Philadelphia Phillies
The Philadelphia Phillies are an American professional baseball team based in Philadelphia. The Phillies compete in Major League Baseball as a member club of the National League East Division. Since 2004, the team's home stadium has been Citizens Bank Park, located in the South Philadelphia Sports Complex.
The National League approved a new franchise for Philadelphia to begin play in 1883, at its annual meeting in Providence on December 7, 1882. The Phillies are the oldest, continuous, one-name, one-city franchise in American professional sports and one of the most storied teams in Major League Baseball. Since their founding, the Phillies have won two World Series championships and eight National League pennants. The team has played 122 consecutive seasons since the first modern World Series and 142 seasons since its inaugural 1883 campaign. As of the end of the 2025 season, the Phillies have played 21,810 games, with a regular season record of .
The resignation of the Worcester and Troy franchises from the National League after the 1882 season created openings in the eight-team circuit for two new franchises, which were granted to New York and Philadelphia. The team has played at several stadiums in the city, including Recreation Park, the Baker Bowl, Shibe Park , Veterans Stadium, and now at Citizens Bank Park. Partly because of the team's longevity, the Phillies were the first American sports franchise to amass over 10,000 losses. A plurality of those losses came in a 31-year period from 1918 to 1948 in which they managed only one winning season. Yet, the Phillies are one of only nine teams to also have won over 10,000 games in their history.
With their first championship in 1980, the Phillies were the last of the 16 pre-expansion teams to win a World Series. Since the start of the Divisional Era in 1969, however, the Phillies have emerged as one of MLB's most successful teams, making 16 playoff appearances and winning 13 division titles, six National League pennants, and two World Series championships.
Over the team's history since 1883, 33 Phillies players have been inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Hall of Fame third baseman Mike Schmidt is widely considered the franchise's greatest player of all time.
The Philadelphia Phillies' Triple-A affiliate is the Lehigh Valley IronPigs, who play at Coca-Cola Park in Allentown, Pennsylvania. The Double-A affiliate is the Reading Fightin Phils, who play in Reading, Pennsylvania. The Class-A affiliates are the Jersey Shore BlueClaws, who play in Lakewood Township, New Jersey; and the Clearwater Threshers, who play in Clearwater, Florida.
The team's spring training facilities are at BayCare Ballpark in Clearwater, Florida.
History
Philadelphia Phillies (1883–1889)
In 1883, sporting goods manufacturer Al Reach, a pioneering professional baseball player, and attorney John Rogers won an expansion National League franchise for Philadelphia, one of what is now known as the "Classic Eight" of the National League. They were awarded a spot in the league to replace the Worcester baseball team, a franchise that had folded in 1882. The new team was nicknamed the "Phillies" from the start, and immediately compiled a.173 winning percentage, which stands as the worst in franchise history. Although many sources claim that Reach and Rogers bought the Brown Stockings and moved them to Philadelphia, all available evidence suggests this is not the case. Significantly, no players from Worcester ended up with the 1883 Quakers.In 1884, Harry Wright, the former manager of baseball's first openly professional team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings, was recruited as a manager in hopes of reversing the team's fortunes.
In 1887, the team began to play at the newly constructed Philadelphia Base Ball Grounds, later renamed National League Park. The stadium would become known as the Baker Bowl in 1923. Despite a general improvement from their dismal beginnings, they never seriously contended for the title.
Becoming the Phillies (1890–1917)
The nickname "Phillies" first appeared in The Philadelphia Inquirer on April 3, 1883, in the paper's coverage of an exhibition game by the new National League club and was the team's accepted nickname from the start. This name is one of the longest continually used nicknames in professional sports by a team in the same city.The franchise's standout players in the era were Billy Hamilton, Sam Thompson, and Ed Delahanty, who in 1896 tied the major-league record with four home runs in a single game. Due to growing disagreements about the direction of the team, Reach sold his interest to Rogers in 1899.
With the birth of the more lucrative American League in 1901, the Phillies saw many of their better players defect to the upstart, including a number of players who ended up playing for their crosstown rivals, the Athletics, owned by former Phillies minority owner Benjamin Shibe. While their former teammates would thrive, the remaining squad fared dismally, finishing 46 games out of first place in 1902—the first of three straight years finishing either seventh or eighth.
