The story of how the Phillies went from sleeping giants to disappointing in three years started way before John Middleton emerged as the new face of ownership. In fact, you can trace it back to six years before the 2008 Phillies paraded down Broad Street.
Their string of good drafts that gave way to the golden age of Phillies baseball ended in 2002 when they took Cole Hamels in the first round. They lost a ton of first-round picks in the coming years for signing top free agents such as Jim Thome and Raúl Ibañez and failed to succeed with a draft strategy of targeting high-upside high school players with a ton of athleticism.