It was a bold move by the front office to acquire Luis Arraez at the trade deadline. From an offensive standpoint, he was more or less exactly what they needed: a contact oriented hitter with an acute allergy to striking out, particularly when runners were on base. It has been something that has plagued the offense for years, so adding in someone (and putting them in a run producing spot) has had good results thus far.
However, the biggest issue was always going to be the defense. Arraez’s stated preference to continue playing second base for any team interested in taking him on meant there would be shuffling around the infield for the Phillies. Bryson Stott was going to have to move positions, Alec Bohm was going to have move positions, Bryce Harper was going to have to move positions. It all became something of a logistical nightmare to try and fit all of those players into spots they hadn’t been accustomed to in years, some in multiple years. The assumption was that the defense was going to be an abysmal nightmare of infield butchery and necessary defensive substitution.
While it’s far too early to have any concrete analysis, one can pretty safely say the defense has been….fine.
The ones that we would have expected to be bad (Bohm at first, Harper in right field) have been just that, but the others are simply average, something that the team is probably happy with. Given that what they were working with, these are numbers that they can likely live with.
As I just mentioned, the two that have been the worst according to FRV are Harper and Bohm. Starting with Harper, it has been a period of readjustment to the outfield. Having not played the position since undergoing Tommy John surgery in 2022, there has been an element of rustiness to his game as he has been out there. Some catches that probably should have been made haven’t been.
There is probably a certain amount of change Harper has to go through, particularly where his knee is concerned. He has spoken of the soreness he is experiencing in the joint right now, comparing it to spring training and the normal aches and pains that come with playing the position for the first time after a certain amount of time off, so maybe there will be some improvement as the season continues moving towards the end. He’s ranked near the bottom of the league in fielding run value (FRV) since the time of the trade, but it’s still a small sample size so maybe some better health will help that number look a little better.
With someone like Bohm, he is just going to be a bad first baseman.
In his career, he has been below average at the position when given the chance to play there, so they’re likely content to simply continue with that kind of defensive production at first. Besides, Harper was no great shakes there this season anyway.
What’s at least mildly surprising is that Bryson Stott has certainly taken to third base like a duck to water, making routine plays look positively routine while also showing some surprising range.
These are plays that the previous third baseman simply wasn’t going to be making, so it’s nice to have at least basic competency at the position. The athleticism that Stott has probably had much to do with their decision to be fine moving him to the hot corner, thinking he’d be able to make plays like this with mild regularity.
Now, it is foolish to declare this experiment a full blown success based on a little over 100 innings of defense. The sample size for most defensive statistics require a lengthy period of stabilization before we can truly put our trust in them. We would need to see this group together for an entire season, maybe two, before we can say this alignment has been a success. Yet this is what we have, 100 innings to show that maybe this will be fine enough to get through this season. Is there still a rough patch in the future? Possibly. Playing out of position all the time means the ball will probably find someone at the worst possible time.
For now, it’s fine. And that’s about all we can ask for.