New Phillies GM Matt Klentak was pressed several times in his introductory press conference earlier this week for a timetable for the team to contend again.
It was a useless question, really, because no front office man is going to definitively answer that question in that forum, especially immediately upon taking the job.
Klentak repeated again and again that "the players will dictate" when that happens. Of course they will. Placing any sort of timetable on the Phillies to contend before the offseason has begun or before the No. 1 pick is made would be arbitrary.
Just think about how much could happen in the coming months to change whatever answer the reporter who kept asking the question was seeking.
• Maybe Aaron Nola takes a giant step in 2016 and starts on a Sonny Gray-like path, expediting the rebuild.
• Maybe Nola gets hurt or struggles in his second time through the league.
• Maybe Maikel Franco picks up where he left off before fracturing his wrist, becoming a bona fide 25-HR, 90-RBI guy.
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• Maybe he doesn't.
• Maybe Nick Williams, Jake Thompson, Jorge Alfaro, Jason Knapp, J.P. Crawford, Zach Eflin and Roman Quinn develop at a rapid enough pace to have one or more of them in the big leagues by September 2016.
You just don't know. And these days, in this current MLB climate, those loose timetables are even more meaningless.
Did anyone expect the 2014 Royals to make such a monumental leap and make it to Game 7 of the World Series? How many predicted they'd be in this position again in 2016? That team is a lot like the 2007-08 Phillies in that it learned how to win on the fly and then used that experience to have an even more impressive postseason run the next year.
Did anyone expect the 2015 Mets, Cubs or Astros to succeed this much and make the playoffs so quickly? Entering the season, New York and Chicago were seen as at least one season away from truly contending. The Astros were believe to be even further out.
Things turn over very quickly in today's game. It doesn't take years and years of rebuilding. Sometimes it just takes a series of shrewd moves, some under-the-radar finds and a few strokes of good luck to increase your win total by 15. The Astros went from 70 wins to 86 this season on the strength of players they developed. The Mets went from 79 to 90 with an enviable foundation of pitching. The Cubs went from 73 to 97 with a strong, young core of position players and two top arms.
Now, all of those teams were set up better in 2015 than the Phillies will be in 2016. But if the right prospects continue to develop for the Phils next season, they could legitimately be ready to stop stinking by 2017, which would be sooner than anyone thought.
The top overall pick will help in that regard. So will, as Klentak noted, the top overall waiver priority through the offseason, the top pick in the Rule 5 draft and the largest spending pool for international free agency.
"Look at what’s on display in the World Series right now," Klentak said. "Two clubs (the Mets and Royals) that have gone through very disciplined rebuilds, but two clubs that have had very different timeframes for doing it. And I think it’s important to realize — and I’m not saying it just to say it — the players will dictate that. If you take a lot of high-upside, high-athleticism, project-type players, it is probably going to take them a little longer to develop into impact big-leaguers. If you focus a little more on polished college players, they're probably going to get there a little more quickly. It doesn’t mean we’re going to rule one out or rule one in. We’re going to have balance and a blend. But that is the one way we can shape a timeline."
Klentak was then reminded that the Mets and Royals spent many seasons in the basement before turning the corner.
"But our timetable has already started," he responded. "Let’s not forget that. That’s why I made a point of referring to Ruben (Amaro Jr.) and thanking him earlier. This club has already begun that process."
Klentak thanked the former Phillies GM at the outset of his press conference for making the hard but necessary decisions over the summer to flip valuable veterans for intriguing prospects. Dating back to December 2014, the Phillies have added 13 prospects toward the top of their system in the trades of Jimmy Rollins, Marlon Byrd, Cole Hamels, Jonathan Papelbon, Ben Revere and Chase Utley.
"There’s a lot of really good players here," Klentak said. "Not only at the big-league level, but not far away in the minor leagues, too. The Phillies' Double A team was loaded this year. I think that’s going to be exciting in the next year or so as some of those guys matriculate to the big leagues. Some will be better than we thought. Some will take a step backward. But over time, I think all of those guys reaching the big leagues is going to be very exciting."
When some of them do, and when we know which kind of players the Phillies are targeting in free agency, and when we can identify a No. 1 pick, then we'll have a better idea of when 85 or so wins is a possibility.
Until then, Phillies fans can take solace in all that has been accomplished by the front office over the last year. The hierarchy has been completely rebuilt. So has the farm system. Fresh ideas and a newfound devotion to analytics are here. Maybe that allows the Phillies to uncover the Jake Arrietas or the Josh Reddicks of the baseball world, players who have fallen out of favor with their current organization but still possess a ton of potential and can be had for a peasant's ransom.
It's a pretty exciting time for the Phillies. When you bottom out, there's only one direction to go, and for the first time in four winters, the Phillies do appear to be trending upward as an organization. So forget about timetables. The Mets, Cubs and Astros did. The Royals and Pirates did before them. And none of those teams, save for maybe the Cubs, has the Phillies' financial capability to supplement the young core.
"I think the resources that this ownership has committed in the past and has committed to me that they will be committed again in the future is a huge advantage," Klentak said. "There’s no question about it. … There’s a lot of inherent advantages that are unique to this situation and also unique to this market.
"What I do know is at the first sign this team is ready and we are ready to be good and take that next step … I know that we will do everything we can to support that group and create a core that's going to last for a long, long time."