The Phillies announced a shakeup in the front office this afternoon. Assistant general managers Bryan Minniti and Scott Proefrock will no longer hold those positions, although both will remain consultants to the organization in 2022. Josh Bonifay is also out as director of player development. He has been offered a position on the pro scouting staff in 2022. Jorge Velandia will take over the player development department on an interim basis.
Philadelphia hired Minniti away from the Diamondbacks organization in 2016. The Phils noted in their press release that he has been in charge of the amateur scouting department over the past few seasons. Proefrock had been in the organization since 2008, serving as interim general manager after the club parted ways with Ruben Amaro Jr. late in the 2015 season. Bonifay was a more recent addition to the staff, signing on in 2018.
The Phillies have had plenty of success in free agency in recent years, but they’ve struggled to pair that with homegrown talent. Selecting Aaron Nola in the first round in 2014 was a huge success, but none of their following few top picks (Cornelius Randolph in 2015, Mickey Moniak in 2016, Adam Haseley in 2017) has yet lived up to expectations. 2018 #3 overall pick Alec Bohm had a fantastic rookie year in 2020, but he’s slumped badly enough in his sophomore season he was optioned back to Triple-A last weekend.
Even independent of those results, it’s not especially surprising to see the Phils making some changes within the front office. All three of the departing executives predated current president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski, who was hired as baseball ops head this past winter. Dombrowski and general manager Sam Fuld always looked likely to reshape the front office a bit relative to where it stood under previous GM Matt Klentak. Velandia and Ned Rice — who served as interim GM between Klentak’s departure and Dombrowski’s hiring last offseason — remain as assistant GM’s.
Must be nice to be a fan of a team that has accountability
Accountability is overrated if the replacements aren’t the most qualified for the job. It seems the Phillies often hire people they’re more comfortable and chummy with, rather than the best people for the job.
I guess fleecing the Rangers in the Kyle Gibson trade couldn’t save their jobs
Waaay too early to judge that trade. Howard isn’t supposed to be in the majors yet. He may develop into something special. Maybe not, but too early to say.
I just don’t believe the right people to get Howard on track are the Rangers rookie co-pitching coaches Doug Mathis and Brendan Sagara. Howard’s a phenomenal talent, and might one day be something special, but I highly doubt it’s for the Rangers. They are a very poorly ran organization. One of the worst in baseball. I’m not knocking Howard. I feel bad for the guy.
HEAD CASE WILL NEVER TURN INTO ANYTHING MORE THANK KYLE KENDRICK
Shocking really… Andy MacPhail…..
I know Right… Wish the Reds would act like that
You can’t just sign FA’s and trade to make a winning team. You actually need to develop. Padres should learn this too.
The Philles flat out can’t draft. Had a 5+ year rebuild and completely whiffed on all their top picks outside of Nola. Padres had a nice young core building, but Preller traded most of it to be a 3rd place team
Their scouting and player development suck. The way they’re going, they’ll have to blow past the luxury tax to put a team on the field that can compete all year.
[aside] so when do we tell him about how highly their system ranks, and about that Tatis guy?
Not a damn person knew Tatis would be what he is. That’s why he was traded for James Shields. And right now, the Padres basically have zero developed players contributing on their big league roster. But please, go off, bro.
But if you can’t develop what do you do? Just give up for 20 years? FA signings can help fix poor drafting. I agree it’s not the only answer, but sometimes you don’t have a choice. That’s what the Phillies are doing. It’s not like they traded away anyone that turned into something great…other than J.P. Crawford.
Dombrowski is probably upset he doesn’t have top prospects to trade away
Dombrowski should have stayed in Nashville to continue his work to bring us an MLB team.
He could always trade Rhys Hoskins and start a mini rebuild. And throw in Aaron Nola for some spider tack
Ranks are just numbers though. It’s all it is. How many top “can’t miss” prospects are actually misses? Tons. So dark side your post is a mute point. Tatis granted is a stud but that comes with baggage as well. Injury prone so far to start a career. Sure moving him to the OF is an attempt to help quell that but he got hurt running bases. Plus now he has to deal with a wall and full speed sprinting of a neighboring OF that he can collide with. So with that Padres “handling and pile” of top prospects and what they’re doing is suspect at best.
they still have plenty of talent in that system. lets be patient.
I talk as much trash on AJ as the next guy, but it’s not like they’re a bad team. Their best player has struggled to stay on the field and they’re 10 games over .500. That they’re in 3rd is as much a product of being in the same division as the Dodgers and the Giants as it is anything they did or didn’t do on the field.
