frankly, AC had nothing to lose financially .    He is a known Coach's manager.  Why would AC want to put in an entyire season of misery like us fans will now do.    Enjoy PR , Alex.    But you should have had them ready, that was your failure.

Cora deserved to be fired but only in conjunction with Breslow being fired. He handed Cora a pile of DUNG to trot onto the field.

[moonslav59]

3 hours ago, JoeBrady said:

Only if one thinks Duran won't have positive regression.

In a way, this roster and maybe the season depends on a major Duran positive regression.

[moonslav59]

3 hours ago, JoeBrady said:

Only if you have 2026 in mind.  Philly has already spent $236M in 2027, and we spent $180M.  And they spent $172M in 2030 (mostly for 37 year old players) while we have only a $110M obligation.  These things matter.

In this context, DD has put the Phillies in a worse position than the 2019-2020 Red Sox roster/budget aspect.

[mvp 78]

13 hours ago, notin said:

Is Schwarber a star?

Story has more Silver Sluggers than Schwarber and more top ten MVP finishes with only one less All Star appearance.

And remember, the ask was for aging stars.  Story certainly qualifies as an aging star…

Do Sox fans care about Story’s time in COL? Is it easier to get a Silver Slugger at SS or DH? Sox fans loved Schwarber. They’ve never cared for Story.

[mvp 78]

10 hours ago, FredLynn said:

Cora deserved to be fired but only in conjunction with Breslow being fired. He handed Cora a pile of DUNG to trot onto the field.

It was a team that went to the playoffs last season, but with more pitching this time.

[Old Red]

1 hour ago, mvp 78 said:

It was a team that went to the playoffs last season, but with more pitching this time.

Yes, but some leftover lumber has been in a slumber, and some of the arms like Crochet, and Ranger were knocked around a few games, which all added up to the not so good start.

[notin]

1 hour ago, mvp 78 said:

Do Sox fans care about Story’s time in COL? Is it easier to get a Silver Slugger at SS or DH? Sox fans loved Schwarber. They’ve never cared for Story.

Again, he wanted an aging star.  Who cares where he was a star in the past?

[FredLynn]

3 hours ago, mvp 78 said:

It was a team that went to the playoffs last season, but with more pitching this time.

And less offense. At the end of the day you still have to be able to hit the baseball and score runs.

Right now the FLOPS are 26th in runs scored of the 30 teams in MLB and 28th in OPS. This was totally predictable when he opted to sign bums rather than talent over the winter. This is half his fault and half the cheapskate owners fault.

 

Breslow failed.

[notin]

3 hours ago, Old Red said:

Yes, but some leftover lumber has been in a slumber, and some of the arms like Crochet, and Ranger were knocked around a few games, which all added up to the not so good start.

… which points to “not necessarily a pile of dung roster” as the primary issue. 

[notin]

38 minutes ago, FredLynn said:

And less offense. At the end of the day you still have to be able to hit the baseball and score runs.

Right now the FLOPS are 26th in runs scored of the 30 teams in MLB and 28th in OPS. This was totally predictable when he opted to sign bums rather than talent over the winter. This is half his fault and half the cheapskate owners fault.

 

Breslow failed.

The same lineup was 7th in the league in scoring last year, and was 8th in the league in runs scored after trading Devers.  They didn’t drop 18 places in runs scored because they replaced Bregman with a Durbin.

A lot of players are flat out underperforming.   Including some pitchers, which magnifies the situation…

[moonslav59]

Before the season started, most baseball experts raved about our rotation outlook and decent SP'er depth. Some argued we focused too much on pitching and could have spared one or two of the SP'ers and used their value to improve the batting.

It's hard to argue against that idea at the 20% mark of the season, but as it turned out, we have needed all the SP'er "decent" depth and have actually dipped down to the #10 or 11 slot on the depth chart. Three of the SP'ers from #6 to #10 or 11 have done very well (Early, Tolle & Bennett,) and in hindsight, we could claim we should have started some of them over Oviedo and Bello to begin with, but we didn't spend a lot to get Oviedo. We didn't really spend a lot to get Gray, either. We did spend nearly all of the Bregman offer money on Suarez, but he's done well.

Most of the winter talk about adding bats focused on players like...

Bregman and or Bichette

Alonso and or Schwarber

Trades for KMarte and or Paredes, Hoerner, Shaw and or Donovan and gamble signings like ESuarez, Polanco or Murakami/Okamoto.

If you add all these most-discussed player up, a large percentage have not done well. If we wanted 2-3 of these guys, instead of Suarez, Gray & Contreras, how can we justify we were right and Brez was wrong or worse than us?

Sure, we can cherry-pick and hindsight this to death: we shoulda traded for BLowe (or Donovan) and signed Schwarber, Murakami & Ranger Suarez, but not one of us suggested that combo.

[mvp 78]

2 hours ago, FredLynn said:

And less offense. At the end of the day you still have to be able to hit the baseball and score runs.

Right now the FLOPS are 26th in runs scored of the 30 teams in MLB and 28th in OPS. This was totally predictable when he opted to sign bums rather than talent over the winter. This is half his fault and half the cheapskate owners fault.

 

Breslow failed.

One less bat. That doesn’t equate to the dip in production we’ve seen.

[moonslav59]

30 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

One less bat. That doesn’t equate to the dip in production we’ve seen.

Yup.

