Outfielder Tommy Pham was traded from the Mets to the Diamondbacks prior to the trade deadline but seemingly had plenty of interest around the league. Per a report from Ken Rosenthal and Will Sammon of The Athletic, the Twins, Yankees, Dodgers, Rays and Padres all had interest in him. That’s in addition to reported interest from other clubs, such as the Blue Jays, Rangers and Phillies.
Pham, 35, has had many strong seasons in his career but has been a bit inconsistent of late. From 2015 to 2019, he hit a combined .277/.373/.472 for a wRC+ of 130, producing above-average offense in each individual season. He struggled in 2020 by hitting .211/.312/.312, but there were reasons to expect that was a blip. That year was played in the unusual circumstances of the pandemic, with the season shortened to just 60 games. Pham also suffered a fractured hamate that year and only played 31 of those 60 contests.
He was able to get back on track somewhat in 2021, with a line of .229/.340/.383. Buoyed by a 13.9% walk rate, his wRC+ was 103, indicating he was 3% above league average. But last year, that walk rate dipped to 9% and his line of .236/.312/.374 resulted in a wRC+ of 90.
On the heels of that down year, the Mets were able to sign him to a one-year deal with a modest $6MM guarantee. They were likely intrigued by Pham’s continued excellent with the platoon advantage, as he still hit .273/.338/.446 against lefties despite the subpar season overall in 2022. That’s long been a strength for him, as he’s hit .271/.382/.456 against southpaws for his career as a whole.
The Mets were rewarded by seeing Pham bounce back into good form. In 79 games as a Met, he hit .268/.348/.472 for a wRC+ of 125, and he wasn’t limited to platoon work either. He produced solid work regardless of who was on the mound, slashing .255/.339/.532 against lefties and .277/.355/.431 versus righties. He hasn’t quite been able to carry that over to his new club, hitting .243/.290/.417 while striking out in a quarter of his trips to the plate. Although he was walking at an 11% clip with the Mets, that rate has dropped to just 5.6% with Arizona.
The fact that Pham had such widespread interest prior to the deadline would seem to bode well for him this winter. Even with his dip in results since the deal, his season-long offense translates to a wRC+ of 113, his highest such figure since 2019. His Statcast page features plenty of red, as he is in the 94th percentile in terms of average exit velocity and 92nd in hard hit rate. He’s also stolen 17 bases so far this year and is considered around league average in the field by both Defensive Runs Saved and Outs Above Average.
What might help Pham, beyond his own results, is the relative lack of impact bats available this winter. The upcoming free agent class leans heavily to the pitching side, which could give Pham and other hitters some leverage in finding deals to their liking.
Turning to those specific teams mentioned in today’s report, the Twins will have plenty of left-handed bats in their corner outfield/designated hitter mix next year, including Max Kepler, Edouard Julien, Matt Wallner, Alex Kirilloff, Andrew Stevenson and Trevor Larnach. The Rays love to play matchups and could fit Pham into a platoon with lefties like Josh Lowe, Luke Raley or Jonathan Aranda. The Yankees are currently giving playing time to younger guys like Jasson Domínguez and Everson Pereira but might want to add some veteran presence for next year. The Dodgers are about to see both David Peralta and Jason Heyward become free agents. The Padres have three outfielders in Fernando Tatis Jr., Juan Soto and Trent Grisham but designated hitter has been a big hole all year thanks to the struggles of players like Nelson Cruz and Matt Carpenter.
Multiple clubs… like Cheetahs and Dirty Dans?
I can confirm that the following clubs had no interest:
Ninja BlackSox, Brave Warriors, Japan Robins, World Powers, Ghastly Monsters, Lovely Ladies, and the SNK Crushers.
and… the giants. they striaght out said they would never consider him after the joc incident
Baseball Stars was a great game. I played that numerous times as a kid back in the late 80s and early 90s!
SnakeWit,
I would still play it, if only I had more than 24 hours in my days or less/no adult responsibilities.
“First, it was not a strip club. It was an erotic club.”
— Marion Barry
San Diego Pacers and. Deja Vu have a Tommy Pham Special that quite frankly isn’t cut out for everyone no matter how you slice it.
Love the Pacers.
He’s turned it around with the bat… but he’s still gonna need a club to visit with his anger issue to keep himself on the field… We all love beautiful things… just not the holy than thou attitude they bring… Just ask Ozuna, Chapman, or any other I take no $h!t male? But don’t ask Bauer… he beat her for sport.. which is different than eat my $h!t because I’m beautiful
Think this was one of the many messages that can be derived from ‘Hello My Name Is Human’?
Team execs want him, but do players and fans actually want him?
Let’s say he got stabbed just by coincidence and it had nothing to do with his sterling personality, but how can you justify him physically attacking Joc Pederson over fantasy trash talk? This guy stinks on ice, but by all means rush to his defense due to his skin color, at least you feel a little less guilty about your own for a day.
Pham said Joc was talking smack to him,
essentially a stranger, and refused to stop when pham told him enough. He got slapped for not respecting pham’s wishes. Im sorry you dont understand the fact that grown men don’t play that mess when pushed.
“It’s good when pham gets stabbed because he’s a jerk. It’s bad when Joc gets slapped because he’s white.”
Since you haven’t seen any evidence that confirms your bias, you are going to choose to ignore the only evidence available to us. The fact that he is emotionally immature proven by his attack on Joc over fantasy football, is at the very least an indicator of a poor attitude.
The dude is a clown and can’t seem to avoid emotional outbursts and drawing negative attention to himself. In any team sport, one person cannot put themselves in the forefront with embarrassing behavior that takes away from where the focus should be, the team itself.
