The Philadelphia Phillies are going to be buyers ahead of the trade deadline that takes place on July 30.
This has been known basically since the first couple weeks of the season when they emerged as a top team in the league.
Outside of the usual bullpen additions, it wasn’t clear what exactly Dave Dombrowski would be targeting with this roster already loaded as is, but things started to crystalize over the course of the year when their outfield wasn’t quite performing as expected.
Nick Castellanos was going through a major slump, Johan Rojas hadn’t taken the next step on offense, Cristian Pache was little more than a platoon option, and super utilityman Whit Merrifield has put together the worst performance of his career.
Outfield became an obvious target for the Phillies.
Who they might look to acquire became the next question.
With things so tight in Wild Card races across the board in both the National and American Leagues, it’s not certain who exactly are going to be sellers except for the few who are already way out of the mix.
One of those teams is the Oakland Athletics, and according to Bob Nightengale of USA TODAY, Philadelphia has their eyes on one of their players.
“The Philadelphia Phillies are keeping a close eye on Oakland A’s left fielder Brent Rooker.
The Phillies rank 26th in OPS among left fielders this season,” he reports.
