It’s hard to overstate just how good Brandon Marsh has been so far this season. He was leading all of Major League Baseball in batting average with a .353 mark entering play on Monday. He’s hitting an absurd .519 (14-27) over his last seven games played and his four home runs on the year are already almost half of his 2025 homer total. Not all of this is a small sample either, as Marsh is hitting .317 with an .852 OPS across 518 plate appearances dating back to his return from injury on May 3rd of 2025.
But of course, one caveat with Marsh has always been his struggles against left handed pitching. Since arriving in Philadelphia, Marsh has hit .213 with a .611 OPS against lefties. He was particularly bad against lefties last season, hitting .197 with a strikeout rate of 36.4%. He’s been better so far in 2026, hitting .286 against lefties with a .680 OPS, but it’s been in an extremely limited 31 plate appearances as the Phillies have mostly deployed Marsh as part of a platoon.
Herein lies the problem with that so far in 2026 though. All of the right handed hitters the Phillies have played in left field this season, primarily Otto Kemp and Felix Reyes, have hit a combined .114 with a .318 OPS. Both of those marks are dead last in baseball among right handed hitting left fielders. Their 34.1% strikeout rate is second worst. It’s only been 44 plate appearances, but clearly this is a major weakness with the Phillies roster.
The team has correctly identified that Marsh should be limited against left handed pitching, but for at least the fourth straight season, they’ve also failed to find a competent right handed platoon partner for him. Marsh is likely to start seeing more playing time as an everyday player regardless of the opposing starting pitcher, especially considering rookie Justin Crawford’s own struggles against lefties so far in his young MLB career.
So, should Brandon Marsh start everyday for the Phillies at the moment? It’s not an ideal solution, as again Marsh has been a poor hitter against lefties. But even his poor numbers are a massive upgrade over the current alternatives.
