I wasn’t sure much could be worse than the 2019 Phillies season.

Same old story of Gabe Kapler burning his way through an untalented bullpen and trotting out has-beens and nobodies into a starting lineup day after day in the name of “analytics” and “advanced statistics.”

It was ultimately pointless.

A roster with a few exciting pieces that was nowhere near ready for any type of sustained success, bolstered by superstar free-agent Bryce Harper and an exciting trade piece in J.T. Realmuto, the best catcher in baseball, who cost the franchise their best prospect but would surely be re-signed before his contract expired after the 2020 season.

The roster had rough edges, but anyone with half a brain could surely see where improvements were needed. Definitely a top-end starting pitcher, maybe another quality depth piece to add to the rotation, a new starting infielder, and a heaping helping of bullpen arms that wouldn’t fold under pressure.

But here we are in 2020. A bullpen that somehow is WORSE than its 2019 counterpart, a rotation decimated with injuries that was only improved with the free agent signing of a talented, but oft-injured, Zack Wheeler whose brittle fingernails and booby trapped pants have already cost him a start.

The Phillies are now .500. Wheeler pitched well last night against the Mets for 7+ innings with a gangrenous fingernail before an inevitable bullpen collapse we could all see coming from 900 miles away.

Outside of the late-August-into-early-September stretch where the team actually played well, this season has been even more depressing than 2019. How is this possible? Was it the high hopes we dared have for a team that improved slightly on paper coming into the new season that has failed in almost every clutch aspect of the season? That’s part of it, sure, but it goes beyond this failure.

It’s more deeply rooted in the fact that we could ALL see the failings of this team in the making before the season.

GM Matt Klentak doomed the team to mediocrity when he brashly told the Inquirer in February the team “absolutely” had enough starting pitching and bullpen arms to compete.

You were? You were CONFIDENT in the fact that you picked up one very good, but injury prone, starting pitcher and did nothing else but sign a few bullpen arms off the scrap heap to improve what was easily ONE of the worst bullpens in the league in 2019?

Klentak continued his brilliance by trading for several pieces in-season, who mysteriously forgot how to pitch the second they landed in Philadelphia. Hire a technician to examine the home team bullpen at CBP for a slow gas leak….it’s the only fathomable reason for our relief pitchers seemingly losing all body control and the ability to throw a baseball the moment they put on a Phillies uniform.

These guys pitch like a 24-year-old who ate one too many goo balls during a Ween set at Coachella. It’s pathetic and utterly mystifying how they can experience success elsewhere and then be dragged down into the marl pit of mediocrity the second they cross over into the Philadelphia city limits.

But is it all that surprising? After an offseason of Seranthony Dominguez spending an eternity on his decision to undergo surgery, David Robertson suffering yet another rehab setback, and the pieces Klentak picked up off the trash heap that were as expected and the 2020 bullpen is hurtling through a historic season of ineptitude. It defies belief.

Or maybe it’s deeper than that? Maybe it’s the fact that Phillies fans have had the utmost pleasure of watching Sixto Sanchez make his professional debut for the Marlins and go 3-1 in his first five starts with a 1.69 ERA and strikeout 29 in just 32 innings pitched. Oh, and he also pitched one complete game in that span….against the Phillies.

But that’s ok, we knew he was going to be good, right? He was a special pitcher, but he’s not the BEST catcher in baseball. Realmuto holds that honor….and he’s currently hurt, which isn’t a rare occurrence for this team. He’s already expressed his frustration at the Phillies’ front office and their inability to agree to a new contract and is looking more and more like he’s going to be overpaid by an NL East rival and walk at the end of the year.

Bryce Harper has openly petitioned for his re-signing. Not sure how that’s going to work out well for anybody. It would be an organizational failure at every single level to give up a 5-star potential ace for two seasons of Realmuto…and a reality that is becoming clearer by the day.

Oh yeah, Rhys Hoskins may have to have Tommy John surgery on his non-throwing arm, though he is holding out hope for an unprecedented return (though unprecedented and the Phillies never go hand in hand, unless it’s for something horrible). Didi Gregorius will be a free agent at the end of the year. Vince Velasquez raised his ERA from 4.91 in 2019 to 6.46 in 2020 and is going to round out a rotation consisting of Aaron Nola, Wheeler and various pieces of flotsam and jetsam.

Mickey Moniak was called up on Wednesday night after spending roughly 17 years in the minors, the 2020 replacement for something called Kyle Garlick. Be still my beating heart.

But yes, there are rays of hope. Every dead cat does bounce, after all, and Alec Bohm certainly has shown flashes of brilliance. Watch Bohm play out the rest of the year and double-fist Zoloft every game Nola doesn’t pitch and we’ll get through this, I promise.

But if Realmuto walks at the end of the year? If Wheeler rips off another fingernail in a freak toaster accident? If Klentak trades for another reliever who gets his foot caught in a bear trap jogging out to the mound? Well then it’s going to be a long, cold, GRAY winter in this city as we watch this franchise nickel and dime its way to the mediocrity yet again.

Enjoy the rest of the season.