If Phils court Harper and Machado, Kapler can’t be out of order
PHILADELPHIA » For years, that has been him in the ondeck circle, swinging around a weighted wallet, waiting for his turn to take a championship cut. Seven days after the conclusion of the World Series, he should pardon that reference, John Middleton will be up to bat.
Ever careful not to break any tampering rules, yet never denying that he was rich and willing enough to make any baseball fantasy happen, the Phillies’ owner was waiting for the 2018-2019 offseason. That’s when Bryce Harper and Manny Machado likely will be available for purchase. And that’s when, and how, he could make Philadelphia a baseball city again.
Since he has said he would return the Phillies to the World Series or die trying, and since his fans had been made to wait out a rebuilding process that this season began to show progress, Middleton will have nowhere to hide. He either offers to outspend everyone for Machado or Harper or both, or he has to stop making promises. By Friday, a report from Fancred Sports was that many major-league executives would not be surprised if the Phillies sign both superstars. That will probably take $800,000,000, or $40 million a year for 10 years for each. Harper is 25, Machado 26. It would work. And even with an additional $80 million next season, the Phillies’ payroll would not be baseball’s heaviest.
But whether Middleton has the resources or the readiness to make that move is not the question. He does. The question, the one that could scuttle that grand plan before Middleton has his opportunity to drape pinstriped uniforms on two developing Hall of Famers for a photo-op is this: Would any superstar be put off by an operation where players are subjected to drastic day-to-day assignments and batting-order spots?
“How about a hypothetical profile?” Gabe Kapler responded Friday, before a game against the Miami Marlins. When he was interrupted with the specific names of Machado and Harper, the Phillies’ manager plowed on. He avoided names, but he was hip to the spirit of the discussion. “A high on-base guy, big power-guy, and a track record of success? That guy would almost always hit in the two- or fourhole. Sometimes he might hit three or four, but almost always in the two or four. It’s very similar to the way you’ve seen me deploy Rhys Hoskins. I’ve hit him almost exclusively in the two and the four. “
Harper would fit that profile. And maybe it wouldn’t bother him at all that the Phillies’ day-to-day lineups are as difficult to predict as Doug Pederson’s next trick play. In Washington this season, Harper has hit third 75 times, second 26 and cleanup 25. Twelve times, he’s led off. So he is used to lineup mobility.
Kapler’s reluctance to bat his better players third is data-driven. The explanation shortened, he prefers to hit them second, for his numbers say that it gives him a better chance of that player coming to bat late in a game. From there, he is OK with cleanup, for the customary, RBI-opportunity reasons. Third? He doesn’t see the value. But it would be fascinating to see how he would treat Harper, who hits third roughly three times more than he hits anywhere else.
Machado, too, is a threehole hitter, having started there 109 times this season for the Orioles and Dodgers. He also had 36 starts as a leadoff hitter. The Phillies’ most pricey, every-dayplayer free agent last offseason, Carlos Santana, was used to the lineup line-dance, having started roughly the same number of 2017 Cleveland Indians games hitting leadoff, fourth, fifth and sixth. For Kapler, Santana was most often started at cleanup, followed by second and fifth. More recently, he’s had nine starts at leadoff.
“Santana, because he’s been so valuable in moving him around, you’ve seen us be a little more liberal with mixing him up,” Kapler said. “And he’s been really good in the leadoff spot. But that’s what you would see with that sort of offensive profile.”
Times and mores change. But in 2008, Charlie Manuel hit Ryan Howard 154 times at cleanup and Chase Utley 128 times in the threespot. Jimmy Rollins started 127 times as the leadoff hitter. Star players in defined roles. And it worked.
Earlier this season, after Kapler had spent the first handful of games pulling his starting pitchers out of games early, newly signed Jake Arrieta made it clear that he was having none of that. Nor did he seem entertained by the concept of hitting eighth in any batting order.
Quietly, Kapler treated Arrieta the way a former Cy Young winner and recent world champion expects. Should the Phillies purchase Machado, Harper or both, Kapler would probably accommodate them with day-to-day lineup stability.
Kapler spent most of the season trying to keep a team without an acknowledged superstar in contention. He did what he could with his lineups, looking for advantages, as he’s said, “on the margins.”
If he has two such players next season, that kind of batting-order carry-on should end. Because for his $80 million a year, John Middleton should expect those margins to be filled.