It’s time for the Phillies to make the call on Johan Rojas. They are at a competitive disadvantage.

None of what you are about to read is meant to suggest that Johan Rojas is to blame for the Phillies’ latest lackluster start. A rookie plus-plus defender batting in the ninth hole is hardly their biggest problem. That’s obvious.

The unfortunate thing about life is that problems come in bunches. The key to survival is identifying the problems you can fix. You don’t ignore the groundhog underneath the shed just because the roof is leaking on your head at night. People who wake up wet and miserable still need onions for the meat loaf.

Some problems are easier to solve than others. Let’s end the groundhog metaphor here, lest someone assume I’m suggesting extreme measures. Rojas may be 1-for-22 at the plate, but he also has minor league options. This happens to be one of those glorious problems that has an easy solution. Option Rojas, or wish Cristian Pache well on the waiver wire.

It’s simple. The Phillies are 4-5. They are putting themselves at a competitive disadvantage by carrying two defensive center fielders. The roster isn’t big enough.

You saw it last week, plain as day. The Phillies were down 3-1 with the bases loaded in the bottom of the sixth inning. The Reds brought in a lefty to face Brandon Marsh with two outs. Marsh has a career .583 OPS against southpaws. The Phillies had already sat him twice against lefty starters in their first five games. The situation screamed for Rob Thomson to call on a right-handed pinch-hitter. Except, he didn’t have a good option.

Let’s clarify. Thomson felt like he didn’t have a good option.

Alec Bohm was there. You can argue that Thomson should have gone to his lefty-mashing third baseman, who was out of the starting lineup that day. This was the biggest spot in the game, worth a whopping 12% on the live Win Probability tracker. Carpe diem, and carpe the rest when it happens.

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But Thomson was saving Bohm to bat for Rojas, who was due up second the following inning.

Also available to pinch-hit were Pache and Edmundo Sosa. Sosa has a .736 career OPS against lefties, which isn’t appreciably better than the .717 Marsh posted against them in 2023. Pache’s career mark is .713, coupled with a ghastly .374 OPS against righties. The complicating factor: Marsh’s spot in the order would be due at least one more plate appearance before the end of the game. Swap in Sosa or Pache then, and they could be facing a righty in the ninth, the game similarly on the line.

Did Thomson make the right move? Clearly not, from an ends-based perspective. What matters is his thought process. If Thomson pinch-hits Bohm for Marsh, then Whit Merrifield moves to left and Bohm stays in the game at third. At that point, Thomson either leaves Rojas in the game for two more at-bats, or pinch-hits for him with Pache, who gets those two at-bats.

His choices were basically this:

1) Two plate appearances by Bohm, one against a lefty with the bases loaded, plus two plate appearances by Rojas or Pache.

2) Two plate appearances by Bohm, both against righties, plus two plate appearances by Marsh, one against a righty.

Forget about the decision itself. Think about the thinking. Thomson was saving Bohm for Rojas because, A) He needed to pinch-hit for one of his regulars and, B) He did not think two plate appearances by Pache instead of Rojas would give the Phillies a material advantage.

In which case, why are both Pache and Rojas here?

There is an answer. It can’t hold water for long. Pache is here because the Phillies need a defensive center fielder if Rojas ends up back in the minors. That’s the only way it makes sense.

To be clear, it does make sense. Or, it did. The Phillies needed to give Rojas a chance to prove that he can hit well enough to maintain a regular spot in the lineup. He did it for 59 games last season. The postseason was tough, but the defense made an imprint. He was a valuable member of a team that came within a win of another World Series. Marsh was coming off knee surgery. Pache has a .502 OPS in four-plus big league seasons with three teams. The best-case scenario was Rojas doing some version of what he did at the plate last year and removing any doubt about his big-league readiness. Instead, we’ve seen more of what we saw in the playoffs. A guy who could really use some triple-A at-bats to become the hitter he needs to be.

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Look, I get it. Nine games is an incredibly small sample. There’s no guarantee that Weston Wilson would have come up with a meaningful hit had he been available to pinch-hit for Marsh against the Reds. Solving the Rojas-Pache conundrum is hardly a silver bullet.

I’ll say it again. Rojas is not to blame. The real list of culprits for the Phillies’ latest lackluster start reads like a Scorsese Netflix script: expensive, star-studded, and long.

Those five players are making a combined $85 million: more than seven MLB teams, and more than 85 times the amount the Phillies are paying Rojas to play center field and bat ninth.

Like Dave Dombrowski said before the season: Follow the money. If everyone on the roster was performing at a level commensurate with his salary, we’d barely notice that Rojas has been on base four times in the Phillies’ first nine games. But, then, dwelling on ifs is a great way to get stuck in the status quo.

The Phillies need to make a decision soon. Either Rojas is here to stay, in which case they can swap Pache out for a more potent bat, or he needs some time in the minors to become the hitter he currently isn’t. Change can be a good thing. It can radiate a sense of urgency throughout the clubhouse.

Until then, it’s just Groundhog Day.