Philadelphia Phillies Shortstop Continues To Be Overrated in Latest Power Rankings

The Philadelphia Phillies received a good season from their star shortstop, though he is still looked on too highly across baseball.

Sep 29, 2024; Washington, District of Columbia, USA; Philadelphia Phillies shortstop Trea Turner (7) reacts after video replay confirmed he was tagged out at second base during a stolen base attempt by Washington Nationals second baseman Luis Garcia Jr. (2) during the seventh inning at Nationals Park. Mandatory Credit: Rafael Suanes-Imagn Images / Rafael Suanes-Imagn Images

The Philadelphia Phillies offense, outside of Bryce Harper and Nick Castellanos, forgot how to hit a baseball in the postseason, leading to an early exit from the playoffs in what was supposed to be a year that they easily made it to, and won, the World Series.

With the roster the team has constructed over the last few winters, they do still have that chance moving forward, though there is one part of their roster many believe is much more of a vital piece than he has proven himself to be.

The Phillies signed shortstop Trea Turner to an 11-year, $300 million deal ahead of the 2023 campaign making the Phaithful ecstatic, and for good reason.

Who wouldn't want a player that has hit .302/.355/.487 with 124 home runs, 434 RBI, 230 stolen bases, and a 122 OPS+ across 3,737 plate appearances in 849 games to that point in his career?

Two years into the contract, though, Turner has failed to live up to expectations, hitting only .279/.328/.463 with 47 home runs, 138 RBI, 49 stolen bases, and a 116 OPS+ across 1,230 plate appearances in 276 games.

Despite the poor production, Joel Reuter of Bleacher Report still ranked Turner highly in the latest shortstop power rankings, placing him 10th.

"The Philadelphia Phillies offense is different," he writes, "when Turner is playing to his potential."

And while that may be the case, he has yet to play to his potential.

His surface stats were nice in 2024, hitting to a line of .295/.338/.469 with 21 home runs, 62 RBI, 19 stolen bases, and a 124 OPS+ across 539 plate appearances in 121 games, but the underlying metrics tell a much different story.

The shortstop carried an xBA of .269, a difference of .026 off his batting average, and an xSLG of .430, a difference of .039 off his slugging percentage.

While those may seem like minuscule differences, those numbers over the same number of at-bats would give Turner 136 hits, a decrease of 13, and 217 total bases, 20 less, or the equivalent of five home runs.

Those numbers track as Turner placed in the 51st percentile for exit velocity (89.1 MPH), the 40th percentile for barrel rate (6.9 percent), the 52nd percentile for hard-hit rate (40.7 percent), the 16th percentile for launch angle sweet spot rate (30.9 percent), the 45th percentile for bat speed (71.7 MPH), the 54th percentile for squared up rate (25.3 percent), while also carrying high chase (33.9 percent) and whiff (26.1 percent) rates, with a low walk rate (5.0 percent).

All of the underlying metrics from Baseball Savant point heavily to a coming regression, and it is going to hurt the Phillies drastically, especially with Turner also being one of the worst defensive shortstops in the sport perennially, and tallying -3 Outs Above Average this year that placed him 33rd among the position.

Turner has been an exciting player in the past over many different seasons in his career, but with what he has shown across the first two years of his tenure with Philadelphia, those days are long gone.