To add tragedy to folly, a balcony collapsed during a game at the Baker Bowl in 1903, killing 12 and injuring hundreds. Rogers was forced to sell the Phillies to avoid being ruined by an avalanche of lawsuits. In 1904, the team finished with a record of 52–100, making them the first team in franchise history to have lost 100 games.
The Phillies won their first pennant in 1915 thanks to the pitching of Grover Cleveland Alexander and the batting prowess of Gavvy Cravath, who set the 20th century single-season record for home runs with 24. They finished the season with a record of 90–62, seven games ahead of the Boston Braves. The Phillies went up against the Boston Red Sox in the World Series, opening the series at home with a victory. The Phillies struggled against a strong Red Sox pitching lineup and surrendered the next four games, losing the series four games to one.
The team continued to dominate the National League in 1916 but fell short of capturing a second consecutive pennant. The team finished two and a half games out of first place with a record of 91–62. Alexander won his second consecutive triple crown and posted 16 shutouts, tying the single-season major league record.
In 1917, Alexander had been traded to the Chicago Cubs for pitcher Mike Prendegrast and catcher Pickles Dillhoefer, when owner William Baker refused to increase his salary. Baker was known for running the Phillies very cheaply; for instance, during much of his tenure, there was only one scout in the entire organization. The Phillies finished the 1917 season in second place with a record of 87–65, ten games behind the New York Giants.
Three decades of struggle (1918–1948)
The effect of the Alexander trade was immediate. In 1918, only three years after winning the pennant, the Phillies finished sixth, 13 games under.500. It was the start of one of the longest streaks of futility in baseball history. From 1918 to 1948, the Phillies had only one winning record, which came in 1932. The team finished higher than sixth only twice, and were never a serious factor past June. During this stretch, they finished eighth a total of 17 times and seventh seven times, with 12 seasons in which they lost at least 100 games. This saddled the franchise with a reputation for failure that dogged it for many years. The team's primary stars during the 1920s and 1930s were outfielders Cy Williams, Lefty O'Doul, and Chuck Klein, who won the Triple Crown in 1933.Baker died in 1930. He left half his estate to his wife and the other half to longtime team secretary Mae Mallen. Five years earlier, Mallen had married a leather goods and shoe dealer, Gerald Nugent. With the support of Baker's widow, Nugent became team president. Baker's widow died in 1932, leaving Nugent in complete control. Unlike Baker, Nugent badly wanted to build a winning team, however, he did not have the financial means to do so. He was forced to trade what little talent the team had to make ends meet, and often had to use some creative financial methods to field a team at all.
Philadelphia's Baker Bowl proved to be a fertile hitting ground for Phillies opponents as well, and in 1930, the team surrendered 1199 runs, a major-league record still standing today. Once considered one of the finest parks in baseball, it was not well maintained from the 1910s onward. For instance, until 1925, the Phillies used a flock of sheep to trim the grass. Fans were often showered with rust whenever one of Klein's home runs hit girders. The entire right field grandstand collapsed in 1926, forcing the Phillies to move to the A's Shibe Park for 1927.
The Phillies tried to move to Shibe Park on a permanent basis as tenants of the A's. However, Baker Bowl's owner, Charles W. Murphy, at first refused to let the Phillies out of their lease. He finally relented in 1938, and only then because the city threatened to condemn the dilapidated park. Despite the move, attendance rarely topped 3,000 a game.
The lowest point came in 1941, when the Phillies finished with a 43–111 record, setting a franchise record for losses in a season. A year later, they needed an advance from the league just to go to spring training. Nugent realized he did not have enough money to operate the team in 1943, and put it up for sale.
After lumber baron William D. Cox purchased the team with a group of investors for $190,000 and a $50,000 note on March 15, 1943, the Phillies rose out of last place for the first time in five years. As a result, the fan base and attendance at home games increased. Eventually, Cox revealed that he had been betting on the Phillies, and he was banned from baseball by baseball Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis on November 23, 1943. The new owner, Bob Carpenter Sr., scion of the Delaware-based duPont family, bought the team with his son for an estimated $400,000 that same day – November 23, 1943. The Carpenters tried to polish the team's image and way of doing business. Carpenter Sr. named his son, Bob Carpenter, Jr., team president. They wanted to shed the image of failure by changing the team's nickname.