Phillies

“We Didn’t Win Enough Baseball Games” – Gabe Kapler with a Brief Reflection on his Phillies Tenure

By Kevin Kinkead

Published: Apr 19th, 2021 · 1:34 PM EDT

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This day somehow turned into a Gabe Kapler throwback session, but the honest truth is that it wasn’t planned this way. We didn’t say ‘hey let’s flood the zone with Kapler posts,’ it just ended up being a super-slow day and this is where the content took us. We don’t dictate the content, the content dictates to us…. or something like that.

The former Phillies manager returns to town tonight and he was asked about his tenure here on Sunday:

Former #Phillies manager Gabe Kapler felt his time in Philadelphia ended after two seasons because the Phils didn't win enough. Kapler was asked what he thinks held the organization back during his time. pic.twitter.com/kw8HqrDyCw

— Dave Uram (@MrUram) April 18, 2021

Kapler:

“I think there’s a long list of things. I guess my mindset right now isn’t going back and examining rosters and trying to figure out where responsibility lies, by way of example. I think there were a lot of opportunities to perform better. There were a lot of opportunities to coach better. And we didn’t win enough baseball games, and I think that ultimately is the bottom line here.”

More or less. They improved 14 games from Pete Mackanin’s final year to Kapler’s first year, going 80-82 in 2018. Problem is they didn’t take much of a step from there, and went 81-81 in 2019, which meant Kapler was gone.

If he won more games, he might still be here, sure, but the bottom line is that his funky methodology and lack of connection with a portion of the fan base probably influenced the decision to fire him after two seasons. If Joe Girardi went 80-82 and then 81-81, he would definitely have gotten a third year. Kapler, not so much, because he was a holistic California dude who like analytics, or whatever.

Either way, it’s kind of lame that the ballpark can’t be totally full tonight, because the boo/cheer ratio would have been interesting to behold.