Philadelphia Phillies 2025 preview
The variance of the Major League Baseball playoffs was on display for the NL East champion Philadelphia Phillies. After making the World Series in 2022 as a Wild Card team and Game 7 of the NLCS in 2023 as a Wild Card team, the Phillies won their first division title since 2011. And, much like that 2011 season, they lost in the NLDS. The Mets knocked off the Phillies and kickstarted the offseason earlier than the team and their fans wanted.
With a roster very similar to last season, Philly looks poised to run it back as a playoff team. Whether or not that means they do so as a division champion or not remains to be seen, but a little bit of bullpen turnover is really the only story here. With Max Kepler and Jordan Romano as the noteworthy free agent signings, and a trade for Jesus Luzardo, a lot of familiar faces will take the field on Opening Day at Nationals Park.
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This is the true “if it ain’t broke” kind of philosophy. This core was good enough to get to a World Series and is good enough to win one. The bench could use an upgrade, but the Phillies have developed well enough internally to get the assets that they need in late July to fill in any holes that have emerged. The starting staff might be the deepest in baseball and the bullpen looks quite strong.
In other words, weaknesses are few and far between and there are a lot of potential platoons to maximize the talent on the ballclub. Rob Thomson, who is 250-185 in the regular season in about 2.75 seasons as the skipper after the firing of Joe Girardi, has a pretty plug-and-play lineup, so long as everybody stays healthy.
But, with few questions and uncertainties, expectations become really high and that is absolutely the case for the Phillies.
2025 Philadelphia Phillies Odds
(odds from DraftKings as of Feb. 23)
World Series: +1200
NL Pennant: +650
NL East: +215
Win Total: 91.5 (+100/-120)
Make Playoffs: Yes -265 / No +220
Philadelphia Phillies Preview: Offense
Honestly, there isn’t really much to say about the Phillies offense. What you saw last season is what you are likely to get this season, as Philadelphia is running it back with almost the same group. Max Kepler is the only new addition and the Phillies will hope that he can bounce back from a down year and replicate his 2023, in which he batted .260/.332/.484 with a .348 wOBA and a career-best 123 wRC+.
Beyond that, a top-five offense returns intact. The Phillies were fourth in wOBA at .325, but eighth in wRC+ at 108, as Citizens Bank Park is a pretty good offensive venue and is treated as such in that park-adjusted metric. Bryce Harper (145 wRC+), Kyle Schwarber (135), Trea Turner (124), and Alec Bohm (115) are all back after being anywhere from 15% to 45% above league average. J.T. Realmuto, who was limited to just 99 games last season, could be a bounce back candidate with a higher xwOBA than wOBA and also the injury that cost him some games.
The only below-average regular was Bryson Stott, but he created enough value on defense and on the bases to effectively be a league-average player with 1.9 fWAR. One area where I am interested to see if the Phillies improve is the power department. They hit 220 homers in 2023 and only hit 198 in 2024. I don’t really see anything in the batted ball distribution or contact authority metrics that raises a red flag for me, but something seemed to have been a little amiss last season.
I will also add that the Phillies’ depth concerns me. None of the projected bench players look like promising bats. Edmundo Sosa did have a 103 wRC+ in his 274 PA, but I think he overachieved a bit, given that he doesn’t walk or hit for much power. That is an area that the Phillies may need to address, as I mentioned above, but that’s what the Trade Deadline is for as a contender.
It does, however, lower their ceiling a bit in my mind because of how stark and drastic the drop-off from a starter to a reserve looks to be. The Phillies are not doing a great job right now of developing internally. Only nine of the 40 players on the roster are homegrown talents and top position player prospect Aidan Miller finished with just 22 plate appearances at Double-A last season.
And that was the thing for the Phillies last season. Realmuto missed time, but the top seven guys in plate appearances all had at least 476 and played at least 121 games. The Phillies were truly blessed on the health front and I don’t know how sustainable that is with a core of guys in their age-32 or higher seasons.
Philadelphia Phillies Preview: Pitching
The deepest rotation in baseball might be even deeper this season. While the offense wasn’t very exciting to talk about because it’s basically the same as last season, Jesus Luzardo is a newcomer to the Philadelphia rotation. He joins Zack Wheeler, Cristopher Sanchez, Aaron Nola, and Ranger Suarez to form what I’d call the best starting five in baseball.
