One of the many questions the Phillies face this winter is how Alec Bohm fits into their future.
Will the All-Star third baseman remain a focal point of their offense and a player they sign long-term, or could he be a trade candidate who helps them improve somewhere else?
On the surface, there would appear to be no reason to dangle Bohm on the trade market. He's 28 years old, he started in the All-Star Game this past season and hit .280 with a career-high 44 doubles, homering 15 times and driving in 97 runs.
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He's a .312 career hitter with runners in scoring position. And just as important as the production, Bohm has an offensive skill set the Phillies need. He uses all fields. He has a line-drive approach. Those are the two attributes Rob Thomson and Dave Dombrowski harped on most at their end-of-year press conferences earlier this month.
But there are a few wrinkles. Bohm is getting more expensive. Last winter, the Phillies settled with all of their arbitration-eligible players except Bohm, who took them to arbitration and won, earning $4 million rather than the $3.4 million the team was offering. This time around, that number figures to double to the vicinity of $8 million.
The following season, 2026, is his last under contract. So if the Phillies do ponder internally whether Bohm is a player they want to sign long-term, a part of that is acknowledging that if he isn't, his trade value will be higher now than in the future.
Obviously, it's an idea that would only be worth exploring if it makes the team better immediately. It would only make sense if the Phillies felt confident they could land a better third baseman (Alex Bregman?) and get equal value for Bohm at a different position.
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"He's a really good player. He's knocked in almost 100 runs two years in a row, he's one of the top hitters in the league, he's improved defensively," Dombrowski said two weeks ago. "He had an outstanding first half of the season and not a very good — not an Alec Bohm second half. But overall, he is a really good player."
It's hard to ignore the fact that Bohm was benched in Game 2 of the NLDS, even with the Phillies desperately needing offense. Thomson started Edmundo Sosa over Bohm against right-hander Luis Severino, citing energy as the reason. Bohm had been slumping, putting together too many quick, weak at-bats in the two weeks back from his left hand strain, and the Phils also weren't thrilled with his body language after some of the outs he made.
"The manager has to make those decisions on what he thinks is the best thing for the club," Dombrowski said. "He was coming off an injury which affected his hand, it made it more difficult to hit at times.
"Those are the things I leave in the manager's hands. I wish he wasn't in a slump at that time. … The manager has to make moves sometimes to spark things."
Bohm entered in the seventh inning of Game 2 and played the rest of the NLDS. He finished the series 1-for-13 and was thrown out at second base after the only hit. Including the playoffs, he went 3-for-his-final-40, hit .150 after the hand injury and had a .299 on-base percentage in the second half.
"I know there's a lot of talk about his second half, how the last couple of months his production wasn't the same," Thomson said. "But he was off the charts at the start of the season. I'm not sure if you can expect a guy to maintain that throughout the entire year."
The Phillies haven't soured on Bohm as a player. He has gotten better from year to year and was one of the best hitters in baseball before the All-Star break.
When you're a contending team trying to figure out how to get over the hump, though, you need to consider all the ifs. What if, for example, another team is in love with his skill set and offers the Phillies an equally talented young outfielder?
Thomson was asked if he will spend time this offseason with Bohm to ensure the player-manager relationship is intact ahead of 2025.
"I think that is a priority of mine,"" he said, "to maybe not spend time with him but be on the phone with him, text with him, stay in contact with him."