Phillies Make Surprising MLB History After Rob Thomson Firing
Philadelphia Phillies All-Star Bryce Harper and Team USA came up short against Venezuela in the World Baseball Classic final on March 17.
Harper was disappointed, but the two-time NL MVP cared more about winning his elusive first World Series. And he felt like this year’s Phillies team could finally do it.
“We have been so close as a team,” Harper said on March 19, per NBC Philadelphia’s John Clark. “I've been so close as an individual player. Obviously, that's the remaining thing on the mantle, right? Obviously, winning a gold medal in the WBC would have been incredible, but also winning a World Series trophy is what you play for, what you dream for. Hopefully, looking forward to doing that this year.”
Fast forward to April 28: the Phillies are an MLB-worst 9-19, and Harper is fielding questions about manager Rob Thomson getting fired.
The Athletic’s Matt Gelb broke the news Tuesday morning that the Phillies had fired manager Thomson and elevated bench coach Don Mattingly to interim manager.
“So, just like that, we have the first father/son GM/manager in MLB history with Preston Mattingly as the Phillies GM and his dad, Don Mattingly, as manager,” USA Today’s Bob Nightengale posted on X.
Harper has something in common with his new manager, as Mattingly, affectionately nicknamed “Donnie Baseball,” also stockpiled individual accolades during his New York Yankees playing career but never won a World Series.
It appears wildly unlikely that Harper and Mattingly will finally win that first ring together this season, but Phillies fans will remember that things looked bleak when Thomson first entered the picture, too.
“I found out at the same time everybody else did,” Harper told reporters of Thomson’s firing. “I talked to him this morning and just told him I appreciate him. Obviously, he wasn’t supposed to be around that long. Everybody knows that he kind of took the job and then was like, ‘Ah, I don’t know if I’m gonna do this for a long time.’ And then, we started winning.”
And now, the Phillies are losing.
Philadelphia has lost 11 of its last 12 games and has already had three separate losing streaks of at least three games since Opening Day on March 26. The latest skid lasted 10 games.
Thomson took over as interim manager when the Phillies fired Joe Girardi in June 2022. Philadelphia ended that season in the World Series, losing to the Houston Astros in six games. Thomson was retained as manager and posted an overall record of 355-270. The Phillies reached the NLCS in 2023 - losing to Arizona in seven games - and exited the playoffs in the NLDS the past two years.
Mattingly was formerly the manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers from 2011 to 2015 and of the Miami Marlins from 2016 to 2022. Before joining the Phillies this year, he most recently served on the Toronto Blue Jays’ coaching staff from 2023 to 2025.
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This story was originally published April 28, 2026 at 2:06 PM.