Insider: Phillies Took Huge Risk At Trade Deadline

August 04, 2026
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Luis Arraez, the major league's leading hitter, and three-time batting champ, seems like a no-brainer addition to the batting order of any team battling for a playoff spot. Arraez batted cleanup in his first game with the Phillies on Tuesday night, behind Kyle Schwarber, Trea Turner and Bryce Harper. And in fact, Arraez started with a bang, driving in a run in his first at-bat with the team in the bottom of the 1st inning. 

And he followed that up with an RBI double in his second at-bat!

 

Welcome to Philadelphia, Luis Arraez, indeed!

But it's on the defensive side of the ball that there are some major risks being taken by the Phillies to make this all work. With Arraez taking over second base, the Phils are moving Alec Bohm from third base to first base, with Bryson Stott sliding over from second to third, and Harper moving back to the outfield where he hasn't played in four years. 

To put it all in perspective, over the last three seasons, Stott has played ZERO games at third base, and Harper has played ZERO in the outfield. Bohm has played a total of 32 games at first base over that time (and 339 at third).

Insider Ken Rosenthal is leery about how this will all turn out for the Phils.

"This is the most interesting team in all of the whole deadline. What they did is basically change the entire essence of their team. 

"They really wanted a right-handed hitting outfielder. I admire their creativity here in getting Arraez, a left-handed hitting infielder. But to accommodate him... (all those guys changing defensive positions)... that's a LOT to do. All those positional changes that I do not expect to work out all that well... 

"I can see this having some real defensive issues going forward."

Wow. The Phillies have to be banking on the potential that adding a league-leading hitter with a .325 average will elevate their offense enough that the defensive growing pains might not matter. 

The Phillies came into the night tied for the second Wild Card spot in the NL with the Arizona Diamondbacks at 60–53, with a 2.0 game lead on the San Diego Padres and Miami Marlins, who are chasing a Wild Card berth.

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