The 24-year-old, South Florida native has shined early on in the Grapefruit League. With a lack of quality big league options in the OF, will this performance put Rincones on the fast track to the big leagues?
While people recover from a legendary Eagles season and things thaw out, we begin to turn our attention to the Phillies. Early spring results have shown a handful of positives. For starters, this Phillies team may very well have the best pitching staff we’ve ever seen in this city with at least two legitimate Cy Young candidates (Wheeler and Sanchez) leading the way. This year will also see the exciting debut of super prospect, Andrew Painter. In the lens of prospects, another player has jumped front and center into the discussions this spring. This player also plays a position of need for this Phillies team.
That player is Gabriel Rincones. Rincones was drafted in the 3rd round of the 2022 MLB Draft and has slowly worked his way through the Phillies system, but has exploded onto the season here in Spring Training. He has shown an incredible power display so far, leading the team with 3 home runs. He is also an outfielder, a position that could very well be a revolving door for this team in both LF and CF. Spring Training stats are hard to draw from, but Rincones’ power display has jumped off the page. Rincones heading into this year was around the 10th ranked prospect in the Phillies system, but his production so far raises the question: How much of a role could Rincones play on the 2025 Phillies?
The short answer will probably be, not much. Gabriel is still an incredibly raw player who, stop me if you’ve heard this before about a Phillie, is a mediocre fielder who strikes out a ton. In 188 minor league games Rincones has 26 HRs, 92 RBI, and 51 2B/3B. He has a solid slugging percentage and his OBP is 100 points higher than his batting average, so he is capable of working walks. However, he also has 208 Ks having never played above AA, over a strikeout per game, which does not bode well against big league pitching, especially when his batting average is only .250.
There is also a log jam in front of him at the potential position he would play. Even if the players are mediocre, they still are there. Nick Castellanos is the only solid outfielder the Phillies have and has RF on lock down, and Rincones is not good enough defensively to play CF. That leaves LF, a position that has at bare minimum, Max Kepler, Brandon Marsh, Weston Wilson, Cal Stevenson, Oscar Mercado, and Buddy Kennedy, all currently in front of Rincones for the role. The other negative against Rincones, which he unfortunately has no control over, is that he is another left-handed hitter on a roster overloaded with lefties. Due to the Weston Wilson injury, if Rincones was a righty he may have had a real chance to break camp with the team because the Phillies are in such desperate need of right-handed production. Oscar Mercado is getting a real look, despite having a career OPS of .677 solely because he is a right-handed hitting outfielder.
Rincones still has an attainable path to the big leagues this year. The Phillies aren’t overly sold on any of their options this year for the LF spot. While the hope/plan is that they brought in Max Kepler to grab the role and run with it, that is not a guarantee and if that is the case, the Phillies just have a menagerie of replacement level players waiting in the wings. His only other competition at the moment in the minor league system is Justin Crawford who still needs some more seasoning. The Phillies are looking for some pop in the outfield though and if Rincones carries this hot spring into the regular season with Reading and Lehigh, while lowering his K rates, Rincones could find himself at the big-league level sooner than anyone may have expected.
Are you ready for the Phillies? Have you been paying attention to Spring Training? What should the Phillies do with their outfield? Let us know in the comments below or on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Threads, BlueSky, or TikTok. Email us at [email protected] and we’ll share the story on the show. Join our Discord for further discussion with the GENY community!