As we all know, fangraphs spring projections tend to be on the conservative side, but here are their projections vs current actuals:

.797 Contreras .861 (+64)

.784 Abreu .828 (+44)

.780 Anthony .673 (-107)

.763 Yoshida .716 (-47)

.746 Duran .511 (-235)

.742 Romy N/A

.723 Durbin .528 (-195)

.721 Rafaela .711 (+10)

.703 Story .546 (-147)

.700 Monasterio .678 (-12)

.697 Mayer .685 (+12)

.634 IKF .499 (-135)

.680 Narvaez .609 (-71)

.683 Wong .712 (+29)

___________________

Of the batters expected to get a lot of playing time, these are the 3 killers:

-235 Duran

-195 Durbin

-147 Story

These are 3 that have not been helpful

-105 Anthony

-71 Narvaez

-47 Yoshida

These are 3-5 that have done well:

+64 Contreras

+44 Abreu

+12 Mayer/ +10 Rafaela/+29 Wong

 

[JoeBrady]

1 hour ago, moonslav59 said:

Sure, we can cherry-pick and hindsight this to death: we shoulda traded for BLowe (or Donovan) and signed Schwarber, Murakami & Ranger Suarez, but not one of us suggested that combo.

One would have to cherry-pick the heck out of the universe of available players to do better than Suarez + Durbin + Contreras.  Suarez and Contreras are out-performing.  Durbin has not, but has done much better over his 17 games.

[JoeBrady]

33 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

.780 Anthony .673 (-107)

.746 Duran .511 (-235)

.703 Story .546 (-147)

Yet very few want to focus in on the real problem.

[moonslav59]

Just now, JoeBrady said:

One would have to cherry-pick the heck out of the universe of available players to do better than Suarez + Durbin + Contreras.  

This is why I kinda shudder when I hear that "Brez provided Cora with crap."

I think he improved the roster from 2025 on paper and in actual current stats. Yes, the offense was not the focus point many wanted, but again we should look at what were the other options many of us wanted instead of Contreras, Durbin, IKF & Monasterio? Most have flopped, under performed or not done better than Contreras. While the last 3 have not done well, so far, they still look about the same as many much higher paid winter options.

IMO, this is why the blame was placed on the manager and coaches- rightly or wrongly.

Lord knows we can't blame the players.

[moonslav59]

3 minutes ago, JoeBrady said:

Yet very few want to focus in on the real problem.

None of these guys are Brez additions.

While many wanted Duran traded, and some worried about further Story regression on defense and him not matching 2025 offense, we realized he was not going to be replaced in the line-up. (Some wanted a position flip.) Everybody wanted Anthony playing FT. While many thought we should not count on him as a top 2-3 batter, we expected better than this.

These three are a major issue, but we can't ignore how over 150 PAs from Durbin & IKF have really hurt, too. Durbin as expected to be .675-.700 and IKF .625-.650ish. Both have done much worse.

Wong took up some slack from the Narvaez dip, but now Narvaez is coming around as Wong is slumping a bit.

Contreras, Abreu, Mayer and Rafaela have been doing close to what was expected, except for maybe Ceddanne's drop on defense in CF.

[FredLynn]

4 hours ago, moonslav59 said:

Before the season started, most baseball experts raved about our rotation outlook and decent SP'er depth. Some argued we focused too much on pitching and could have spared one or two of the SP'ers and used their value to improve the batting.

It's hard to argue against that idea at the 20% mark of the season, but as it turned out, we have needed all the SP'er "decent" depth and have actually dipped down to the #10 or 11 slot on the depth chart. Three of the SP'ers from #6 to #10 or 11 have done very well (Early, Tolle & Bennett,) and in hindsight, we could claim we should have started some of them over Oviedo and Bello to begin with, but we didn't spend a lot to get Oviedo. We didn't really spend a lot to get Gray, either. We did spend nearly all of the Bregman offer money on Suarez, but he's done well.

Most of the winter talk about adding bats focused on players like...

Bregman and or Bichette

Alonso and or Schwarber

Trades for KMarte and or Paredes, Hoerner, Shaw and or Donovan and gamble signings like ESuarez, Polanco or Murakami/Okamoto.

If you add all these most-discussed player up, a large percentage have not done well. If we wanted 2-3 of these guys, instead of Suarez, Gray & Contreras, how can we justify we were right and Brez was wrong or worse than us?

Sure, we can cherry-pick and hindsight this to death: we shoulda traded for BLowe (or Donovan) and signed Schwarber, Murakami & Ranger Suarez, but not one of us suggested that combo.

It’s not a matter of “instead of”. It’s a matter of “in addition to”. Breslow failed and should be fired.

[FredLynn]

6 hours ago, notin said:

The same lineup was 7th in the league in scoring last year, and was 8th in the league in runs scored after trading Devers.  They didn’t drop 18 places in runs scored because they replaced Bregman with a Durbin.

A lot of players are flat out underperforming.   Including some pitchers, which magnifies the situation…

The players knew what they needed to become a contender. No doubt they were pretty deflated when they saw that the cheapskate owner wasn’t willing to shell out the money to provide the team with what everyone knew it needed. I am quite sure that is a large part of the reason we stink.

[moonslav59]

4 hours ago, FredLynn said:

It’s not a matter of “instead of”. It’s a matter of “in addition to”. Breslow failed and should be fired.

The budget was not limitless. He did fine with what he was given.

[Deja Doh]

The real problem started in November 2020 when the team rehired Cora.  They should have moved on.