Phillies news and rumors 8/30: Jean Segura reportedly won’t sign with new team this season

Jean Segura spent the 2019-22 seasons in Philadelphia. (Don Otto)

If you took Jean Segura’s Instagram post on Monday, in which Segura held his dog while wearing a Phillies shirt, as a sign that the fan favorite second baseman was headed back to Philadelphia for a late-season homecoming — it appears you’re even more wildly off base than it initially seemed.

Not only is Segura not rejoining the team with which he made his first postseason appearance; it seems he’s not joining any team at all for the rest of this season. Craig Mish and Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald reported on Tuesday that Segura “plans on continuing his career but that will likely come in 2024.”

Segura was traded by the Marlins to the Cleveland Guardians for Josh Bell just before the trade deadline. Cleveland subsequently released Segura before he reported with the club, making him a free agent.

After four seasons in Philadelphia, Segura had signed a two-year, $17 million deal with a Miami team hoping to get over the hump and crack the playoffs in 2023. The Fish played their way into contention, though Segura wasn’t a huge part of that equation: He hit .219 with a mere .556 OPS and just three home runs in 85 games.

That came after Segura established himself as a fan favorite in Philadelphia. He spent the 2019-22 seasons there, after the Phillies acquired him and a couple relievers from Seattle for J.P. Crawford and Carlos Santana. Segura was much more productive in his first NL East stint, hitting .281 with a .755 OPS in four years and contributing the go-ahead single in Game 1 of the Wild Card Series that will live in Phillies lore for quite some time.

Segura had said during the World Series he hoped to remain a Phillie his whole career, but with the team clearly interested in the four big-ticket shortstops on the free-agent market, that always seemed an extremely unlikely outcome. Trea Turner’s 11-year deal effectively put the nail in that coffin.

At least for 2023, that is. Who knows? Perhaps a bench fit presents itself later down the road. More likely, though, is that Segura lands elsewhere — and now, it seems we’ll have to wait until next year to find out just where “elsewhere” might be.

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, from our Ty Daubert.
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Bryce Harper powered the Phillies’ World Series run last year. Thomas Harrigan of MLB.com wrote about why history could well repeat itself.
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Shoutout to Chuck.