Trea to form: Phillies want Turner to run it back instead of powering up

PHILADELPHIA — Trea Turner had his most successful season as a Phillie in 2025. 

He won the batting title. He improved his defense considerably, and was arguably a top five defensive shortstop in baseball, which a complete 180 from 2024 when he was easily in the bottom five.

It was about as good a season as he could have had, minus missing most of the final month of the regular season with a hamstring injury. 

But, as he said, just before the playoffs began, while not unhappy with his season, he was still a little unfulfilled. 

He thinks he has more to give. He’s using the best season of his career – 2021 – as a baseline. 

In that season, Turner also won the batting title. (.328) but he also hit a career-best 28 home runs. He led the league in total bases (319), hits (195) and stolen bases (32). He finished fifth in the MVP voting in the National League after splitting the season between Washington and the L.A. Dodgers. 

He only hit 15 homers for the Phillies in 2025. Excluding the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, it’s his fewest in a full season since 2017. 

He wants to get back to that. 

The thing is, the Phillies don’t want him to think that way.

“We don’t need to see any more pop out of him,” Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski said last week at his season-ending press conference. “That’s not why we signed him. … His numbers were phenomenal. He had a really good season.”

Dombrowski went on to praise Turner’s defensive work and the extra time he put in with Phillies fielding coach Bobby Dickerson. 

OMG no way Trea pic.twitter.com/Ij2GzF7Lhj

— Philadelphia Phillies (@Phillies) October 10, 2025

And then he offered this:

“I know he’s hard on himself,” Dombrowski said. “He’s one of these guys who if he doesn’t hit 40 home rind and 40 doubles and has 40 stolen bases and doesn’t lead the league in hitting, then he probably thinks he needs to do more. That’s how he is, which is great. It’s a great quality and attribute. But he doesn’t have to hit with more pop for us. He really did a fine job.”

It was a vastly different response to the one that Dombrowski gave about Bryce Harper, where he questioned if Harper will ever be elite again. 

It was an interesting dichotomy. The two highest paid players on the team with the longest contracts both coming off productive seasons – even if Harper’s was down from the level it usually is – and one guy he doesn’t want him to do more and the other guy he does. 

But how he talked about Turner may also be a glimpse into what he’s thinking for the offseason. 

Atta way, Trea! pic.twitter.com/lFqBnW3DAa

— Philadelphia Phillies (@Phillies) October 7, 2025

If he wants Turner to take the same approach – be a high average, base stealing, run scorer who improves his on base percentage in the process in lieu of more home runs, than maybe Dombrowski’s efforts this offseason are to add that pop to the lineup – and not just by re-signing Kyle Schwarber, which is certainly the Phillies top priority. 

Maybe the other changes Dombrowski makes this offseason will focus on adding slug to the lineup. Let Turner continue to be the guy at the top doing the things that made him so effective in 2025, and fill in behind him. 

Because if they wanted more slug out of Turner, then one could conceive the Phillies looking to add someone who gets on base to join Turner at the top of the order, and lengthen the lineup with power in the middle. 

Otherwise, it would be conceivable to drop Turner a spot or two and let some other on base machine take over at the top of the order, counting on Turner for more punch. 

While it’s far too soon to start talking about lineup construction, it does, at least, seem like the Phillies would be content with the same production out of Turner next season – especially out of the leadoff spot.