Cristian Pache, a former top prospect in the Atlanta Braves organization, was traded to the Phillies on the eve of Opening Day. The team that traded him, the Oakland Athletics, did so because he was out of minor league options and wasn’t going to make their major league team. That makes him a safe bet to be the Phillies’ twenty-sixth man tomorrow.

Pache, a 24 year-old glove-first center fielder, has undoubtedly experienced a fall from grace. Two years ago at this time, he was Baseball America’s seventh ranked prospect. Even last year, he was ranked eighty-fourth. Now, he’s looking to rejuvenate his career in Philadelphia, after failing to make one of MLB’s least competitive rosters.

Last week, I took a look at what the Phillies might to with their backup center field spot. Initially the organization came to the same conclusion I did: Dalton Guthrie was the best man for the job. When the final round of spring training roster cuts came, they gave Guthrie the edge over Scott Kingery.

While nothing is official at the time of this article’s writing, Guthrie, 27, will almost certainly be the odd one out when the Phillies announce a corresponding move to the Pache acquisition. Is this the right move?

First of all, the trade to get Pache didn’t cost the Phillies much. They sent 23 year-old minor league reliever Billy Sullivan to Oakland. Sullivan pitched to a 4.59 ERA in AA Reading last year, with a 1.67 WHIP in 51 innings. He struck out an impressive 13.6 batters per nine innings, but his command was a mess, posting a 6.0 BB/9. Sullivan is the kind of hard-throwing reliever with control issues that can be found in any team’s farm system in 2023. Andrew Baker and Yunior Marte are both club-controlled players who throw similarly hard and are higher on the depth chart.

So back to the main point.

At the plate, Pache has struggled across most of his professional career. Granted, he’s been well below the average age at each level he’s played.

Year	Age	Level	OBP	SLG	OPS
2016	17	Rookie	.349	.391	.740
2017	18	A	.335	.343	.679
2018	19	A/AA	.307	.410	.717
2019	20	AA/AAA	.340	.462	.802
2020*	21	MLB	.250	.250	.500
2021	22	AAA/MLB	.295	.380	.675
2022	23	MLB	.218	.241	.459

Across six full seasons (and one significantly shortened pandemic season), he’s only surpassed or come near an .800 OPS once. That’s hardly what you’d expect from a top-10 prospect.

That doesn’t tell the full story of Pache, though. Last year, Pache ranked fourteenth among outfielders (forty-first overall) in outs above average, which measures how many outs Pache made that an average fielder would not have made, based upon catch probability. Playing the most demanding outfield position, his success rate (80%) was a tick above what was expected (79%), given the degree of difficulty of the plays he was tasked with executing. In other words, an average fielder would have caught 79% of the balls hit to Pache in 2022, while he caught 80%.

An above average center fielder off the bench is valuable, especially late in close games. To overcome his performance at the plate, however, he’d need to be even better than that. He finished with -0.6 WAR last season, and he has a career WAR of -1.4.

In the short term, Pache is a late game defensive replacement. Maybe the Phillies think they can unlock something in his swing. That obviously can’t be known from people outside the organization, at least at this point.

Pache clearly has work to do, but does that make him a worse option than Guthrie?

Year	Age	Level	OBP	SLG	OPS
2017	21	Rookie	.333	.364	.697
2018	22	Rookie/A	.293	.341	.634
2019	23	AA/AAA	.284	.362	.646
2020*	24	__________	__________	__________	__________
2021	25	Rookie/AA/AAA	.320	.401	.721
2022	26	AAA/MLB	.346	.476	.822

Across the board, the numbers aren’t too far off. The biggest advantage for Guthrie, though, is the overall trend. His OPS has increased every year he’s played since 2018. He’s coming off his best professional season, at the highest levels.

If that’s his biggest pro, his age might be considered his biggest con. At 27, he’s approaching the prime of his career. His development might very well be largely in the past.

 The Phillies might think that the three-year age gap gives Pache enough time to surpass Guthrie’s performance.

The outlier nature of his 2022 also doesn’t look great. A below average career hitter with one good year at the plate under his belt is certainly a regression candidate.

Not too much can be drawn for Guthrie’s 2022 performance in the outfield for the Phillies. Baseball Savant doesn’t provide the same metrics for minor league performances as it does for the majors, leaving an unreliably small sample size to be analyzed by the public. For what it’s worth, in 21 outfield opportunities last year, Guthrie’s success rate (81%) was four points below his expected success rate (85%). It’s worth reiterating that trying to read into that very much at all is a fool’s errand.

It’s fair to say, however, that Pache has proven to be the better defender of the two over their respective professional careers.

For now, Guthrie to Pache feels like an unnecessary move to make. Guthrie maintaining the level of success he managed in 2022 feels unlikely, but maybe he really did figure something out that will make him a better player. Crazier things have happened.

Outfield depth is a good thing to have, but I would have preferred the Phillies to acquire it in the form of a player with minor league options. If Pache isn’t working in a month or two, the Phillies will be left in the same spot as the Athletics. Maybe Pache would pass through waivers, but a 24 year-old former top prospect still seems like someone a rebuilding team would claim. I think it’s just as likely that someone not currently on fans’ radar ends up being their fifth outfielder later this season.