CLEARWATER, Fla. -- Trea Turner and Phillies prospect Aidan Miller worked together at shortstop on Monday at Carpenter Complex.
Bryce Harper took batting practice in seafoam green cleats.
Andrew Painter threw a bullpen session.
Zack Wheeler played catch from 120 feet.
Charlie Manuel watched the hitters hit, like always, while Larry Bowa hit fungoes, like always.
The Phillies had their first full-squad workout on Monday. Beforehand, everybody from owner John Middleton to manager Rob Thomson addressed the team. They talked about expectations, disappointments and more. It seemed more subdued than recent Spring Trainings.
“I don’t think a Knute Rockne speech right now would hit home with anybody,” Thomson said. “I’d hate to talk about [the importance of] health and then do a Knute Rockne speech and then they all run out there and get hurt. We’re just trying to keep everybody under control.”
The Phillies already know what’s at stake this year. They don’t need to hear more about it. They won 87, 90, 95 and 96 games in the past four regular seasons, respectively. But they lost in the World Series in 2022, the NLCS in '23 and the NLDS in both '24 and '25.
They have been building better and better teams in the regular season, but they have fallen further and further short in October.
This offseason, the Phillies re-signed Kyle Schwarber and J.T. Realmuto. They signed Adolis García and Brad Keller. They traded Matt Strahm to Kansas City for Jonathan Bowlan. They released Nick Castellanos. They made other moves, but other NL teams got more headlines, like the Dodgers (Kyle Tucker! Edwin Díaz!), Mets (Bo Bichette! Freddy Peralta!) and Cubs (Alex Bregman!).
The Phils’ offseason has been underwhelming for many in the fan base -- especially when Bichette chose the Mets over the Phillies last month -- so it will surprise Phillies fans (and probably irritate them) to read this recent story by MLB.com’s Mike Petriello about the teams that improved the most in the offseason.
(You’ve been warned, folks.)
“I feel like we have the pieces,” Turner said. “It’s not necessarily the new toy [that is best]. We’re more than capable of winning the whole thing. We’ve just got to execute at the end of the year. We had a great season last year. We fell short to a really, really good team. One play here or there, and maybe we move on. That’s how it goes at the end of the year. I’ve said it before. It’s really hard to win.”
“Obviously, we’re expected to win the [NL] East,” Harper said. “I feel like it’s that every single year. I’m not saying we’re going to, but we’re expected to do that. I want to. This team wants to. Obviously, the Mets got better, getting Freddy Peralta and a couple other guys on that club. The Braves are going to be really good again this year, getting a lot of their guys back. I feel like the East is a juggernaut. We’ve just got to play our game and understand we’re a really good team.”
FanGraphs’ 2026 projections have the Phillies tied for the sixth-best record in the Majors at 86-76 with the Red Sox and reigning AL champion Blue Jays. They’re behind the Dodgers (97-65), Braves (89-73), Mets (88-74), Mariners (87-75) and Yankees (87-75).
For what it’s worth, FanGraphs projected the Phillies to win 88 games last season, six games fewer than the Braves.
“At the end of the day, we’ve just got to do it,” Schwarber said. “I think that’s the biggest thing, there’s no excuses. It doesn’t matter what year it is. 2022 hurts just as much as ’23, ’23 hurts just as much as ’24 and so on. We come into Spring Training every single year expecting -- and we have expectations of ourselves -- that that’s where we want to be.”