J.T. Realmuto is Damage? However J.T. Realmuto By no means Will get Damage!

J.T. Realmuto can now not outrun the brutality of his chosen occupation. The Phillies catcher, having battled knee discomfort all spring, is having right knee surgery. Whereas Realmuto has handled knee ache for weeks, that is nonetheless startling information. Realmuto’s sturdiness is the factor that makes him particular; in 11 main league seasons, that is solely his fourth stint on the IL (together with a COVID quarantine interval in 2021), and none of his earlier journeys have lasted longer than 22 days.

Furthermore, Phillies Doomerism, as a psychological well being situation, is ceaselessly comorbid with Sixers Doomerism. Individuals who undergo from the latter in all probability heard the phrase “meniscus” flashed again to Joel Embiid collapsing in a heap and taking the Sixers’ season with him.

It’s not fairly that dangerous. Realmuto is headed for the longest damage absence of his profession, however absent some weird complication, he’ll be again properly earlier than the tip of the common season. Even when that weren’t the case, no baseball participant is as essential to his crew as Embiid is to his. Nonetheless, the Phillies had been constructed beneath the belief that Realmuto would all the time be out there. So even a short absence goes to be problematic.

Since his preliminary callup in 2014, Realmuto has caught 9,377 innings, over 1,000 greater than anybody else in baseball in that point; 5,130 2/3 of these innings have come since he was traded to the Phillies after the 2018 season, 14% greater than anybody else. Realmuto’s 588 begins at catcher since 2019 are additionally probably the most in baseball throughout that point, and solely Martín Maldonado is inside 100 video games of catching (ha ha ha) him. That is on prime of occasional appearances at first base and DH, although these alternatives have largely dried up since Nick Castellanos and Kyle Schwarber joined the crew in 2022.

Good two-way catchers are so uncommon that it’s mainly exceptional for a crew to hold a top quality backup on something greater than a brief foundation. You’ll see platoons, or a pairing that trades off offense and protection, or a crew that brings by way of a prospect for a brief time share with an incumbent. However no crew in baseball can lose a beginning catcher like Realmuto and plug in a like-for-like alternative. Not since, like, the Fifties Yankees groups that had Yogi Berra and Elston Howard.

Even so, the Phillies, who’ve began Realmuto behind the plate in 76.1% of their video games previously six seasons, should not properly suited to regulate to having the remaining 23.9% balloon to 100%.

The Phillies have mainly punted the backup catcher place since Realmuto got here north. For 2 years, they’d Andrew Knapp, a profession .209/.310/.313 hitter, earlier than changing him with Garrett Stubbs in 2022. Stubbs is most well-known for being among the finest hangs within the Nationwide League. He curates the well-known postgame celebration playlist, and attends such celebrations wearing overalls and an empty case of Bud Heavy. And he’s as snug in a reserve function as anybody might be. During the 2022 playoffs he told Emma Baccellieri of Sports activities Illustrated that backing up Realmuto is “the most effective job in your complete world.”

However as worthwhile as Stubbs is within the clubhouse, he’s, sadly, hideously overexposed as a starter. Prior to now two seasons he’s hitting .194/.273/.255, and he has only one extra-base hit, a double, in 59 plate appearances this 12 months. Stubbs can take a stroll, and he’s one of the best in baseball at bunting for a hit, however the idiom “damning with faint reward” was invented for conditions like this. In a super world, you don’t need your J.T. Realmuto alternative to have “nice bunter” this near the highest of his CV.

So the Phillies are bringing in a reinforcement within the form of Rafael Marchán, a 25-year-old from Venezuela who was one of many group’s prime prospects a couple of years in the past because of a plus hit software. Since then, he was supplanted by Logan O’Hoppe — although Realmuto rapidly turned each into commerce fodder — and suffered a collection of accidents that severely restricted his taking part in time. In distinction to Realmuto, Marchán has had IL stints of 60 days or longer in every of the previous three seasons, as a consequence of accidents to a few completely different components of his physique. That features a again drawback that restricted him to simply 13 minor league video games this season.

The opposite challenge with Marchán is that even when his hit software was meriting a 60 from scouts, his energy was getting 20s and 30s. Marchán’s first main league house run, which he hit in 2020, was additionally his first skilled house run at any stage; it wasn’t till 2022, his seventh skilled season, that he put a ball over the fence within the minors.

So in distinction to the beefy Realmuto, the Phillies now have the smallest catching tandem within the recreation. Marchán is listed at 5-foot-9 and 170 kilos, Stubbs at 5-foot-10, 170. And having seen Stubbs up shut, he should’ve been carrying ice skates and toting round about $100 in nickels when he bought measured.

If the Phillies had been in an in depth pennant race, or if Realmuto’s availability for the postseason had been in any respect doubtful, I’d strongly advocate that they make a commerce, reasonably than depend on these inner choices.

Now for the excellent news.

Phillies baseball ops czar Dave Dombrowski told reporters on Tuesday that he expects Realmuto to overlook solely a month or so. Meniscuses are bizarre, so each case is idiosyncratic. To say nothing of the truth that primarily based on his earlier observe report, I’d be inclined to consider that Realmuto’s bones are literally fabricated from adamantium. So possibly that’s a practical timeline.

However let’s be just a little extra pessimistic and say Realmuto is definitely going to overlook six weeks, and even two months. How a lot are the Phillies really going to overlook their franchise catcher?

Effectively, Stubbs is perhaps practically an computerized out on the plate, however he’s really as shut as you will get to Realmuto by way of baserunning and pop time. His blocking and framing numbers haven’t been spectacular, however he’s a reliable defender total.

Realmuto’s defensive popularity is stellar, however his numbers have really began to slide in recent times. He’s solely been a median framer for about three years now, and in 2024 he’s really been one of many worst blockers in baseball. Which I feel is comprehensible. It is a bodily demanding job at the most effective of occasions, however dropping to your knees to dam a 58-foot curveball with a busted meniscus might be about as snug as being stabbed with a leather-based punch.

So whereas the Phillies are going to have an enormous gap of their lineup, the defensive dropoff from an injured Realmuto to Stubbs and Marchán might be going to be near nil. Eradicating a key right-handed bat from this closely left-handed lineup (Schwarber, Bryce Harper, Bryson Stott, Brandon Marsh when he will get again from the IL himself) can be just a little scary, but it surely’ll develop into much less so as soon as Trea Turner returns from his hamstring damage, which may very well be as quickly as this week.

And Turner’s return brings up an essential level. Realmuto may have performed by way of this, however as a result of the Phillies are 10 video games up on the Braves and an extra three and a half video games forward of the cutoff line within the wild card race, he has the luxurious of getting this situation fastened with out imperiling his crew’s first-place place. With Turner coming again, and the All-Star break developing, that is the proper alternative to go beneath the arthroscope. The Phillies may put the Phanatic again behind house plate they usually’d nonetheless be in first place on the break.

That’s the sort of luxurious a scorching begin affords a crew. You possibly can’t win the division in April, however you’ll be able to construct a buffer that enables your 33-year-old catcher to get off his ft for some time and are available again for the stretch run absolutely wholesome and rested. Residing by way of a month or two of Stubbs and Marchán goes to be powerful, but it surely’s a small worth to pay for getting the most effective out of such an essential participant in October.