A day later, after sleeping on it (or not), Rob Thomson had no regrets.
So, yes, if he could do it again, the Phillies manager would stick with Cristopher Sánchez, at 92 pitches, against Kiké Hernández with two on and two out in the sixth inning. (“Pitch count was still intact,” Thomson said.) And sure, he would let David Robertson begin the seventh after getting the last out of the sixth rather than going directly to Matt Strahm or even Ranger Suárez, who was available in relief. (“D-Rob was the guy to go to there and stay with him.“)
“No,” Thomson said Sunday, “I think we played it exactly the way I wanted to play it.”
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The Phillies probably will play it that way Monday night, too, even though the margin for error will be even smaller. They lost Game 1 of the National League Division Series, 5-3, to the defending champion Dodgers. And if they drop Game 2, they will fly to Los Angeles with the season on life support.
It was no surprise, then, that Thomson said “we’ll probably have everybody available” to pitch, including probable Game 3 starter Suárez and Aaron Nola, who hasn’t come out of the bullpen in 10 seasons in the majors.
But what if Jesús Luzardo is all the Phillies need until they call on star closer Jhoan Duran?
OK, before any quants in the analytics department object, consider this: When the Phillies allowed Luzardo to go three times through a batting order this season, he held hitters to a .189 average and .556 OPS. In pitches 76 to 100 of a start, he allowed a .182 average and .521 OPS.
In other words, if Game 2 is close in the sixth and seventh innings, Luzardo might represent a better option for Thomson than Robertson, Strahm, Suárez, Orion Kerkering, Tanner Banks, or anyone else who’s part of the rickety bridge to even a six-out save from Duran.
“Getting into a groove, finding my rhythm maybe a little bit later in the game, I think it’s just keeping hitters off balance, kind of switching it up on them, finding different avenues to get outs and not staying repeatable in the same pattern,” Luzardo said Sunday. “Hitters do their homework. They study, so you try to stay as unpredictable as possible.”
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Now, given the stakes Monday night, Thomson won’t be able to stick with Luzardo amid early trouble in Game 2. Suárez and Nola will be available in the bullpen for that reason. But if Luzardo gets into a rhythm — and if Trea Turner, Kyle Schwarber, and Bryce Harper awaken against Dodgers lefty Blake Snell after combining to go 1-for-11 with six strikeouts in Game 1 — he’s the best bet to navigate the middle innings.
Let’s pause and appreciate what Luzardo did this season: 32 starts, 183⅔ innings, and 216 strikeouts — all career highs. The 28-year-old lefty had a 3.92 ERA, including back-to-back starts in which he gave up 20 runs in 5⅔ innings. Remove those twin nightmares, in which Luzardo believes he was tipping pitches, and his ERA would have been 3.03.
“We thought if he’d go out there every five, six days that he’d be a very good big league pitcher,” Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski said. “He’s really one of the better pitchers in baseball this year. I can’t say that I would have said, ‘Oh, we know that’s going to happen.’”
Dombrowski whiffed in free agency last winter, with reliever Jordan Romano (8.23 ERA), swingman Joe Ross (released on Aug. 26 with a 5.12 ERA), and outfielder Max Kepler (.691 OPS) providing little return on a combined $22.5 million investment.
But trading for Luzardo was a master stroke, reminiscent of the 2012 deadline deal when Dombrowski added Aníbal Sánchez to a Tigers rotation that already included Justin Verlander, Max Scherzer, Doug Fister, and Rick Porcello.
Dombrowski didn’t set out to make a major addition to the Phillies’ rotation in the offseason but pounced when the Marlins made Luzardo available for a package headlined by teenage shortstop Starlyn Caba.
And considering the season-ending injury to Zack Wheeler, Nola’s struggles, and top prospect Andrew Painter’s learning curve in triple A, where would the Phillies have been without Luzardo?
“We were looking for somebody to help us, and it just so happened, we got a little bit better quality than maybe you would have said as a No. 5 starter,” Dombrowski said. “I don’t think we were looking for the quality that [Luzardo] was.”
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Luzardo incorporated a sweeping slider in spring training, and it became a major weapon with which he held hitters to a .178 average. But in September, as the innings mounted and teams saw more of the new sweeper, he threw his changeup more frequently.
It gave him a different look.
“The sweeper, the fastball, they just kind of jumped out early on in the year as my strengths,” Luzardo said. “I think we leaned on them heavily. Then, as a big-league season goes on, hitters start to become aware of certain pitches. That’s when more of the mix has to come into play. That’s where the unpredictability comes in.
“I think we’ve gotten into a good pattern now of keeping a steady mix.”
Luzardo will need it all — fastball, sweeper, changeup, and the occasional sinker and slider — against the Dodgers. He faced them three weeks ago in Los Angeles and fell behind, 3-0, in the fourth inning before retiring 10 consecutive batters and pitching into the eighth.
“When he settles in,” Thomson said, “he has some of those quick at-bats where he gets a lot of weak contact. I think he’s grown. He’s learned over the course of the year how to slow it down, especially in this environment. I’m super confident that he’s going to be able to handle the emotional part of the game.”
And maybe save the Phillies’ postseason from the brink of extinction even before they board the overnight charter for Los Angeles.