I’d be much more frustrated to be a Mets fan or a Phillies fan, who went for it and are hovering around .500 in the weakest division in baseball.
The NL East is not the weakest division. Not even close.
The Phillies are the least patient organization in the league. They will never commit to a proper rebuild (3 to 5 years) because they’re too busy coveting what other teams have.
The fanbase have no stomach for player development either. So yeah, they’re basically screwed until they find a GM with some backbone.
The Phillies were rebuilding for 8 years before making a big FA signing. Patience is not the issue. Failure to scout, draft and develop is. It’s not like they jumped a rebuild too early. It’s that they failed to rebuild throughout the history of the franchise.
Dope ass comment bro.
I, along with many others have plenty of patience for player development and watched them rebuild for almost a decade. Stop talking out of your @ss.
You got patience huh? The Phillies had no busy signing Bryce Harper with that roster. They literally had no core of position players to build around. It was a stupid signing, and your record reflects that… enjoy the offseason.
The Harper signing made plenty of sense. Just because your team can’t afford a $300 million player doesn’t mean that the Phillies, or any other team for that matter, shouldn’t have signed him.
The Harper/Machado free agency was an absolute rarity with two star players hitting free agency in their mid twenties. Both teams are now markedly better by making those signings. I am thrilled to have Harper and I’m glad that the front office made the move.
As for the Phillies having ‘no business’ making that signing, OK buddy. More like all about business. Considering he brought in excess of $100 million between merch and from the ticket sales spike that occurred at the signing announcement in the first year of his contract alone, I’d say it was a good move.
Good analysis of Bryces impact
They started spending without a real major league core in place. Which positions player are homegrown?
Hoskins anddddd Bohm if he ever gets it figured out.
The core of a championship team was never built. They attempted to plug those holes with expensive veterans. This is what you get. Teams are not built in free agency.
I don’t care if you rebuilt for 15 years or 2 years when you had a core like the Phillies—it wasn’t going to work out.
I think you meant Padres
The Phillies need to hire a GM of bullpen development. I say this half jokingly, but only half jokingly. DD has never been good at this aspect but it is critical to a team’s success today. Recognize it’s not a strength and put someone in charge who is.
Phillies bullpen, which was awful early, has really improved thanks to DD’s moves.
The Phillies should have fired the entire front office a couple years ago. Ruben Amaro left them in a terrible place but the next regime didn’t do themselves any favors. They were rebuilding for a long time and have almost nothing to show for it
@Ronk325 all of this. So many people assumed they didn’t try to rebuild. What you stated is the real issue; they did rebuild, more than once in fact. They just have little to show for it.
Obviously the rebuild wasn’t over, but the Phillies spent money on Bryce Harper anyway. It sent the wrong message to the fanbase. They weren’t ready to contend before they added his $340MM contract, snd they still aren’t ready now.
Remember when signing Harper prevented them from signing other FAs like Wheeler and Realmuto? Oh wait…it didn’t. Harper is one of the better players in the league. If a big market team can afford him, they should pay him. He’s well worth the AAV and they’ll still have financial flexibility next year.
I smell jealousy
Annmd that’s why your roster stinks.
Thanks. Please enjoy your good team. Let us suffer in peace.
Look, I’m not bagging or trolling on Phillies fans. You guys are awesome fans! You deserve better. The reality is, however, you can’t spend your way out of mediocrity when your scouting and development is weak. You only end up with a few really good players and a .500 record that way.
No one denies that, but my counter point is simply, the Phillies didn’t lose anything by signing these FAs. In fact, they’ve improved a terrible team and turned it into a mediocre one. They’re technically in the middle of a division reason, albeit it’s only because the division is severely flawed. The problem would be if they were trading great prospects away for older stars. That’s not what they’re doing. Signing Bryce, Wheeler and Realmuto did not impact the team in any negative way. It didn’t block talent from developing. There’s no talent to develop. It seems like this FO shakeup is a step in the right direction.
tl:dr version: Since the Phillies consistently failed to develop a talented core, they went out and bought one. It’s not all doom and gloom. They aren’t a million miles away, but they aren’t great.
Mets fan here. The Harper signing hasn’t hindered them at all. Guys a stud and they got prime years from him. At least the Phils had the cajones to drop down the cash when their rebuild(s) didn’t work out. Coming from a White Sox fan I’d assume he’d actually understand and appreciate that. Just enjoy your great team for the first time in a long time dude. People are rooting for you guys. Damn.
