Phillies

Will the Phillies Get Bryce Harper Lineup Protection for 2026?

By Nick Piccone

Published: Nov 7th, 2025 · 2:18 PM EST

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During the World Series, I lamented the Phillies’ inability to come up with clutch hits for the last two-ish years in the playoffs. Realistically, the stretch began with Games 6 and 7 against the Diamondbacks at Citizens Bank Park and continued against the New York Mets in 2024 and Los Angeles Dodgers in 2025. If you watched any of the MLB postseason after the Phillies were eliminated once again in the NLDS, you saw how many clutch hits in clutch moments the Dodgers, Toronto Blue Jays, Seattle Mariners had. The more and more baseball I watched, the more and more annoyed I became at the Phillies’ decision to not shake things up enough at this year’s trade deadline.

Now, when people just throw out statements like “shake things up” and “trade Castellanos, Bohm, and Stott” or things like that, the immediate reaction – deservedly so – is “OK, but how do you replace them?” It’s a good question, and it deserves a good answer. The problem is, most of the time, there isn’t a good answer. We’re fans, often not in the know of what major decisions front offices of our favorite teams make. So, was calling up Justin Crawford the move this year? Harrison Bader did what seemed like enough to shake things up on the surface, yet he quickly opted out of his mutual $10 million option to become a free agent after statistically the best year of his career. But the team certainly had a different feel heading into the postseason this year than they did last year. Which is why I still can’t believe why they thought Alec Bohm batting behind Bryce Harper was enough to win a championship.

I can’t believe they had Bohm behind Harper

— Nick Piccone (@_piccone) October 30, 2025

Admittedly, this sounds like I’m taking a shot at Bohm, but that wasn’t the intention behind the tweet. Unlike the lesson in internet literacy, I could see how people would view this as me blaming Bohm for the lineup’s deficiencies. I wasn’t. In fact, Bohm seemed to be the only batter interested in getting on base, amassing four hits and walking six times. Compared to Bryce Harper’s three hits/three walks, Kyle Schwarber’s three hits/two walks, and Trea Turner’s four hits/two walks, it looks pretty good! And that’s the problem.

That’s why I planted most of the blame for 2025’s end on Turner, Schwarber, and Harper.

Nobody’s afraid of Bohm. In fact, I’m not sure anyone’s afraid of Turner, Schwarber, or Harper anymore, either. They get themselves out pretty easily when the team needs them the most. That puts more pressure on Bohm, who obviously can’t carry the offense. Forget about Brandon Marsh and J.T. Realmuto.

Bohm batted fourth behind Harper for 25 games. He had a .571 OPS with three homers and 12 RBIs in 97 at-bats. His BABIP was .225, whereas the league averages were .293 (NL) and .288 (AL) respectively.

When Schwarber batted fourth behind Harper, he had a .955 OPS with 10 homers and 26 RBIs in 37 games. Realmuto had a .683 OPS with five homers and 15 RBIs in 43 games.

Those are the only options the Phillies had to bat behind Harper to try and protect him somehow. Slim pickings. Schwarber is probably the best option, but batting him fourth vs. second is a big difference. I wouldn’t have minded moving Harper up to second and Schwarber third, but either Harper wasn’t comfortable enough with that or Rob Thomson wasn’t. I still think batting Schwarber behind Harper in this lineup gives Bryce Harper the best chance to be Bryce Harper.

That might have improved their 20th-ranked OPS among four-hole hitters across the league, which was .720. The Athletics, Rays, Diamondbacks, Angels, Orioles, Braves, Twins, Marlins, and Nationals all ranked higher:

Which is why I still can’t believe Bohm was the best choice for the four-hole. It’s an indictment on Dave Dombrowski and the rest of the Phillies’ lineup. As the Dodgers were molly whopping the Brewers in the NLCS, I thought that running it back was the right move. I haven’t wavered from that totally, but watching that incredible World Series just highlighted how incredibly outmatched most of our hitters are. Running it back obviously isn’t good enough. But they can’t completely revamp the roster, either. Dombrowski’s going to have his work cut out for him trying to make 2026 work.