25 things to know about the Phillies in ’25: From the new guys to World Series odds, and more

Fair or not, 2025 is all about the postseason for the Phillies, which unfortunately is mirroring the run made by the 2009-11 clubs. Good teams. Couldn’t get to the finish line.

Those clubs, chronologically, lost the World Series, then lost in the LCS, then lost in the divisional round. That nucleus had won a World Series in 2008. This current one has not. That group was leaking oil by the end of its run. This team still has a window open … for now.

As the train leaves the station for the upcoming campaign, Bryce Harper and Zack Wheeler remain in the conductors’ car with everybody else riding along in first class.

Here are 25 things to know ahead of a highly anticipated season.

1. The Phillies’ most notable additions were leftfielder Max Kepler, left-handed starting pitcher Jesús Luzardo and right-handed relievers Jordan Romano and Joe Ross. Among the key players lost were relievers Jeff Hoffman and Carlos Estévez.

2. Looked at the FanGraphs metric of Total Defensive Runs Saved/above average. From 2018-22, Trea Turner was plus-7. In 2023 he was minus-12. Last year, he was minus-14. Maybe it’s Father Time — Turner turns 32 in June — or maybe he just needs a standing ovation when he takes the field for the Monday home opener against Colorado. Heck, it worked for him at the plate in 2023.

3. That same metric measured Harper at plus-5 last year, tied for fifth among qualifying first basemen. That’s borderline amazing for a guy who was playing his first full season at the position.

4. Trivia I: Harper, entering his 14th major league season, has averaged 25 homers in his six years as a Phillie. Who holds the team record for most home runs by a player in his 14th season? Hint: It was set in this century, so it wasn’t Mike Schmidt. Answer below.

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5. Romano, a bullpen piece signed in the offseason, was born in Ontario and was a popular member of the hometown Blue Jays for six seasons. Arm injuries limited him to 15 appearances and a 6.59 ERA in 2024. He’s a two-time All-Star, an avid baseball-card collector, and left the Jays with the third-most saves (105) in club history. He should get a warm reception when the Phils play at Toronto June 3-5.

6. Luzardo missed most of last season because of a lumbar stress reaction in his back. But in 2022-23, he had 328 strikeouts in 50 starts. His 10.58 K/9 IP was second only to Blake Snell (11.83) among starting lefties. He really stepped up his game in 2023 when the Marlins lost ace Sandy Alcantara to a season-ending arm injury, helping the Marlins reach the playoffs where they were swept in two games by the Phillies. At least he got them there.

7. Luzardo also allowed 32 home runs in 2022-23, and earlier this spring gave up three bombs on three consecutive pitches. But also his velocity is up, so who knows what to expect?

8. Luzardo was drafted in the third round by Washington in 2016. The following year, he was sent from Washington to Oakland in a deal that included relievers Sean Doolittle (Shawnee High School) and Ryan Madson (member of the Phillies’ 2008 World Series team).

9. Luzardo graduated from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., in 2016. He was supposed to be on campus working out the day of the 2018 mass shooting in which 17 people were killed. However, he received a text message from a former coach to stay away because there was an active shooter on school grounds. Luzardo then started texting with his former teammates. “Some were telling me they were in closets, some were hearing gunshots,” he told the San Francisco Chronicle in 2018 when he was 20 years old. “It was pretty tough.”

10. Trivia I answer: The Phillies likely would be in real good shape if Harper approaches the club record for most home runs slugged by a player in his 14th season, which is 42 hit by Jim Thome in 2004. Next on that list are Raul Ibañez with 34 in 2009 and Schmidt with 33 in 1985. Mark McGwire (asterisk) is the all-time leader with 65 in 1999 followed by Babe Ruth with 60 in 1927. Attaboy, Babe.

11. Team president Dave Dombrowski said over the winter that top prospect Andrew Painter would make his big-league debut “July-ish.” Painter, a first-round pick in 2021, has not pitched for most of the last two seasons (except for six games in the 2024 Arizona Fall League.) He turns 22 on April 10.

12. Note that the Phillies visit the Bronx for a three-game series against the Yankees starting July 25, which also will be the two-year anniversary of the Tommy John surgery Painter had on his prized right arm. Would be cool if he was in the rotation by then.

13. Trivia II: Phillies manager Rob Thomson is third among active managers with a .575 career regular-season winning percentage (250-185). Who are the two ahead of him? One’s in the National League, the other’s in the American. Answer below.

