SURPRISE, Ariz. — Phillies center fielder Dante Nori was in the starting lineup for the Surprise Saguaros in their Arizona Fall League opener on Oct. 7. He picked up his first hit in his second at-bat and, when he was thrown out trying to steal, felt a little tweak.
In many cases, that would mark the end of a player’s AFL stint. No reason to risk anything, so as time passed without Nori’s return to the lineup, there was anticipation for a transaction announcement … that never came.
“I had no interest in going home whatsoever,” Nori said in a recent interview on the MLB Pipeline Podcast. “Even the Phillies, they know how I am. There was no chance I was going home out here. I wanted to play ball. I love this group, and I just wanted to keep getting better out here. So no, going home was not an option for me.”
And that, in a nutshell, is what the Phillies’ No. 6 prospect is all about. He returned to action two weeks later, and he hit .308 with an .822 OPS in 12 games. Even when completely healthy, prospects don’t play every day here, which can be a challenge for a high-energy player like Nori, but it does offer the opportunity for them to not only learn by doing, but by watching as well.
“While you’re playing here, you get to learn a lot about different organizations,” Nori said. “We got the Rangers, Guardians, Brewers, everybody on this team. So just getting a feel of how they do things and then you know you get to see every other org — it’s five per team, so paying attention to that — and you just get to watch the game a little bit more, dig deeper. And then to see pitchers out here, they can pitch, they know where they’re gonna put it, where they want to put it, so it’s just picking up on those things.”
The 2024 first-rounder did a very good job of picking up pitchers during his first full season of pro ball. He spent the bulk of the year with Single-A Clearwater, and while his combined surface numbers of .261/.361/.372 don’t jump off the page, he drew nearly as many walks (75) and times he struck out (85), leading to the third-best BB/K rate in the organization. He also stole 52 bases, second only to Aidan Miller (PHI No. 2), and finished with a 109 wRC+. He played 125 games and earned a promotion not only to High-A Jersey Shore, but a surprise bump to Double-A Reading to finish the year.
“It all happened so fast,” Nori said. “You got sent up to Jersey the last two weeks there, and then you’re sitting there after a rainout on Saturday, your last game Sunday, you get called in the office like, ‘Hey, you’re gonna go to Reading the last week,’ and you’re like, ‘Wow.’ It’s very exciting, it’s kind of a surprise, but also it’s like, ‘Hey, I’m up for it.'”
Earning a promotion was among Nori’s goals for his first full season. He also wanted to steal at least 40 bags. He’s well aware he needs to drive the ball more. He likely will always be hit over power, but there’s some juice for him to tap into, and he feels like he took a nice step forward in 2025.
“Definitely one of [my goals] was the power game, slug more,” Nori said. “I had 12 triples on the season, a couple bombs here and there, so definitely that’s a goal I checked off.”
Nori knows he can do more damage, and some of that will come with just some small tweaks to his approach. No one with the Phillies wants him to lose his advanced plate discipline, but starting to learn to hunt for pitches to drive earlier in counts could go a long way toward helping him become a more complete offensive player.
“We’re trying to almost make me not as picky and let it rip half the time because you know you come up here, I was a big ‘just spray the ball to left field’ guy, take your singles and get on base. Now with the Phillies, you go through a couple of adjustments. ‘Hey, we want to get more slug, we want to get more power. Go up there, basically take some hacks, see what can happen.'”
Nori has always wanted to see what can happen on the baseball field, even though he grew up around another game, basketball. His father, Micah, is a long-time NBA assistant coach, famous for interview colloquialisms like Dante’s favorite: “Our defense is like 7-11: Open 24 hours,” and a big reason why Dante was born in Canada, then moved to California and Colorado before settling in Michigan in middle school.
Micah also has a baseball background, having captained Indiana’s baseball team in college. And Dante’s grandfather, who played pro ball with the Mets, is credited with recruiting Kyle Schwarber to play for the Hoosiers en route to becoming a first-round pick. The youngest Nori always knew he wanted to follow in footsteps of the player he looked up to from back in his days in Bloomington, it’s just icing on the cake that they both are wearing Phillies uniforms.
COMPLETE PHILLIES PROSPECT COVERAGE
“It’s very surreal,” Nori said. “You almost can’t write a better book in a sense. There’s a picture of me playing catch on the warning track with him when he was catching at Indiana, swallowed up by a jersey, and all of a sudden you get the call on Draft night: ‘Hey, you’re going to join Kyle Schwarber with the Phillies organization.’
“I’ve worked out with this guy in the winter. He’s been with me this whole time, so it’s really surreal and you could not write a better story.”
