The Phillies never even got their chance with Juan Soto, according to Matt Gelb, Ken Rosenthal, Evan Drellich and Brendan Kuty at The Athletic:

It’s pretty disappointing to see this, no matter what you thought the Phillies’ chances were to land the superstar outfielder. A meeting can’t hurt, and whether it’s Soto’s camp who didn’t want it, or the Phillies hesitation to meet with him, you wish they would’ve at least given it a shot.

The Phillies were always unfortunately a longshot for Soto. Although the connections are there, the teams on the market seem to be pushing insanely hard. The Mets, Yankees, and Blue Jays are all serious about signing Soto as of now, the Dodgers reportedly sent an offer, and the Red Sox have emerged as a serious threat to land the outfielder.

The best case scenario at this point for the Phillies would be Soto going to the Red Sox. We obviously don’t want Soto playing for the Mets or Dodgers for the next 10 years. And who wants to see the Yankees succeed? Not me.

The contract will exceed $600M, according to Rosenthal and other reporters. The talk of the offseason has been that Steve Cohen will outbid anyone, but a difference in a few million probably won’t matter for Soto. He wants to win, and he wants to be the face of a franchise, while still getting paid a hefty chunk of money.


The expectation, according to Rosenthal, is that Soto will sign at some point during the Winter Meetings, which begin on Monday, December 9th.

The Phillies not sending an offer doesn’t mean that they won’t spend money this offseason, but it’s disappointing to think Soto is not a possibility at the current moment.