Phillies make huge move to improve player development, farm system

The Phillies have hired another executive from an MLB team praised for its farm system

For too long, the Philadelphia Phillies have been known for their struggling farm system and inability to develop top prospects. Some of their first-round picks have languished in the minors for years, others have debuted, struggled, and been traded, like Spencer Howard.

Even Bryce Harper has criticized his franchise’s farm system famine.

But the dawn of a new era of Phillies prospects may be upon them. During the season, President of Baseball Operations Dave Dombrowski made sweeping changes and reassignments within his front office. When the season ended, they hired San Diego Padres coordinator of major-league advance scouting and game planning, Preston Mattingly, to be their new director of player development.

Now, the Phillies have gone out and hired an executive away from another franchise that consistently has one of the top farm systems in the game. According to ESPN’s Jeff Passan, they are hiring Tampa Bay Rays assistant director of research and development, Anirudh Kilambi, to serve as Assistant GM.

At 27 years old, Kilambi worked his way up from interning with the Rays. In August, he was credited with helping the Rays find unexpected talent, especially in the pitching department. Anyone who watched Aaron Nola struggle to go deep in games, or suffered through the Phillies’ MLB record-tying 34 blown saves in 2021 can understand what Kilambi brings to the table.

The Phillies farm system has hurt them for too long

In 2021, Baseball America, which has been ranking farm systems for nearly four decades, awarded the Rays’ the top spot for the second consecutive year. Only six teams have ever topped the rankings in back-to-back years, but in their short franchise history, the Rays have done it twice (2007-08, as well). The Phillies have never gone back-to-back, and it’s hard to remember them even being in the top-10.

Ahead of both the 2020 and 2021 seasons, MLB.com ranked the Phillies’ farm 19th overall. In August of this year, they had sunk to 27th, which is where Baseball America and The Athletic had put them in February 2021. No matter how you slice it, the farm system is full of withering stalks and rotting fruit, with little produce to be found.

But the Rays and Padres have had two of the top farm systems in baseball for years, so as a result, much of their top talent has been squired away. Chaim Bloom was Vice President of Baseball Operations with the Rays when he interviewed to be the Phillies’ GM in 2015. Instead, he succeeded Dombrowski on the Red Sox after the 2019 season, taking on a .

In less than two years, Bloom took the Sox from last place in the AL East to a 92-win season and a postseason run that reached Game 6 of the ALCS, a model the Phillies would clearly love to replicate. While signs point to Dombrowski spending big this offseason, the hirings of Mattingly and Kilambi bring the more Bloom-esque vibe to the back-end, which is also crucial to the Phillies’ success; it’s the perfect marriage of management styles.

In short: be excited, Phillies fans. Your team is building for both short and long-term success.