00:00Phillies are hot. Phillies are looking like the Phillies. And yes, Schwarber is near the top of
00:05Major League Baseball in terms of homers. And yes, Harper has had a very solid year. And yes,
00:10Boehm came out of that dreadful first four to six weeks of his season. But dude, the drink is being
00:16stirred by Brandon freaking Marsh. Brandon Marsh in his age 28 season is already a two-win player
00:24in 61 games, hitting 333, one of the best marks in Major League Baseball, 11 doubles,
00:30eight homers, two triples. He's driven in 30. He's got five bags. And it's an 880 OPS for Brandon
00:36Marsh right now. We talked about him a little bit on Sunday night on the weekend roundup. And
00:41I just mentioned like this is a consistent player that pulses up to a breakout. And you're seeing
00:47maybe the birth of semi-stardom, but at least just like a true showcase of,
00:53hey, we had answers in the outfield here already. Like our average guy is well above average. Now,
00:59what do you make of Brandon Marsh's first two months of the year?
01:03Amazing. Because, you know, you get to a certain point and here's another 28-year-old though that
01:09is really figuring it out. But the difference is, you know, I just felt like you kind of knew who
01:13Marsh, well, you thought you knew who Marsh was at this point where you had a pretty large sample
01:18size here since his age, 23 season. Guy I loved as a prospect because of the floor and just the
01:24blend
01:25of solid enough hit and power. But then through the first few years, I'm like, man, this guy's
01:29whiffing more than I expected. And I think that was the limitation because a hitter of his archetype
01:34where it's speed and some defense and, you know, you look at a little bit more aggressive at times in
01:40the box and you think, well, he's got to make a lot of contact, right? And you see the underlying
01:44whiff and you say, oh, that's going to hold him back from being, you know, the most successful
01:49version of that archetype. And he has just improved so much bat to ball wise this year.
01:53Now, I don't know how sustainable it fully, fully is, but he's just clearly a notch better
01:59this year. I kind of across the board, whether it be contact consistency, whether it be, you know,
02:05just the, the overall, I think, leveraging of the angles where I think you're seeing him just hit
02:10the ball at better angles in general. And I think just being more comfortable in the box. What's
02:15funny is he has been as aggressive as ever. So you have Marsh, a guy that, you know, has had
02:19whiff
02:19concerns in the past in terms of just striking out too much, but the zone contact has always been
02:25pretty solid. And all of a sudden the zone contacts right around where it was last year, he's chasing
02:29like 8% more and he has cut the strikeout rate and is putting the ball in play and has
02:36been one of
02:36the best in terms of batting average and expected batting average in major league baseball. So
02:40I don't know how to fully explain it other than the fact that this guy has figured out how to
02:47pulverize four seamers, pulverize it. And he's seeing them 5% less this year, sitting 426 against
02:53four seamers. If you can't get one by him, you say, oh, why don't they just spin them to death?
02:56He's been good enough against spin. If you don't suck against spin and you're one of the best
03:02fastball hitters in major league baseball, you're going to be in a pretty good spot.
03:06Yes. And what's funny is Marsh doesn't walk either. Like you would think, okay,
03:11spin him to death and like, he'll just take and see if you can land it. He's only walked 11
03:16times
03:16in 60 games so far this year. So he's getting enough fastballs and like, don't throw him one
03:22because he's going to beat you with one. Marsh's breakout was so important for the Phillies and
03:27the way that they started. And, you know, you can still look at the season long numbers and you see
03:32Trey Turner sporting a WRC plus shy of 80 and boom and Scott sporting WRC plus is shy of 80.
03:39You needed three pieces to guide you through. And frankly, the back 60% of that rotation has just not
03:46been good enough. Like Lizardo has not been good painter. We got to have a painter discussion at some
03:51point soon. Nola has kind of looked like the Aaron Nola that we were worried about,
03:57like the sacrificial lamb, the five-star that you're paying that you have to run out there. But
04:01you know, Justin Crawford doesn't really hit the ground running at the least. Garcia has a 610 OPS.
04:05He's hit the ground a lot. Yes. Yes, he had a real mute. So as a 601 OPS, like there
04:11are a lot of
04:12OPSs that lead with sixes. So obviously you have Schwarber and his 155 WRC plus you have Harper and his
04:17139,
04:18but you were begging for another 140 and you thought it would come from Turner. That's not
04:23the case. Came from Marsh and his 142 WRC plus man. The rest of these guys obviously need to step
04:30up
04:30for the Phillies to be a world series contender, but the fact that they are where they are right now
04:35with all of the bad happening at the outset and kind of elongated into right now, it's fascinating to
04:42watch and you have to feel like they're coming out of it soon. It's shocking. Yeah. Aside from Schwarber,
04:47as you mentioned, Harper and Marsh, they do not have another bat that is within 20% of league
04:53average. Yeah. And then you also mentioned, yeah, it's been worst case scenario just about,
04:59I know, Lizardo's peripherals are better, but it's been just about worst case scenario for three,
05:03four, five and the rotation, particularly four and five and Lizardo just not pitching to his
05:07standards. Wheeler was out. I mean, if they didn't get Wheeler back, I think that's been one of the
05:11biggest, biggest parts of this, of this success. Cause Christopher Sanchez has been the best
05:15pitcher probably in baseball this year, but he can only throw every fifth day. So if you had some
05:18deficits, otherwise that's a big part too, but you literally have a scheduled massive advantage now
05:24two out of the five times out of the rotation. Yeah. And that's been enough for them to just
05:30fight through. It's like, okay, well, if we can win one to two out of three of the others,
05:35we're going to win the other two at the start of the rotation, almost every single time it feels like.
05:38Uh, but I mean, I also do think that they have to address this offense because I do think guys
05:43are
05:43going to get better, but it's just, you can't have three guys leading the way. And then the rest
05:49of the fricking offense, more than 20% below league average.
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