I want to take a break from the Bryce Harper/Manny Machado rumor mill madness for a moment and offer some thoughts on where I’m at with this process as spring training gets underway. So indulge me.

With sports, with life, really, it’s often easy to get swept away by a moment. It’s easy to make a situation into more than it really is, or assign it more worth and importance than it actually holds. I write this to acknowledge that I’m perhaps knowingly about to commit this very mistake, but I don’t think I am.

After all, Matt Klentak has to know. John Middleton must know, too. Both men must realize that they currently exist only one move away from completing with authority the final touch of an epic offseason that could:

  • pay off with the much-anticipated return of championship-caliber baseball to this city
  • alter their legacies and raise their own profiles as two of the shrewdest and calculated negotiators in the sport

After last season’s September of baseball that looked like the game’s reenactment of Weekend at Bernie’s, the Phillies’ additions of veteran players Jean Segura and Andrew McCutchen made for good first attempts to ensure there will be no sequel. Adding reliever David Robertson was a big boost to the bullpen. The deal to acquire J.T. Realmuto last week signaled, in earnest, that the front office is aggressively looking to end the team’s seven-season playoff drought. Aaron Nola’s arbitration-avoiding four-year contract extension gives the budding ace some stability, but it’s team-friendly nonetheless. Yet another good deal.

All of these moves should be met with both applause and optimism, and, truthfully, with or without Harper or Machado, the Phillies have likely built themselves into a team that will be a part of the postseason chase come the season’s final weeks. In fact, and I know that nobody wants to hear this, but alternate paths exist that don’t include either star player that can still lead the team to its ultimate goal. True enough, but if you’re either man at the heart of the Phillies’ renewed pursuit of greatness, here’s a philosophical question to ponder:

Why gingerly tread with apprehension along an uncertain alternate path when you can, quite literally, parade right down Broad Street like the god damn rock stars you would be by signing one of these guys?

No doubt each player’s preference is a big part of the equation, but I’m operating under the assumption held by most around the game regarding the determining factor – the best offer wins. And maybe as I evaluate this situation I’m setting myself up to be called out by the Freezing Cold Takes guy. Say the Phillies sign Harper or Machado and then flame out. It wouldn’t be the first time this city saw a hype machine sputter and malfunction. Sup, 2011 Eagles? Hell, maybe an analytical-thinker like Klentak arrives at this fork in the road and decides he finds it more gratifying to take the one less traveled. Skip the franchise-altering mega-signing and find “value in the margins.” Those things are possible.

Still, the decision to go all-in right now, pack Citizens Bank Park to capacity every night, and tell the rest of Major League Baseball, “We’re back!” while simultaneously bracing themselves for the inevitable firm pats on the behind from, well, everybody for a job well done seems like an absolute no-brainer.

That’s it. That’s where I’m at. Now back to the rumor mill.