Tough to complain about a 50-win first half of the year, but the team has been kind of treading water lately and there has been a bullpen issue or two.
The big picture:
Obviously our biggest problem right now is Toronto, which has gone on a tear to nearly erase our division lead was as much as 9 games a month ago.
Pythagoreas says we are who we are, although outside of our red-hot May this has been a team only slightly above .500. Considering we lost Shane McClanahan and Luis Castillo it's saying something how elite our pitching has been this year and the offense has been decent but needs to be better, and hopefully the Riley Greene acquisition will address that. Marco Luciano wasn't an offensive force at 3B but his replacements aren't quite as good so we'll have a bit of a dropoff there. Just about all the 3B on other teams who would be an improvement are on big contracts extending beyond 2028 so I'm afraid help isn't coming from outside.
6 of our 9 starters are having good seasons (although one day recently I looked up and saw Ozzie Albies was hitting .227 after going 8 for his last 56) and hopefully Greene will make it 7 of 9 starters. James Wood can't seem to get going and the bench has been abysmal, especially Cal Raleigh whom we brought in as the backup C hoping he'd provide us with some pop; instead he can barely make contact.
Quality all around as seen by our team numbers. Even the guys with ERAs over 4 have been solid contributors, and Trey Riley and Aldry Acosta were inspired waiver claims. Grayson is on track for a Cy Young, Swanda isn't too far behind him, and Luis German has been incredible in multi-inning relief.
One aspect of the franchise that hasn't been good of late has been the farm system, where we've both traded guys away and had several others fail to develop and it might be time to start paying more attention and making an emphasis there. Haro and Khattak of course are the glaring exceptions; despite his pedestrian numbers in AA ball Haro will be an offensive force, and Khattak could be in our rotation next season. After that there isn't really help on the way.