Philadelphia Phillies: The JT Realmuto situation is trending towards disaster

Are the Philadelphia Phillies preparing for life without JT Realmuto?

The Philadelphia Phillies really set themselves up for criticism when they signed off on trading Sixto Sanchez for catcher JT Realmuto last offfseason. Sanchez had been their highest rated prospect down in the minor leagues, and Realmuto was set to be an impending free agent in just two years. Despite the controversial nature of the move, things seemed to be leaning in the Phillies’ favor after just one year of Realmuto.

The star catcher finished his debut season with the Phils receiving an entire mountain of awards. He won a Silver Slugger, a Gold Glove, and was the team’s lone All Star. The collective census around the MLB was that Realmuto was undoubtedly the “best catcher in baseball”, and that the Phillies had pretty adamantly won their trade with the Marlins.

One year later, and things aren’t looking too hot anymore.

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Not only is Sixto Sanchez the second coming of Pedro Martinez himself, but Realmuto has still yet to receive a contract extension from his current team. Barring an unforeseen last second agreement, Realmuto will hit the open market as a complete unrestricted free agent. A lot of this has been drummed up to difficult contract negotiations due to COVID and a luxury tax concerned owner (hi John Middleton), but Matt Klentak’s recent comments on the situation really cast a depressing light on the situation.

"“We would love to have JT but when you make that trade, you’re trading for 2 years of control & you know that. So, Sixto looked really good against us. He’s looked good this year. But we’ve had 2 very productive years with JT as well.” -Phillies GM Matt Klentak on Monday"

For starters, Klentak is completely false in his assessment of the trade. Trading away an exciting pitching prospect for “2 very productive years” of Realmuto is almost certainly not good business, and that’s with the understanding that Realmuto has played at an elite level two seasons in a row. Even if the Phillies re-sign Realmuto, they have still likely lost their trade with the Marlins considering just how great Sixto has looked (2.75 ERA through six starts).

Secondly, this doesn’t scream of man who is inherently optimistic about his team’s chances to finalize a contract extension. Whether it’s a decision that Klentak is making himself, or something being imposed on him from a higher power (once again, hi John Middleton), the likelihood that Realmuto hits the open market and at least entertains offers from other teams seems all but locked in at the moment.

Klentak is really bad at his job, we should all know this by now, but the catastrophic failure that would be not re-signing JT Realmuto isn’t necessarily all on his shoulders. For what it’s worth, Klentak will likely get axed this offseason, leaving this mess to an entirely new GM who has to figure out a way to keep his team’s superstar catcher away from the newly billionaire-backed New York Mets.

Jack Fritz of SportsRadio 94WIP wrote a whole piece about how a majority of the blame should be placed on Philadelphia Phillies owner John Middleton, and I couldn’t agree more (The J.T Realmuto Fiasco is on John Middleton, not Matt Klentak).

After Tuesday’s double-header, it’s entirely possible that the Phillies will have just four regular season games of JT Realmuto left. Losing a player of his caliber would obviously set the team back an absurd amount, but the cultural impact might be even worse. Bryce Harper loves him, the fans love him, Joe Girardi loves him, etc. This is a guy who you simply don’t let walk out your door, and yet, it looks like the Philadelphia Phillies are seriously flirting with the idea of allowing Realmuto to dawn new uniform colors in 2021.