David Lorela

That's going to allow them to build a...

You know, maybe not like a juggernaut, but a competitive team, which is more than what they've been able to produce consistently throughout their history.

That said, going back to the Marlins now, they're in just, you know, the Blue Jays lived through this with the...

The Red Sox, Yankees, juggernaut at the top of the division, and then when the Rays seemed like they had this wizard-like ability to produce young talent, there's only so many wins available in a division, and the Marlins are sort of in that situation right now, where the Phillies and Mets are spending just so much money, and the Braves are...

you know, they've got their magic back.

That's a, you know, it's a very high payroll team with a strong perspective from their front office, they're basically always going to be competitive.

And there's just only so many playoff spots available without

you know serious investment for ownership and as long as they don't have that it's going to limit the ceiling but they could still be a really dangerous really annoying team even if they're on the on the wrong side of that contender non-contender line yeah annoying is a is a good word for it and if I were in the NLEs I'd probably feel that way about them uh speaking of the NLEs you mentioned mentioned Christopher Sanchez there um the Phillies came up they are back to 500

Yeah, they're back to, I've stopped making plans for October on the chance that I'm going to have to cover home playoff games.

I think you're right.

I think it is like dead cat bounce to a certain extent.

You also look at, they were playing the Braves and Cubs that entire losing streak, and they went on a run against pretty crappy opposition.

So some of that is the schedule.

They're still not great against teams over .500.

But I do think that, you know, what I liked about Rob Thompson, and he's somebody I have a lot of time for, is he's just such a calm, measured, you know, nurturing presence.

And that was the right thing for a very veteran-heavy team that policed itself for a long time.

And there were worries, even as, you know, as recently as 2020, or as early as 2023, is, are these vets...

taking advantage of that?

Are they getting complacent?

And I think we saw some of that at the beginning of the season and just the comments from, you know, guys, you know, Schwarber, Harper, Zach Wheeler, that, you know, that kind of leadership group on this team saying, you know,