The Phillies gave rings to their Wall of Famers. When will they retire numbers from 2008?

The Phillies gathered some of their most prestigious alumni last summer for a private ceremony at Citizens Bank Park. A few months earlier, the current team received championship rings for winning the National League.

John Middleton, the team’s managing partner, thought the alumni on the Wall of Fame earned one, too.

“The Wall of Famers are an inner circle of people who’ve been especially important to the organization,” Middleton said. “They’ve all been very special, and I thought giving them a ring would be special for them. That would show our gratitude for what they meant to us, what they continue to mean to us, what we want them to mean to us in the future.”

The reactions, Middleton said, were incredible. Mike Lieberthal, who played 14 seasons without reaching the playoffs, joked that he finally got a ring. The ceremony caused Middleton to think about what else he could do to honor his team’s greatest players.

So he called the designer of those championship rings — the jeweler Jason of Beverly Hills — and got to work. They designed championship-like rings for every member of the Wall of Fame, which were distributed to the Wall of Famers as a surprise on Saturday night before David Montgomery became the latest member to receive a plaque at the ballpark.

The yellow gold rings are 8.2 karats with 479 diamonds and rubies. The Phillies believe they are only the third team to honor alumni with rings, joining the Yankees and Diamondbacks. The Wall of Fame ring will be an annual tradition, as each new member will receive one.

“It’s a big ring,” Middleton said. “When you see this ring in person, it looks like an NLCS championship ring.”

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It’s been a while since a Phillies player wore No. 6, 11, or 26. There’s a reason for that.

“We’ve kind of put certain jerseys away and said to the clubhouse people, ‘You’re not issuing these jerseys again until I tell you you can do it,’” Middleton said.

The Phillies have not yet retired any numbers from the 2008 World Series championship roster, but they have at least three — Ryan Howard’s No. 6, Jimmy Rollins’ No. 11, and Chase Utley’s No. 26 — that have been kept off-limits. Those numbers have not been worn since Howard, Rollins, and Utley left the team.

Three players have worn Cole Hamels’ No. 35 — including David Dahl this season — since he left in 2015, but it would be surprising if the number worn by MVP of the 2008 World Series also isn’t in the running to be retired.

The Phillies once leaned on an informal policy stating that only players who were inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame could have their numbers retired. Middleton erased that policy, which often was ignored anyway by the team, when he retired Dick Allen’s No. 15 in 2020.

» READ MORE: Phillies will retire Dick Allen’s No. 15; Hall of Fame nod could be next | from 2020

All four stars of the 2008 champs are integral to the franchise’s history, but there’s a chance that they are left out of the Hall of Fame. If so, the Phillies will have to decide on their own how to honor the keystones of their second championship team.

Rollins is the team’s all-time hit leader, and Utley trails only Mike Schmidt, Steve Carlton, and Robin Roberts in WAR (wins above replacement). Howard has the second-most homers and Hamels has the fourth-most WAR among pitchers, trailing Hall of Famers Roberts, Carlton, and Grover Cleveland Alexander. The four 2008 stars might not be Hall of Famers, but they are franchise icons. Could the Phillies retire just one or two? Is it too much to retire all four? It’s a decision for Middleton, who created a lengthy document a few years ago to define the team’s retired number policy.

The new policy allowed him retire a player like Allen who is not in Cooperstown but “virtually a Hall of Famer.” The 2008 players could be in a similar spot.

Howard fell off the Hall of Fame ballot after one year, while Rollins and Utley remain under consideration. Utley had a strong showing in his first year on the Hall of Fame ballot and seems to have the best odds of getting there. Hamels, who last pitched in 2020, is still a year away from having his candidacy considered.

“I view retired numbers as clearly more than the honor of being on the Wall of Fame and a step below being a Hall of Famer in Cooperstown,” Middleton said. “But I think retiring a player’s number is much, much closer to being in Cooperstown than it is simply being on the Wall of Fame.

“Like the Hall of Fame, I think you have to wait a while to see how opinions age. You need to see how the Hall of Fame reacts to them. I think there’s a relatively short list of players who are under consideration and will continue to be under consideration. Maybe they’ll get in and that will make the decision a slam dunk. Maybe they won’t.”