We’ll see what version of Luzardo the Phillies get, but if they get the 2023 version, look out. That version of Luzardo had a 3.58 ERA with a 3.96 xERA and a 3.55 FIP, good for 3.8 fWAR. Most importantly, that version of the now 27-year-old made 32 starts and threw 178.2 innings. Unfortunately, the 2024 version of Luzardo had a 5.00 ERA with a 4.59 xERA and a 4.26 FIP in 66.2 innings. Honestly, the Phillies would take the 2022 version that had a 3.32/3.39/3.12 pitcher slash in 100.1 innings.
One thing that the Phillies have had incredible success with is pitcher health. Last season, they had four starters make at least 27 starts. Wheeler has made at least 26 starts in each of the last four seasons and exactly 32 in three of them. Nola has made at least 32 starts in each of the last six non-COVID seasons. Sanchez made 31 starts last season and Suarez has made at least 22 in each of the last three seasons. He’s been the only one to really run into injury issues, but he’s been worth at least 2.3 fWAR in each of the last four and has been tremendously effective when he’s been healthy.
I think the Phillies feel confident in their ability to keep Luzardo healthy. I think they love where the rest of the rotation is. It seemed like Nola was more comfortable after re-upping with the Phillies. He was able to return to form last season after posting a 4.46 ERA and tying his highest career FIP in 2023. Sanchez emerged as a reliable stud and Suarez kept up his stellar performance.
In today’s highly-specialized game, the Phillies were one of four teams to get at least 900 innings from the starting staff. Being able to limit the exposure and workload on the bullpen is important, especially because getting length from the starters often means you don’t have to use your lesser arms to get outs. Only the Braves and Royals got more fWAR from starting pitchers. If the Phillies can scale back their high HR/FB%, this will be an even better rotation. They had the third-highest HR/FB%, but that’s sometimes a byproduct of throwing a ton of strikes.
While the bullpen looks very similar to last season’s group, Jordan Romano is a nice add and I really like that the Phillies have a full season of Tanner Banks after getting him from the White Sox. The bullpen was such a weakness a few seasons ago, but Dave Dombrowski has rebuilt this group into one that should be a top-10 unit.
Philadelphia Phillies Player to Watch
3B Alec Bohm
For parts of 2024, it felt like we were seeing the Bohm breakout. From Opening Day through the end of August, Bohm hit .290/.343/.462 with a .345 wOBA and a 122 wRC+. In September, he inexplicably crashed, batting .170/.204/.298 with a 37 wRC+. He struck out over 20% of the time and wound up looking awful in the brief four-game postseason appearance against the Mets.
Bohm also had a miserable May with a 78 wRC+. He had a poor August, too. It was quite the roller coaster ride that ultimately resulted in a season that nearly doubled his career fWAR total. He turns 29 in August, so I think this will be the season where he needs to define a new ceiling or we can reasonably assume that this is the player that he is. He’s a valuable hitter who puts the bat to the ball. He’s worked incredibly hard on his defense to go from a major liability to an okay fielder. The batted ball distribution will limit his power potential, but he was a clutch bat last season with a .303 BA with men on base and a .301 BA and 144 wRC+ with RISP.
I guess I’m just curious if there’s another level he can find.
Philadelphia Phillies Season Win Total Odds & Prediction
Nothing against the Phillies, but some season previews are more interesting and exciting to write than others. This one really wasn’t. This is a very good team that could be a very great team and would need a lot of things to go wrong to fall well short of expectations. The 2024 team won 95 games and went over this win total, though both the Braves and Mets do look stronger this season and I believe that the NL is stronger as a whole.
So, I can understand why there’s a possibility of the Phillies winning four fewer games than last season. Like I said, they were remarkably fortunate on the health front with their four key starters staying healthy almost all season and most of their position players out there on a regular basis.
I think this is lined pretty accurately. For the sake of making a pick, because I do on every team, I guess I lean Over because of the possibility that Luzardo is a difference-maker.
Slight Lean: Over 91.5
