The Phillies and JT Realmuto<\/strong> we have an existing agreement to reunite in a new agreement. It’s reportedly a $45MM guarantee over three years for the CAA Sports client, with bonuses worth $5MM per year. The Phils have a full 40-man roster and will need a corresponding move to make this big.<\/p>\n At the start of the offseason, it looked like Realmuto and the Phils would be back together. That has happened but there have been some significant twists and turns along the way.<\/p>\n Back in early December, it was reported that the Phils had an offer for Realmuto. No details of the offer were reported but the two sides were separate enough to explore other options. Just a week later, it was reported that the Phils were looking at other possible solutions behind the plate. The most ambitious pivot came in January. With the infielder Bo Bichette<\/strong> unsigned, the Phils appear to be after him for real. Various reports have suggested that if the Phils sign Bichette, they will have to move on from Realmuto and a third baseman. Alec Bohm<\/strong>.<\/p>\n That seems to come from a financial perspective. Bob Nightengale of USA Today reports that the Phils thought they would sign Bichette for $200MM over seven years, an average annual value of $28.57MM. Realmuto was slated for something like $15MM per year, and MLBTR predicted he would be offered a $30MM contract over two years at the start of the season. Bohm will make $10.2MM in his final season in control of the club.<\/p>\n In fact, it appears the Phils were willing to spend another $15MM to $20MM on developing the system. Signing Bichette and trading Bohm would have added that much. But the Mets swooped in and had a deal with Bichette, a three-year deal with big averages and an exit after each season. That not only cost the Phillies Bichette, but also put them in a division title. About an hour later, the Phils quickly insisted on a more straightforward approach, bringing their longtime star back behind the plate.<\/p>\n While it is somewhat straightforward to bring back Realmuto, this is still a significant commitment. Realmuto turns 35 in March and will play out the deal in his age-37 season. There is a decline in risk for any position player at that age but especially for catchers. Every backstop in the majors in 2025 was in his age 36 season or younger, except Mart\u00edn Maldonado<\/strong>who is now retired. Realmuto was already one of the most senior players in the league last year. Salvador Perez<\/strong> he is one year older but has also started spending more time at first base or as a designated hitter in recent seasons.<\/p>\n Realmuto and Perez have been two position players for the past decade and more. Since the start of 2015, Realmuto has appeared in 1362 games and Perez 1304. However, Realmuto has actually appeared as a catcher in 1,252 of those contests while Perez has only pitched in 980. That kind of work can be an argument for or against Realmuto. His ability to carry a lot of responsibility relative to his peers is there in the numbers but that may be the very thing that goes against him as he gets older.<\/p>\n The signs of decline are already somewhat visible. At the plate, Realmuto has clearly fallen from the top. From 2018 to 2022, when he was in his late 20s and early 30s, he produced a combined batting line of .272\/.339\/.476. That led to a 118 wRC+, which shows he was 18% better than the league average hitter over that span. Over the past three years, he has slashed .257\/.315\/.421 with a wRC+ of 100. In 2025, he hit .257\/.315\/.384 with a wRC+ of 94. That’s still pretty good for pitchers, as backstops typically hit about 10% of the trend line, but the league average is worse than the league.<\/p>\n There are yellow flags on the defensive side as well. Outlets like FanGraphs, Baseball Prospectus and Statcast have him listed as an above-average reliever from 2018 to 2022 but with poor grades over the last three years. His running game control grades and block yards didn’t drop consistently in all those areas but there was a slight dip. Statcast, for example, had him as a subpar blocker two years ago.<\/p>\n Taking the Perez route and getting behind the plate is impossible in Philadelphia. As mentioned, Realmuto’s offense has been on the wane, which wouldn’t be good for him if he was at first base or in the designated hitter position. The Phils don’t have those opportunities available to him though, with Bryce Harper<\/strong> locked on first base again Kyle Schwarber<\/strong> actually a full time DH. Harper is signed through 2031 and Schwarber through 2030.<\/p>\n All of those concerns are probably things the Phillies are aware of, thus explaining why they are toying with the idea of \u200b\u200ba future without Realmuto. But despite all the concerns, Realmuto was still the best free agent catcher available this winter and the Phils had to do something. Rafael March\u00e1n<\/strong> again Garrett Stubbs<\/strong> they are on the list but also wouldn’t be a good everyday choice behind the plate. Stubbs has 203 major league games under his belt with a mediocre offense and defense. Marchan’s big league numbers are very encouraging but he only has 82 games under his belt.<\/p>\n In the end, the Phils stuck with the devil they knew. While there is real concern in the numbers, there are also countless things to consider with a bad guy. The Phils have seen Realmuto work with their pitchers for seven years now and are likely happy for him to continue doing that for another three years.<\/p>\n It appears that the 2026 Phillies will look very similar to previous versions of the team, with a few tweaks. Adolis Garc\u00eda<\/strong> he will take over in the right place, with Nick Castellanos<\/strong> it may have been released at some point. Guard Su\u00e1rez<\/strong> you’re gone, you have a deal in place with the Red Sox, but the Phils will hope Andrew Painter<\/strong> he can move up in his position on the pitching chart. Justin Crawford<\/strong> hopefully it will take center field. Their two biggest free agents this winter, Schwarber and Realmuto, were re-signed.<\/p>\n That leaves the Phils with the same core, which is debatable whether it’s good or bad going forward. It was certainly a good backbone in the past. They have won at least 87 games in four consecutive seasons. They made the World Series in 2022 and won the National League East the past two campaigns. But Schwarber will turn 33 this year, as he will Trea Turner<\/strong> again Aaron Nola<\/strong>. Harper is already at that age. Zack Wheeler<\/strong> he turns 36 this year. As mentioned, Realmuto will turn 35 in a few months. Everyone on that team is signed for at least two more seasons but usually much more.<\/p>\n Spending a lot of money on the veteran has increased the salary. RosterResource estimates the Phils to have a $281MM payroll and a $317MM competitive balance sheet. The annual breakdown of Realmuto’s deal has not yet been reported but CBT will not be affected by that, as that number is calculated based on AAV. The Phillies are in the highest tax bracket, both because they have paid taxes for at least three consecutive years and because their CBT number is above the $304MM cap.<\/p>\n They were below that top line coming in today, facing a 95% tax rate. The Realmuto deal got them through it, until they got to the point where they were paying 110% tax on new spending. So this will add about $15MM to their tax bill this year in addition to the money going to Realmuto himself.<\/p>\n Realmuto had a quiet market but was linked to the Red Sox at one point. With Realmuto and Danny Jansen<\/strong> signed, the remaining top agents are holding in Victor Caratini<\/strong>, Jonah Heim<\/strong> and others.<\/p>\n Ken Rosenthal and Matt Gelb of The Athletic first reported that the two sides were close. Bob Nightengale of USA Today and Robert Murray of FanSided reported that a deal was in place and provided some details of the contract. Photos courtesy of Kyle Ross, Jayne Kamin-Oncea, Imagn Images<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Phillies and JT Realmuto we have an existing agreement to reunite in a new agreement. It’s reportedly a $45MM guarantee over three years for the CAA Sports client, with bonuses worth $5MM per year. The Phils have a full 40-man roster and will need a corresponding move to make this big. At the start …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2354,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2353","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mlb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2353","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2353"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2353\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2355,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2353\/revisions\/2355"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2353"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2353"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.insightresearcher.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2353"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/cdn.mlbtraderumors.com\/files\/2025\/12\/USATSI_27281147-300x200.jpg\")
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