VonPurpleHayes
No one denies that, but my counter point is simply, the Phillies didn’t lose anything by signing these FAs.
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That’s one way of looking at it. But another way is, what have they accomplished? Is there an end game that results in a playoff appearance, let alone a WS?
One way I like to look at things is, if you are a .500 team, what is going to improve enough to make you a .550 team? Teams like the Tigers, for example, have a worse record, but they could spend $50M in the off-season and still have a small payroll. I’m not seeing a trajectory, but maybe that is what the firings are all about.
@JoeBrady This I agree with. Their trajectory has simply been to improve what they have, but that’s not enough. They need to fix their scouting and development because what they have isn’t great.
Remember when they thought it was Kapler that was the problem? Oooops!
Kapler is not the reason why the Giants are in first. He’s also not the reason why the Phillies didn’t make the playoffs.
He’s still an over managing, self righteous, snobby, prima donna nut job. He’s the perfect fit for San Fran.
This is clearly a step in the right direction. All aspects of player development need to be overhauled. Now if they are smart they will start poaching the front offices of LA and Tampa Bay and learn how to use their financial clout to supplement and build their farm instead of buying their way out of mistakes.
Right, if I’m the Phillies owner, I definitely poach any and everyone I can away from both TB and especially LA.
Those are both two first-class ran organizations, and they should put their money there first!!
The Phillies draft history just has been horrible. 15-18 they had 4 consecutive top10 picks including a first overall and only bohm looks like he could be a decent player (a good year and a bad one means there still is hope).
I’m also surprised about the lack of development. Their minor league hitting coordinator Jason ochart is a driveline guy who is very smart and uses all the latest biomechanics tech. He did get some results and many of the development failures predate him (was hired like in 2018 I think) but je didn’t have a huge breakthrough either, I wonder if he gets enough support.
This should have been done years ago but finally.Now this will buy them more time saying this can’t change overnight.Hopefully I don’t have to hear anymore how we are a family.Just bring in BASEBALL people for thes jobs.As Dombrowski hinted he needs more old school baseball people not just analytics.Next big move hopefully is at the end of the year a new manager.
Steve Cohen, you paying attention?
I’ve been saying this for a couple of years. They tried to shortcut the rebuild. It started with signing Santana for $20M per without knowing if Hoskins could play the OF, which he can’t. Then they signed Arrieta to a $25M per contract, coming off of a 4.16 FIP.
Then trading Crawford for Segura, and then signing McCutchen.
The players they got were okay, but between them, it added $75M+. Almost overnight, they went from a young cheap team, to a middle-aged expensive team.
FWIW, it is basically what Preller just did.
The Phil’s will still be playing second fiddle to the Mets for years to come, lol. You can try to change, but you’re still bottom feeders. LEARN TO DEVELOP PITCHING, just dont take our guys.
2nd fiddle to the Mets? What did the Mets do? If you want to say the Braves sure. You can even call out the Nats for winning the WS. But the Mets? Nah. They’ve done nothing and in fact are currently sitting behind the Phillies for the 2nd year in a row.
MetsFan23 is a parody of MetsFan22, everything it says is a joke
Haha. I actually didn’t notice the 3.
at least we are not dumpster divers and think every player we sign is taking us to the promise land.you have a CRAP owner and even more dummy fans Mutts suck
Moniak with an ops+ of 9. That’s not easy to do!
Something needed to be done. There is too much of a history of drafting players that just flat out bust. Larry Greene, Shane Watson are just two 1st round picks that busted.
To me, the mindset needs to change. That starts top down.
They need to fire the interntional scouting guy too he is a phillies lifer and has produced nothing.Remember if the owner does not allow the money to sign the draft picks and international players then it does not matter who is there.They have not drafted certain players because they new it would cost more made 2nd round guys #1’s
In the 60’s I grew up an Indians fan. Fosse, McDowell, Tiant, Seibert. Not to mention my Beloved Colovito from the early days. But I left them at the end of the decade and became an Orioles fan. We’ll I gotta say I’m tired of my O’s and it’s taken awhile. I still live near. But gonna hang another hat on my visor as my team. It’s gotta be East coast. Choices are limited. Phillies, Rays or Reds. Don’t want to root for the others here and can’t see myself pulling for Guardians right now. No matter though, I love baseball.
Poorly constructed team with players with no heart. Blow this mess up.
Someone get them a cardiologist? That’s serious!