The Phillies have plenty of early season problems, but perhaps one of the most concerning ones is the performance of Jesús Luzardo.
Four starts into the season after signing a five year, $135M extension, Luzardo sports a 7.94 ERA in 22.2 innings. He’s allowed five or more runs in three of those starts, with the most recent edition being his 9 runs on 12 hits in just 5.1 IP shellacking at the hands of the Cubs. His struggles are reminiscent to the tipping pitches situation from last summer, but he insists
that’s not the case now.
So, what is the problem then? One of the first things to look at when a pitcher is struggling is the stuff. In this case, Luzardo’s stuff looks good and, in some cases, looks better than last year. He’s averaging 97.3 MPH on his fastball, a slight increase from 2025, his sweeper has a 49% whiff rate on 140 pitches, and his changeup has a 46.3% whiff rate on 77 pitches thrown so far. There’s nothing under the hood to suggest that Luzardo’s stuff has regressed, in fact there’s more evidence to show it’s slightly improved.
Luzardo suggested in his post-game interview that some of the problem could be pitch usage and sequencing. Here we can see a noticeable change, at least in the small sample size of four starts. He’s greatly increased the usage of his sinker, up to 19.1% from 10.8% last year at the expense of his four-seam fastball. The four seamer has fallen from his most used pitch at 33.3% to 24.1%, being overtaken by the sweeper for most used. Last season, Luzardo used the fastball and sweeper at similar rates, 33.3% and 32.1% respectively. So far in 2026, he’s tried to incorporate the sinker more into that mix at the expense of his regular fastball.
Elsewhere, his problems with runners on base have once again reared their ugly head. Opposing hitters are hitting .441 with five extra base hits including three home runs against Luzardo with runners on base. When the bases are empty, opposing hitters are hitting .220 with three doubles and 20 strikeouts to 3 walks. He’s also struggled mightily the second and third time through the order. Opponents are hitting .171 with a .394 OPS and 12 strikeouts to one walk against Luzardo the first time through a lineup. But the second time through, those numbers jump to a .281 AVG and .861 OPS. They soar even higher the third time through, with Luzardo getting pulverized to the tune of a .500 AVG and 1.231 OPS in a sample of 26 batters faced.
At least part of the explanation to this poor start for Luzardo is bad luck. He’s sitting on a league worst .417 BABIP (Cristopher Sánchez is second with .411), well above his .324 mark from last year and way above the league average of .288 so far in 2026. That suggests that Luzardo is due for at least some positive batted ball regression. There was some soft contact that found grass in his latest start, but there were also some hard-hit rockets among the balls in play he surrendered, including four balls at over 100 MPH in exit velocity. Nevertheless, his 86.2 MPH average exit velocity for the season so far is right in line with his 88.5 mark from 2025.
It is still early, and Luzardo was able to rebound from a string of poor starts last year. His batted ball luck should normalize as the season goes on, but his struggles with runners on base is a trend that dates back to last season and was thought to have been fixed. So, is it time to worry about Jesús Luzardo? Or are you confident that he’ll be able to right the ship again?
