The Phillies have filled their hitting-coach opening, and they’ve done it by reaching into a familiar Red Sox tree.
According to The Athletic’s Charlotte Varnes, Philadelphia has hired Peter Fatse for the job. He steps into the role after Kevin Long held it since 2022, taking over from Joe Dillon following the 2021 season.
Long’s run ended with a rough offensive year for the Phillies. In 2026, the club finished 28th in wRC+ at 92, 22nd in OPS at .707 and 23rd in OBP at .312. Philadelphia scored 719 runs, and only three National League teams - the New York Mets, San Francisco Giants and Cincinnati Reds - scored fewer.
Fatse arrives after a long stint with Boston, where he had been the Red Sox’s hitting coach since the 2022 season under Alex Cora. After Boston opened the season 11-17, Fatse was part of the sweeping staff changes that followed.
There’s also an obvious subplot here. Cora turned down the Phillies’ managerial opening for a second time this October, but Fatse’s arrival could still matter in that orbit. Cora had promoted him to assistant hitting coach in December of 2021, and with Don Mattingly on just a two-year deal, the link to a former partner may not be lost on Philadelphia.
Still, Fatse brings more than that connection. During his Boston tenure from 2022 to 2025, the Red Sox were second in the American League in runs scored, trailing only the New York Yankees by 100. They also ranked fourth in OPS at .741, fifth in wRC+ at 104 and second in HardHit% at 41.7%.
The concern is the chase profile. Over that same stretch, Red Sox hitters ranked 24th in MLB in BB/K, a number that stands out for a Phillies lineup that already had issues with swing-and-miss.
Fatse has most recently been with the Tampa Bay Rays, working as a hitting consultant for the team’s research and development group since July. Tampa Bay finished as the American League’s fourth-ranked offense and is currently down two games to zero against the Milwaukee Brewers in the World Series.
The timing of his hire comes with one more wrinkle: the lockout. That means Fatse won’t be able to communicate with Phillies hitters the way coaches normally do in the offseason, since player-team contact is prohibited during lockouts. If there is spring training next year, he’ll have to get up to speed fast when it begins.
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