If the Phillies’ offseason is over, that’s OK. They can do things the old-fashioned way.

I don’t think the Phillies are done with their offseason.

If they aren’t? It could be fun.

Could the Phillies use a starter like Jordan Montgomery? An outfielder like Cody Bellinger? A third baseman like Matt Chapman?

Sure. All three would move the needle. All three would fit, albeit with some depth chart contortions. All three also happen to be clients of Scott Boras, who has a long track record of googly-eyeing his way into the bank accounts of impulsive billionaires.

» READ MORE: The Phillies will run it back in 2024. How will that play in the NL East? Let’s size up the competition.

I’m not buying the Montgomery potential. In order to sign the Rangers starter, Dave Dombrowski and John Middleton would have to be comfortable with the prospect of Taijuan Walker sitting in the bullpen singing that song from the Apple iPhone charger commercial. Three years is a long time to ask your $18-million-a-year pitcher to do nothing.

A right-handed bat remains the missing piece of the offseason. It’s hard for me to believe that the Phillies will enter the year without some other option besides Johan Rojas alongside Brandon Marsh and Nick Castellanos. Tommy Pham is still out there. He would make a lot of sense, assuming Bellinger and Chapman are about to become richer than the Phillies can handle.

Even if the offseason is over, the hope still springs. If the Phillies are going to overtake the Braves in the division and the Dodgers in the National League, they are going to do it the old-fashioned way.

By improving from within.

The most amazing stat of the postseason is still this. Marsh reached base 13 times in the Phillies’ last eight games. He didn’t score a single run. There’s your ballgame.

Now that the sting of the NLCS has faded, we should talk about the silver lining. Marsh was tremendous, and he was tremendous in a way that suggests he has a tremendous more in him. His final postseason numbers: a .342/.405/.526 batting line, five extra base hits, four walks, 42 plate appearances.

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This wasn’t just a blip. Marsh was pretty much the same hitter he’d been since the All-Star break. In his last 52 games of the regular season, he hit .281/.408/.473 and made a huge dent in his strikeout/walk numbers.

We tend to evaluate bullpens from the top down. Start with the closer and work backwards. I tend to think it’s more instructive to reverse that order. How good are your fourth, fifth and sixth options? Look at the truly dominant bullpens and you’ll find guys with back-end stuff pitching in the sixth and seventh innings. There are plenty of bad teams with elite setup-closer combos. But those middle innings are key to racking up regular season wins. Keeping pace and limiting damage can be as important as finishing things off. Plus, injuries have a way of forcing those fourth and fifth options up the ladder.

» READ MORE: Orion Kerkering will have a big role in the Phillies’ bullpen. Could he wind up being the closer?

From that perspective, the Phillies enter spring training in better shape than recent years. Jeff Hoffman and Matt Strahm both proved themselves capable of handling big moments behind José Alvarado and Seranthony Domínguez. Gregory Soto was a perpetual wild card, but he brings strikeout stuff and bounce-back potential to the front of the pen. That’s a solid fivesome, assuming good health and the good versions of Alvarado and Dominguez.

Which brings us to Kerkering. The Phillies have a lot riding on their 22-year-old righty. He has the stuff to be a closer, and a darn good one. We saw that in his first seven appearances with the Phillies when he struck out 10 of the 29 batters he faced and did not allow an earned run. We also saw that he needs to command his fastball well enough to pitch off of it. His last three outings in the postseason: 11 batters, one strikeout, seven baserunners.

Kerkering is a true hinge piece. Alvarado and Domínguez both showed some signs of fraying late last season. There’s a reason Craig Kimbrel wound up as the closer. Another good bullpen rule to live by: You are only as good as your third late-inning option.

He’s a gamer, plain and simple. You see it in his two-strike approach, in his defense at second base, and in his overall demeanor. Stott doesn’t have a physical framework that portends a big jump toward a lofty ceiling, not like Marsh and annual breakout candidate Alec Bohm. He is streaky, but he seems to emerge from his dips on higher ground than he was when he entered. Last year, his OPS bottomed out at .672 on May 10. After a three-day break, he re-emerged to post a solid .282/.335/.439 batting line the rest of the way. That was accompanied by 13 home runs in 479 plate appearances, a bit of a bump from the 12 he hit in his first 527 big league PAs.

In Stott’s first season, his OPS+ was 15% below league average. His second season, it was 4% above. Another step forward will leave the Phillies with huge value at a premium defensive position.

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It’s funny. This team feels a lot more stable than it did at this time last year. Bryce Harper will be in the lineup for a full season. The bullpen returns everyone except Kimbrel. There is also plenty of room for improvement from guys like Ranger Suárez (stay healthy, earn a long-term contract), Bohm (still only 27 and coming off a big jump in his power production), Trea Turner (a full season, this time).

This is the first time in a while where the Phillies are losing the offseason headline game. But it isn’t a game that they needed to win.