Drop the race card bro, clowns come in all
colors.
White people really hate discussions of racism, I wonder why that would be??? You don’t get to tell black people what to do, thanks.
I would steer away from this guy. He’s always caught up in drama of some sort. He’s had issues with management, teammates, opposing players, was involved in an altercation at a nightclub, and now fans..
If it’s just one issue or maybe even two, you could look past it, but he’s clearly the problem with all the issues he has.
And yet he keeps getting signed and was coveted by multiple teams! Guess you’re just a racist ay?
theathletic.com/4840461/2023/09/07/diamondbacks-to…
This article with direct quotes from Buck Showalter, Francisco Lindor, and Pham would say otherwise. He’s been well-liked and respected by players, managers, and coaches from every team he’s played for.
If he’s so well-liked, why has he played for 5 teams in 3 years?
That’s definitely a false narrative. Pham had opportunities with the Cardinals. But every time he had one, he either regressed or got hurt. And when he did excel, he wasn’t one of the three best choices in the outfield. It was bad timing, bad luck, and poor execution. If you go month by month over several years, you can clearly see Pham was treated fairly. He made OD lineup, and promptly got hurt. When he did have an opening, he was a sub .700 OPS, and when he was playing well, it came when guys like Grichuk and Piscotty posted 130 wRC+ splits, while Pham wasn’t
He’s not well liked says the cardinal fan who never met pham but had his *reasons* that I’m sure are super legit. I’m not trolling when I say that 90% of the criticisms of pham are knee jerk and race related. Ask any black baseball player since integration and they’ll tell you that the only way to avoid getting the labels pham has gotten, is to shuffle around, smile and be as inoffensive as possible (act white)
Oh goodness, we’ve attracted the race-baiters. Pham brought race into his latest ordeal on his own. It has nothing to do with race – it has everything to do with being an a-hole. AJ Pierzynski was an a-hole too, and I say that bc he was an a-hole, not bc he is white.
Any time a black person brings up race, white people love to condescendingly explain how it’s not race related. Literally any mention of pham has people foaming at the mouth. You want me to believe you’re all just white-knighting for joc?? Please. But hey, I’m sure Reggie, Jim rice, dick Allen, both bonds, Eddie Murray and basically every black player ever that was labeled “surly, thug, cancer, diva” etc will be happy to hear that you’re all not racist but instead, totally lovely people. Cheers.
Find me a single black player with more personality than smiling and shuckin Tony Gwynn who hasn’t been absolutely vilified. It’s plainly obvious why such a disproportionate amount of hate goes his way, and it ain’t about the slap, that’s such a cop-out
All that interest and yet Mets received a lackluster return.
Pham was never going to generate a big return. I think the Mets did fine.
Was this written by his agent?
I think all these teams were interested in him because he would have been cheap.
I heard multiple clubs were interested in Shohei Ohtani too.
I’m sorry, but what on earth is the point of this article? More than a month after the trade deadline, and “multiple teams had interest in Tommy Pham” needed a write-up?? Tommy Pham!? Even for a slow news day, this didn’t deserve 1000 words and 8 paragraphs.
Looks like somebody needs a nappy nap
This article has less to do with Pham and more to do with MLBTR need to explain what wRC+ means.
mlb.com/glossary/advanced-stats/weighted-runs-crea…
no way!
way
Really thought he was going to return a better prospect haul than he did with all that interest
This is the equivalent of Home Depot putting Christmas decorations out in August.
Pham started off great with the Red Sox last year after being acquired from the Reds and cooled off in September, maybe the D’backs will get lucky and he’ll hit til the end of the season
With the NFL season starting up I suspect Pham will be quite distracted running his fantasy team. Not a good bet to put up good production through the end of the year.
Sounds like Tommy’s agents are taking a page out of the Boras Corporation handbook. Don’t blame them one bit for generating free publicity.
“They were likely intrigued by Pham’s continued excellent…”
Which MLB city has the best clubs for Pham’s hobbies?
VegA’s
Pham will get another 1-2 year guaranteed contract. His defensive metrics aren’t great this year and he’ll be 36 with nearly a month left before his stat line at the plate will be final. If Pham continues to hit like he did with the Mets, he might eek out a 2 year, $14MM deal or something. If he hits at the level he’s been hitting with the Diamondbacks, it probably drops to 1yr $8MM.
Not sure about the Twins’ depth chart mentioned in the article. Larnach and Stevenson are MiLB roster filler, Kepler will be a exercise final option year before trading and Kirilloff… well, if he played 80 games a year, it’d be a huge leap forward.
Twins need another outfielder like they need another Buxton.
He looks like a lot of fun, he looks like he’s ready to explode at all times
Tommy Pham is just a no-nonsense gamer. Every team should want to have him on their roster. Extremely hard worker. While I do disagree about him making a lot of his issues about race, his upbringing was tough. I knew he’d be the steal of the offseason when the Mets signed him, you can even look back at the article. I said it was the only Billy Eppler signing that I liked
You don’t get to tell black people when to bring up race, thanks
He doesn’t pass the eye test…
Tommy Pham is a product of his upbringing. Boy, if you track down what his father did, it’s pretty damn awful. That aside, Tommy is a big boy now and should understand that he is just perpetuating the strife in his life by being a jerk, a bully, threatening people with violence along with being violent with people.
He’s a clubhouse cancer and he has been really nasty with teammates on the field one might even say racist because he has specifically treated Asian players poorly on a few occasions.
His sucky years with the Padres were excused with his terminal eye condition. Why do I not believe that? He’s a real quality guy, mommy and daddy were real quality people and anybody signing him has to be wearing blinders.
Did you have to widen the holes in your white hood to type this?