Phillies Rumors: Club showing 'strong interest' in 'multiple' Marlins outfielders

Phillies Rumors: Club showing ‘strong interest’ in ‘multiple’ Marlins outfielders

Tim Kelly

July 20 2017

By Tim Kelly, Sports Talk Philly editor

Though nearly every report seems to acknowledge that the Miami Marlins don't plan to trade Giancarlo Stanton or Christian Yelich prior to the July 31 non-waiver trade deadline, the connections to the Philadelphia Phillies don't seem to be coming in any slower.

According to Jon Heyman of FanRag Sports, the Phillies are showing 'strong interest' in different Marlins outfielders, presumably Stanton and Yelich:

The St. Louis Cardinals, San Francisco Giants and Philadelphia Phillies are among teams showing strong interest in multiple Miami Marlins outfielders (Miami radio person Craig Mish first mentioned the Cardinals and Giants as a Stanton possibility and Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe mentioned the Phillies), and at least Marlins people seem to be viewing those three teams and one or two others as potential landing spots for Stanton eventually.

There doesn't seem to be any debate about the Phillies love for Yelich, who homered against them yesterday and is under team control through the 2022 season. Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports reported last week that the Phillies have been 'vocal' about their interest in the 25-year-old. Nick Cafardo of The Boston Globe reported last weekend that the interest in Yelich may be 'heating up.' Heyman said later in this report that the Phillies "are said to love Yelich."

The Stanton part if where things get interesting. Heyman says here that the Phillies are showing strong interest in 'multiple' Marlins outfielders, which based on the context of the rest of the piece refers to Stanton and Yelich. However, Rosenthal reported last week that while the Phillies have made their interest in Yelich known to the Marlins, they hadn't with Stanton. He didn't deny that the internal discussions had taken place, but said that people within both organizations had told him the two clubs hadn't formally discussed the idea of a potential trade. Heyman and Rosenthal, in my opinion, are the best two national baseball writers, so perhaps at the time of Rosenthal's report, the Phillies hadn't expressed interest in Stanton and have since done so. Or perhaps the two have heard different things.

Heyman is clear in the blockquoted part to say that people within the Marlins organization do feel that the Phillies could eventually be a place that they trade Stanton to.

Later in his article, Heyman said that Stanton's no-trade clause could put him in a position to block any trade agreed on in principle, including one to the Phillies. On this week's 80-08 Podcast, Jack Fritz and myself cited that and other reasons as to why we don't believe Stanton is a good fit for the Phillies. In a seperate piece, I noted that his 2020 opt-out, whether he exercises it or not, worries me:

While potential opt-outs actually make Harper and Machado more attractive to perspective suitors, a potential opt-out from Stanton makes him less attractive. Stanton, who is a few years older than Harper and Machado, can opt-out after 2020, his age-30 season. If he's playing at any level similar to what he is in 2017, he's likely to exercise this option. This will be after Harper and Machado both reset the MLB contract record books and in the same offseason that Mike Trout could potentially be a free-agent. So the Phillies, who may just be starting to become a contender at this time, would be forced to either lose potentially their best player or possibly give a 10-year deal to a player that's over 30 years old.

If Stanton doesn't opt-out, it's likely because he's struggled to stay healthy and/or underperformed. It seems fairly realistic to think that Stanton won't have better health as he gets older. When you couple a history of injuries and the fact that he's so reliant on being able to generate other-worldy power, the idea of having to pay Stanton $118 million between ages 34 and 37 is pretty scary.

There is, of course, nothing wrong with the Phillies internally discussing Stanton and even approaching the Marlins to see what it would take to land his services. However, in my opinion, Stanton isn't the type of player the Phillies want to take up the largest portion of their payroll. Whether general manager Matt Klentak and others within the organization eventually feel the same way remains to be seen.