Philadelphia Phillies are still long shots for Bryce Harper, despite upcoming meeting

As bad as it sounds, the Philadelphia Phillies still seem like a long shot when it comes to having a chance at landing Bryce Harper.

Philadelphia Phillies fans have been more than patient over waiting for an update in regards to the team’s chances landing Bryce Harper or Manny Machado in free agency, although it’s taken a little longer than expected.

While the Phillies seem to have made it clear their preference between the two would be Machado when seeing how they already met with the shortstop a few weeks ago, the team also knows they face stiff competition with other teams like the Chicago White Sox and New York Yankees.

Sooner or later, Philadelphia could find themselves in the middle of a bidding war to land Machado, which may also work in their favor as well since they do have the money to spend. But in the mean time, it looks like the Phillies are still keeping all of their options open if things actually don’t work out with Machado.

That’s where Harper comes back into play, as the outfielder who seemed like a longer shot a few weeks ago to join Philadelphia when looking at some of the interest he was gaining from other teams is all of a sudden finding his name in conversation again with the Phillies.

In fact, Jim Salisbury reported on Wednesday that a face-to-face meeting between the two parties is expected to take place at some point over the next week or so, which is great to hear, but also still tough to figure out.

Just because the Phillies appear to be getting a meeting with Harper doesn’t necessarily mean their chances of landing the star outfield are going to increase because once again, the competition is high between other teams as well.

Without question, joining a team with potential like Philadelphia could work wonders for a player like Harper, especially when seeing all of the extra games he would get to face his former team in the Washington Nationals.

However, Harper most likely views the possibility of joining a team like the Yankees or Los Angeles Dodgers as an opportunity to be part of an already serious contender.

Only time will tell when it comes to seeing how things play out in this meeting between the Phililes and Harper. But when seeing how Philadelphia seemed to already be a long shot based off the last couple of weeks, would an upcoming meeting with Harper really change anything?