It is a world where accountability exists only in theory and blame is quick to find undeserving homes.
Dave Dombrowski laid the culpability for the Phillies’ 9-19 start directly at the feet of Manager Rob Thomson earlier this morning when the club announced Thomson was relieved of managing responsibilities.
Something had to change. The Phillies rank at the bottom of almost every statistical category in baseball. Offense? Dreadful. Pitching? Horrendous. Defense? A nightmare. The team as a whole is an unmitigated disaster.
There are plenty of issues with the Phillies: the lack of organizational depth, poor young player development, shocking veteran regression, and poor roster-construction. The handwriting on the lineup card was not one of them, and when the roster includes three every day players that rank among the 60 worst wRC+ metrics in baseball, what can Thomson possibly do but write the names on the card?
Roster construction, among the plethora of other failures, is not Thomson’s responsibility. They are the responsibility of a President of Baseball Operations.
Yet, it was the manager who wore the public blame, and the lack of accountability at the top has become too familiar of a refrain.
For all the discussion surrounding Bryce Harper and his “elite” status, Harper has been one of the few bright spots in an otherwise dreadful season.
The shortcomings of this Phillies team were years in the making, and there was nothing either Harper or Thomson could have done to stop it.
“We’re content with where we are.”
Such were the words of Dombrowski in the offseason following a 3-1 series loss in the NLDS to the eventual World Series Champion Los Angeles Dodgers.
The Dodgers had given the Phillies organization high praise for their performance in that series. They felt “lucky” to have gotten past them. After all, the Phillies had indeed scored more total runs in the series. Raise the banner.
Yet when it came time to improve the roster, the back-to-back champion Dodgers were aggressive in adding Edwin Diaz and Kyle Tucker.
In an admission that they were a right-handed bat short, the Phillies sheepishly attempted to sign third baseman Bo Bichette after he fell into their laps late in the offseason. They were outmaneuvered by the Mets. Plenty of other answers were available if the front office had acted with urgency.
Instead, the Phillies remained content outside of another band-aid one-year contract outfielder, a few relievers, a quickly-aging 35 year-old catcher, and Kyle Schwarber.
Instead of making more meaningful improvements, Dombrowski paraded the Dodgers comments and scoring differential as proof the Phillies needed no additional upgrades. The plan was to “run it back.”
That has been the recipe for four seasons. It has not borne much fruit.
Since Dombrowski took over in December 2020, the Phillies have neglected an outfield desperate for production. Since 2021, the first season after Dombrowski’s arrival, the Phillies rank 20th in wins above replacement among outfielders. Even more damning, since Harper’s first full season at first base, they rank 25th with 7.0 WAR. Only the Reds, Pirates, Royals, White Sox and Rockies have produced less. The Yankees, first in baseball, have produced 44.3 WAR over that timeframe.
The lack of change does not stop there.
By his own admission just last week, the Phillies lack a cleanup hitter.
That problem was clear last season. In 2025, Phillies cleanup hitters posted a 99 wRC+, which ranked 20th in baseball. The only playoff teams that performed worse were the Reds, Guardians and Red Sox.
Most of those plate appearances belonged to Nick Castellanos (214), who was the worst qualified batter in baseball last season. Given the offseason transactions, the player most likely to fill that role was Alec Bohm, who did see 107 plate appearances as cleanup last season. Despite Castellanos’ struggles as cleanup in 2025, Bohm managed to perform even worse. He posted a .571 OPS and a 56 wRC+ (for reference, the much maligned Castellanos managed to produce .651 OPS and 77 wRC+). No change needed; the Phillies were content.
If the lack of meaningful improvement was a constraint imposed by John Middleton’s funds—completely understandable, not everyone is the Dodgers—the $38 million owed to Nick Castellanos and Taijuan Walker this season, both of whom do not play for the Phillies, would have been helpful. Unfortunately, that money was committed in in March 2022 and December 2022 when Dombrowski signed them.
Yet, the head to roll was the manager with a proven track record of success and not the President of Baseball Operations whose legacy at multiple stops has been a barren organization with little hardware.
Thomson, meanwhile, finishes his Phillies tenure as the winningest manager in Phillies history. He made the postseason in every season he was the manager. He won the National League East in two of the three seasons in which he was the full-time manager (2024, 2025). The Phillies had not repeated as NL East champions since 2010-2011. Under Thomson, the playoffs became an expectation for an organization that had not been to the playoffs in over a decade, re-igniting a fanbase that had waned over years of consistent futility.
Though a dignified legacy, the President of Baseball Operations laid the blame at Thomson’s feet well before the announcement today. As reported by Matt Gelb, Dombrowski asked recently-fired Red Sox Manager Alex Cora to replace Thomson on Sunday, while Thomson was still the manager of the Philadelphia Phillies. Cora declined.
The Phillies now proceed with Don Mattingly as the interim manager, a position that Mattingly previously stated publicly he did not want.
More heads will roll this season unless the outlook changes drastically. Thomson was a player’s manager through and through, and the players just lost one of their greatest advocates who was willing to publicly wear the failures of the organization throughout his entire tenure, even when those failures were not his own.
It is shocking that Thomson was outlasted by Alec Bohm, the worst qualified batter in baseball who the Phillies have tried to trade on three separate occasions. Even more shocking, Thomson is outlasted by a hitting coach whose players have under-performed in three consecutive postseasons, culminating in this season’s travesty. Of note, Kevin Long received a three-year extension in the offseason.
Time will tell if the Phillies made the correct decision in parting ways with Rob Thomson. He was not perfect. He had his shortcomings, particularly in bullpen utilization in the postseason and a now infamous bunt against the Dodgers.
But in a season that already feels like a punt, there is an uneasy feeling the Phillies may have punted on the wrong guy.
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