The younger outfielders can take their time developing and there will be less need to sign an expensive veteran if the hairy Georgian, who's hitting .312 since May 3, keeps this up.
We are witnessing the very best version of Brandon Marsh.
There's no telling if it will last, but if this is even an approximation of what Marsh really is, it answers a lot of questions and solves a lot of problems for the Phillies -- especially as those questions pertain to outfielders Justin Crawford, the Phillies' No. 3 prospect, and Johan Rojas, whom the franchise consistently has denied the chance to properly develop.
Entering Monday night in Cincinnati, Marsh had an OPS of .845 since May 3, or his last 77 games. That is his best OPS in any span of 75 games in his career, according to Stathead.com.
By comparison, since May 3, Marsh is outpacing veterans Trea Turner (.774), J.T. Realmuto (.743), and Nick Castellanos (.713), and they're averaging more than $23 million this season. Marsh, in his fourth season, is making $3 million in his first year of arbitration. He is arbitration-eligible for the next two seasons.
We sometimes forget that Marsh remains a relatively young player. He's played 566 major league games and has an OPS of .743. He's 27.
When Shane Victorino was 27, his OPS through 487 games was .762. Victorino was a late-blooming Phillies outfielder. Maybe Marsh will be, too.
If he is, that looks good for both the Phillies' roster and their financial future.
It's always been my contention that every major league prospect should spend a full season, start to finish, at triple A. He sees a better standard of pitching, especially from veterans with strategies and more advanced off-speed pitches, and he grinds through 140 or so games against men who have to shave more than twice a month.
Still, promoting Crawford has been a tantalizing option.
That's because the Phillies' outfield has, to date, generally been a disappointment. This has led to continued calls to bring up Crawford, who, with a .330 average and 36 steals, as well as an .851 OPS, is a candidate for International League MVP. That's an award won in 2005 by Victorino and in 2017 by Rhys Hoskins, both of whom got lots of triple-A at-bats.
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Through the slumps of Marsh and $10 million free agent Max Kepler, the ineptness of Rojas, the continued mediocrity of Castellanos, and assorted injuries, the Phillies' front office has been tempted to promote Crawford several times this season. It deserves credit for resisting those temptations.
At the All-Star break, the Phillies' outfield ranked 25th in OPS at .685, but the addition of Harrison Bader has done little to change that, since they're now 24th and just six points better, according to FanGraphs.com. They also ranked 29th in both defensive runs saved and outs above average; they are slightly better now, at 27th and 25th, respectively. At any rate, thanks mainly to Marsh, they got a little bit better without disrupting Crawford's development schedule.
They disrupted Rojas' development in 2023, when the called him up from double A in the middle of the season as an injury replacement. His .302 average the rest of the season fooled the Phils into believing he could learn on the job, but he's been a disaster since, with a .237 average and a .591 OPS. Even his defense has suffered. When the Phillies traded for the journeyman Bader at the deadline, they sent Rojas to triple A, where, as of Monday, he'd played 16 games in his professional career -- eight last season, eight this season.
That translated to just 72 plate appearances. That's not nearly enough.
The best homegrown Phillies have spent ample time at triple A. Jimmy Rollins got more than 500 plate appearances, and he was an All-Star as a major league rookie. Chase Utley got more than 1,000, and he's the best second baseman in Phillies history. Ryan Howard, the 2005 Rookie of the Year and 2006 NL MVP, got almost 400 over two seasons. Victorino got almost 900 between the Dodgers and Phillies organizations. Hoskins got 475 in 2017, and when he left Philly via free agency after five-plus seasons he had an OPS of .846.
By contrast, top prospects Domonic Brown and Scott Kingery were shortchanged at triple A. They, like Rojas, crashed in the majors.
Marsh's slow development might be connected to his lack of triple-A experience, too.
Minor league baseball shut down in 2020 because of COVID-19, and that was the year Marsh would have built on his strong 2019 double-A season in Mobile, Ala., where he hit .300 with an .811 OPS in 412 plate appearances. He was the Angels' No. 1 prospect in 2021 when he was called up in mid-July despite having had just 110 plate appearances in 24 triple-A games due to a shoulder issue. The Angels needed help, since Mike Trout and Justin Upton were injured. About a year later the Phillies traded for Marsh, and he's been on their major league roster ever since.
Eventually, his lack of seasoning showed.
After a promising Phillies season three years ago and a strong follow-up in 2023, he reverted to his anxious, twitchy mannerisms in the batter's box and started chasing pitches out of the strike zone. He went hitless in April before a hamstring injury landed him on the injured list for two weeks.
Maybe he's finally on the right track.
When Marsh returned from the injured list, he stopped chasing. A left-handed hitter, he focused on hitting balls to the left-center-field alley. It's working, ever better. In his last 10 games entering Monday, his OPS was 1.520, with four home runs, five doubles, and seven RBIs. He remains in a platoon with Bader -- Marsh is hitting just .216 against lefties this season -- but Bader started Monday's game in Cincinnati hitting just .220 against lefties, so Marsh might yet earn full-time status this season.
And if that happens, suddenly the Phillies' outfield projection looks a lot more promising.
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There is a reality in which the Phillies' opening-day outfield in 2026 looks like this:
Marsh in left field, Crawford in center field or vice versa, since there are rumblings that Crawford might be better used in left field. Castellanos plays out the last year of his contract in right field, or maybe he plays left field, where he can do less harm. Total cost: Maybe $26 million.
In 2027 things could be even cheaper, with Marsh in his third year of arbitration, Crawford in his second full season, and Rojas, with a few hundred triple-A plate appearances on his resumé, in his first year of arbitration: say, $13 million, soup-to-nuts.
Of course, the Phillies always could upgrade the position in the offseason. They also could move shortstop Trea Turner to the outfield to accommodate No. 2 prospect Aidan Miller, who has begun to heat up at double-A Reading.
However things develop, if the version of Brandon Marsh that the Phillies have seen since May 3 is the real Brandon Marsh, their outfield plans will be much simpler to contemplate.