Phillies

The Phillies’ Handling of Nick Castellanos is Embarrassing

By Nick Piccone

Published: Feb 10th, 2026 · 9:39 AM EST

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We’re less than a week away from the entire Phillies team reporting to spring training in Clearwater, Florida on February 16th and Nick Castellanos is technically still on the roster.

Make no mistake, the odds of Castellanos showing up at BayCare Ballpark aren’t even slim to none. Seeing Castellanos show up there would be like finally seeing Bigfoot in the Pacific Northwest. Since the season ended, Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski has said on multiple occasions he doesn’t expect Castellanos to stay with the club heading into the last year of his five-year contract.

In 2025, Castellanos played himself out of a full-time role in right field, clashed with Rob Thomson, and instead of the Phillies managing a platoon in left field as they did when the season began, the situation in right field turned into a platoon.

We can agree Castellanos hasn’t always lived up to the expectations of his five-year, $100 million contract he signed in 2022, but there were more than a handful of times where he made spectacular catches and delivered clutch hits to not make his entire tenure in Philly something to forget. I was ready for the team to move on from Castellanos in 2024, but there was always that hope that he’d somehow adapt to what pitchers were doing to him and become a more potent threat in the lineup. That never really materialized, so Dombrowski’s been looking to move him since November. 

The issue is that 29 other teams aren’t going to part ways with anything for a one-year, $20 million rental – that is, unless the Phillies decide to pay most, if not all, of his salary. Even the Miami Marlins, who might be relatively open to a hometown kid coming home to play, don’t want to spend much money on that deal. Even the cheapest teams understand the Phillies backed themselves into a corner with their handling of Castellanos.

So that leaves the option of releasing Castellanos, who might not be in a rush to find a new team, anyway. He signed with the Phillies on March 22nd, 2022, more than halfway through spring training. With added mileage, he might be content to wait it out. Of course, Dombrowski could be waiting for a team to come to him should their potential outfielders or designated hitters suffer an injury, leaving an opening for a possible deal to be made. 

Dombrowski said Monday:

Dave Dombrowski: #Phillies “continue to talk to clubs” about trading for Nick Castellanos. “That’s something we’ll continue to work on this week.” Unless they’re playing in the WBC, position players don’t have to be in camp for workouts until next Monday.

— Scott Lauber (@ScottLauber) February 9, 2026

Understandably the sport has changed over the years, where free agents are less likely to sign early in the offseason. That certainly has something to do with the Phillies still hanging onto Castellanos at this point, but is eating $20 million really going to cripple John Middleton? He already put a cap on his spending, and if the Phillies are content enough to run it back in 2026, they’re not going to make a splash via trades or free agency moving forward, anyway. $20 mil, schmenty mil.

I don’t know what Castellanos said to Thomson in that dugout in Miami, but having him still on the roster can’t feel great for either side.