Philadelphia Phillies: What happens if they “sell” at the trade deadline?

Conclusion

Look, there’s no guarantee that the Philadelphia Phillies will be looking to offload pieces this year. With the NL East in such a bad shape currently, there’s an equally high chance that the Phils will be in first place next week as there is them being in last place.

However, the point of this 2,000 word article was to highlight the possibility of Dombrowski beginning to look ahead to next season. The Phillies referred to 2021 as a “transitional year” during the offseason, and I’m not sure why that logic would have changed following a lackluster start to the season.

So much of this year’s team is built by bad Matt Klentak contracts, and so many of the organization’s pending free agents are not expected to return next year. Would offloading these players for future pieces really be the worst thing in the world? Sure, it may lower the team’s current quality by just a smidge, but it would also give Joe Girardi a chance to properly evaluate guys like Nick Maton, Spencer Howard, and Adonis Medina.

Figuring out if any of these players can contribute in 2022 is an underrated positive effect from this whole hypothetical.

Regardless, I expect Dombrowski to seriously reconstruct this team more so in his image moving forward. The current roster is a bit of a mess, and Dombrowski was brought in for the sole purpose of winning ballgames – as in like ASAP.

I’m simply making the argument that Dombrowski should begin that makeover project sooner rather than later.