The Phillies have done nothing yet towards a rebuild, since an offseason in which shortstop Jimmy Rollins, outfielder Marlon Byrd, and pitcher Antonio Bastardo were traded. Phillies manager Ryne Sandberg resigned rather than wait another day for nothing to happen, and the Phillies may or may not be adding a president in the near future. While the Phillies are seemingly in a state of flux, teams are not coming to the Phillies ready to deal.
Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe writes:
What’s frustrating for the Phillies is that there seems to be preparation and scouting for possible proposals for their players, but not much has been offered. The Phillies don’t want to wait until the trade deadline for a big flurry. They’d rather do it little by little, but nobody is cooperating.
Speaking of the front office flux, Cafardo added a bunch of names to the list of general manager candidates to Matt Klentak, originally mentioned by Todd Zolecki of MLB.com:
Andy MacPhail, future team president, Phillies — It’ll be interesting to see whom MacPhail might name as his general manager. There are a lot out there to choose from, including Kevin Towers, Jim Bowden, Jim Duquette, and Wayne Krivsky, as well as a number of assistant GMs. An interesting name: Brady Anderson.
Some of those names have not been active in baseball in years.
As we saw last year, the trade deadline can be a very busy time and the Phillies could risk doing nothing again, should they find themselves in too many conversations at the same time. If the Phillies are serious about changing the culture of the club, sooner is better. So far the only one who has done anything to change the Phillies culture is Ryne Sandberg.
