Jesús Luzardo gave the Phillies everything he had.

They came into Monday needing nine complete innings on both sides of the baseball. Luzardo did his part.

Making his first start in 12 days, the first-year Phillie looked completely unfazed. The lefty followed up a 32-start, double-digit win regular season with one of the sharpest outings of his 2025 campaign — and easily his best on the postseason stage.

That hadn’t always been the case. As a rookie with the Athletics, Luzardo threw three scoreless innings out of the bullpen in the 2019 AL Wild Card Game against Tampa Bay. But since then, his postseason record had been rough: three starts, 11 ⅔ innings, and 10 earned runs — including a loss at Citizens Bank Park in 2023.

He cleaned that slate almost entirely.

After a 24-pitch first inning, Luzardo locked in. His next five frames were flawless — 48 pitches, no hits, no walks and four strikeouts. He retired 17 straight Dodgers, the second-longest streak in franchise postseason history.

“The first was bumpier than expected,” Luzardo said. “But after we got out of that, it felt pretty smooth. Me and J.T. had a good mix, kept guys off balance, used a good amount of offspeed and fastballs in certain counts. Keeping them off balance was the key.”

The only issue? Blake Snell was just as dominant.

The two-time Cy Young Award winner didn’t allow a hit until the fifth inning. By the time his night was over, Snell had tossed six one-hit innings with nine strikeouts, generating 23 whiffs — the second most by a Dodgers left-handed pitcher in a playoff game during the Pitch-Tracking Era (2008).

“I thought our at-bats were better tonight than they were in L.A. [against Snell three weeks ago],” Rob Thomson said. “We didn’t chase as much. But Snell was really good again. We just have to keep grinding — those guys will get it going.”

And it was only a matter of time before Los Angeles’ lineup broke through.

With just 72 pitches, Luzardo returned for the seventh. Teoscar Hernández, who’s been unconscious this postseason, lined a leadoff single. Then Freddie Freeman did what Freddie Freeman does — lacing a double down the right-field line to move Hernández to third.

Rob Thomson made the walk to get his starter.

“I mean, he retired 17 in a row,” Thomson said. “He had 72 pitches and was pitching great. You’d be asking me why I took him out [before the seventh] if I did.”

Orion Kerkering entered in a tough situation — second and third, no outs. He struck out the first batter he faced, but a broken-bat Enrique Hernández grounder brought home a run. Then Dodgers manager Dave Roberts pressed the right button again.

Will Smith came off the bench and delivered a two-run single. Shohei Ohtani followed with an RBI knock off Matt Strahm to make it 4–0 Dodgers.

Two of the runs were charged to Luzardo, who left to a standing ovation from over 45,000 fans. His line — six-plus innings, three hits, five strikeouts — hardly tells the story.

“He was really fantastic,” Thomson said. “He was about 70 percent strikes. The slider was good, the changeup was good, the fastball had life. He battled and then just rolled from there.”

Bryce Harper liked what he saw from the southpaw, as well.  “Yeah, I thought he did a good job mixing it up on both sides of the plate,” Harper said. “He’s been like that for us all year long — threw the ball really well tonight. We just didn’t get it done for him.”

In the end, his outing will be remembered only as the one that got away.

The Phillies scraped together a run in the eighth and two in the ninth but couldn’t complete the comeback, falling 4-3 and heading to Los Angeles down 0-2 in the series.

“I thought we fought like hell in the eighth and ninth,” Thomson said. “Hopefully that carries over. Our backs are against the wall, and we’ve got to come out fighting.”

Luzardo expressed that same mindset. “Obviously you never want to go down 0–2,” he said. “But this is a really resilient and scrappy team. We’ve got a lot of faith in everybody in this clubhouse. Wednesday’s a new game, and we just have to go out and take it inning by inning.”

Without run support, even the best pitching performances can vanish. Luzardo deserved better — and now, the Phillies need answers fast.