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14. The Phillies will play six games in minor league stadiums this year. (Or is it stadia? No. It’s stadiums.) Anyway, they’ll play the Tampa Bay Rays May 6-8 at Steinbrenner Field (capacity 11,026) because of the extensive storm damage to Tropicana Field in November. From May 23-25, they’ll play the A’s in Sacramento, Calif., at Sutter Health Park (capacity 14,000) as the Athletics transition from Oakland to Las Vegas.

15. Aaron Nola is 32 away from becoming the fourth pitcher to start 300 games for the Phillies — a pretty cool achievement in this day and age. Steve Carlton (499), Robin Roberts (472), and Chris Short (301) are the others. Nola has started 268 games total, and 208 games since 2018, most in the majors over that span. Zack Wheeler is seventh at 193.

16. Nola, with a typical season, also will move into the Phillies’ top five for wins. He’s seventh at 104, trailing Carlton (241), Roberts (234), Grover Alexander (190), Short (132), Curt Simmons (115) and Cole Hamels (114).

17. Trivia II answer: Thomson’s .575 regular-season winning percentage is third among active managers behind Dave Roberts (. 627, 851-507) and Aaron Boone (. 584, 603-429). Roberts is the only one with a title.

18. Alec Bohm’s benching in Game 2 of last year’s divisional round series against the Mets just punctuated what was a rough second half of the season, particularly at home. Bohm hit .254 at Citizens Bank Park with an OPS of .748. On the road, his batting average was .303 and his OPS was .808. If he can get cooking at home, it could be the difference in a few more wins. As tight as the NL East is expected to be, that could be huge.

19. Odds to win the NL East at FanDuel (as of Monday): Braves (+125), Phillies (+195), Mets (+220), Nationals (+8,000), Marlins (+22,000).

19a. Odds to win the World Series: Dodgers (+240), Braves (+850), Yankees (+900), Phillies (+1,000), Mets (+1,100), Orioles (+1,600). Everyone else was +1,800 or higher.

20. Kepler, who hit 24 homers for the Twins two years ago, is a career .237 hitter. But he has done some raking in his limited time at Citizens Bank Park. Kepler, 32, is 8-for-22 at the Bank (. 364) with four homers in six games. Three of those were in 2019 (off Nick Pivetta, Jake Arrieta, and Zach Eflin), the other was in 2023 (off Cristopher Sánchez).

21. Kepler was born in Berlin in 1993 — six years after Ronald Reagan’s famous speech in which he implored Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to “tear down” the Berlin Wall. “My parents actually have a piece of the wall,” Kepler told the St. Paul (Minn.) Pioneer Press in 2013. “That was the best time for baseball in Berlin because of all the Americans who came over to help out Germany.”

22. Kepler’s parents — Marek Rozycki and Kathy Kepler — were professional ballet dancers; his father especially was very famous throughout Europe. Max Kepler is the all-time major league leader in home runs hit by a German-born player. Collect 10 pounds of Wiener schnitzel if you knew Mike Blowers, who played in the 1990s mostly with the Mariners, was the previous all-time leader.

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22a. Remember Aaron Altherr, an outfielder who played for the Phillies from 2014-19? He was born in Landstuhl, Germany.

23. The biggest outfielder addition to the National League East, with apologies to Kepler, was the Mets bringing Juan Soto over from the Yankees. Soto spent his first five seasons with Washington, and is a career .328 hitter at Citizens Bank Park with 13 homers and an OPS of (eek) 1.086 in 38 games. The Mets are in town June 20-22, and Sept. 8-11.

24. Ross, who was signed to provide long relief and perhaps a spot start, has had two Tommy John surgeries. He appeared in 25 games for the Brewers last year, starting 10 and finishing eight. Ross, who was teammates with Harper and Turner in Washington, has never had a big-league save. But his father sure has.

25. Willie Ross, in 2021, performed the Heimlich maneuver on a woman who was choking on a hot dog during his son Joe’s game at San Francisco. The incident seems reminiscent of “Moonlight” Graham saving the little girl in the movie Field of Dreams. And just like the Burt Lancaster character, Willie Ross also is a physician. “I don’t think a lot of people knew what was going on because they’re focused on the game,” Ross told the (San Jose) Mercury News shortly after the incident.