DOWN GOES THOMSON!

Draft narrative for the 2026 season: Patience is an overrated virtue.   

The second managerial domino has toppled, revealing more impatience by baseball leadership for teams with rabid, vocal fanbases. 

Watching all this unfold on radio, a listener could see it coming. Phillies announcers presented a forlorn, if professional, broadcast on Sunday. The listless delivery matched the play on the field. On Saturday, the Phillies snapped a 10-game losing streak with an extra-innings victory in Atlanta. On Sunday, however, the Phillies quickly buried themselves anew. 

“Hit high in the air to right. It’s a long, long home run,” Scott Franzke called the action as Atlanta’ss Matt Olson bashed Philadephia starter Aaron Nola. “Three batters into the first innning and the Phils are behind 3-nothing.” 

It didn’t get better, as Franzke described the game on WIP where he is in his 20th year as the voice of the Phillies. 

“This is hammered to left. Deep. Going back is Reyes and it goes in the bullpen,” Franzke said with resignation. “A two-run home run for Eli White and the Braves are all over the Phillies early.” 

Another Brave, Drake Baldwin, singled and drove in Ronald Acuna Jr.

Ronald Acuna Jr.

Courtesy @Topps

“The Braves with another three-run inning. Through two, Phils down 6-nothing,” Franzke intoned.  

A later at-bat in a subsequent inning offered Franzke a chance to reflect the mood of his listeners. 

“Changeup!” Kevin Stocker, a former player and analyst on the WIP broadcast said to register his surprise at the pitch selection. 

“Need to change something up,” Franzke offered, aridly. 

“Heh heh heh,” Stocker gave low-wattage assent. 

The Braves won 6-2. 

Phillies General Manager Dave Dombrowski canned Rob Thomson Tuesday, leveraging a Monday off day and before a three-game home stand to take what was perhaps a more orderly changing of the guard than the Red Sox brain trust took with its Saturday Night Massacre on the road.  

“Relieve”

Courtesy @Phillies

Dombrowski got stiffed by Alex Cora, unemployed for fewer than 72 hours, The Athletic reported, in his attempt to reignite former magic.  

Instead, Don Mattingly gets tagged interim in Philadelphia. Unlike the Triple-A interim Chad Tracy taking over the lineup card in Boston (2-0, as of this moment!), Mattingly has two previous stints running a ball club. He had five years of winning baseball leading the Dodgers and seven years of losing as Marlins manager, including a 105-loss season. Donnie Baseball has done it before. 

Now, perhaps another team’s front-office and ownership will see the merits of firing a manager. Your move, Mets. 

Dombrowski couldn’t fire the team and there were limits on the players he could release – last week he gave Taijuan Walker his unconditional release and the club will pay him $15.3 million not to pitch; in February Dombrowski released Nick Castellanos and will pay him $19.2 million to play for the Padres (minus the Major League minimum San Diego will pick up). Point being perhaps the GM’s roster building played a part in the 9-19 record.

Dombrowski is a baseball nomad, moving at the top of the org chart from the Marlins to the Tigers to the Red Sox and now with the Phillies. Philadelphia baseball fans can’t move on to another team. They’ll have to cheer for Donnie Baseball to turn things around. He’ll do so from a hole looking up, focused first on those 10 games the Phillies are below .500. 

With 134 games remaining in the regular season, there is time. Just not much patience.