PHILADELPHIA \u2014 The chaos was already underway when Adolis Garc\u00eda jumped to his feet in the right-field corner at Citizens Bank Park, trying to get ahold of the ball he\u2019d just slid over.<\/p>\n
Dansby Swanson rounded third, then Miguel Amaya. Amid the wreckage stood Jes\u00fas Luzardo, with the Chicago Cubs\u2019 12th hit of the night rolling into right as the team tacked on two runs, pushing the score to 7-1 in the sixth inning.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt just felt like every ball they hit found a hole,\u201d Luzardo said.<\/p>\n
An 11-2 Philadelphia Phillies loss Wednesday marked the latest installment in a rough start to the season for Luzardo, whom the Phillies signed to a five-year, $135 million contract extension last month. He gave up 12 hits and eight earned runs against the Cubs in perhaps his worst outing since struggling with tipping pitches last June. Now, four starts into the season, Luzardo holds a 7.94 ERA in 22 2\/3 innings.<\/p>\n
There is plenty to puzzle over, particularly considering that what has ailed him has looked a bit different each start. He was burned by a handful of bad pitches in his first outing, then struck out 11 and dominated at Coors Field less than a week later. Last week, he struggled to get ahead in the count and paid for it during a five-run fifth inning.<\/p>\n
A big inning and struggles with runners on base arose again Wednesday, an outing that spiraled after Luzardo threw just 17 pitches across the first and second innings. A weird third inning featuring a J.T. Realmuto error and a Luzardo wild pitch soon after gave way to three runs \u2014 a preview of fifth- and sixth-inning difficulties with runners on.<\/p>\n
Entering the start, hitters were 7-for-14 (.500) against Luzardo with runners in scoring position this season. After Wednesday\u2019s start, opposing batters are hitting .579 against him with RISP.<\/p>\n
It is not a new problem for Luzardo. He struggled from the stretch last summer, primarily with mechanical adjustments meant to prevent him from tipping. From June through August, batters hit .310 against Luzardo with RISP. Toward the end of the season, he found success changing his delivery from the stretch to mimic the windup. It appeared as though problems from the stretch were behind him.<\/p>\n
Now, maybe not. But \u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not tipping,\u201d he said. \u201cWe work tirelessly to make sure that \u2014 I mean, all my throws in between starts are out of the stretch. We work at that. Obviously, it\u2019s something that\u2019s kind of biting me. So, it\u2019s something we\u2019ve got to fix ASAP.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even more puzzling is just how good some of Luzardo\u2019s stuff looked initially. His sinker, which he tweaked to induce greater movement, had an 80 percent strike rate and worked well the first two times through the order. The pitch averaged 21.6 inches of vertical drop (total movement) last season, but it averaged 24.5 inches through Luzardo\u2019s first three starts and 23 inches on Wednesday. His sweeper drew six whiffs on 14 swings. His command was sharp. Yet there will be plenty for the pitching staff to pore over.<\/p>\n
Said manager Rob Thomson: \u201cI mean, the stuff was good. Threw strikes, got ahead. They had some good at-bats against him. He tried to grind it out to save the bullpen.\u201d<\/p>\n
Five of the 10 hardest-hit balls off Luzardo on Wednesday were sinkers. Two of those were outs. The other three traveled 110, 107.9 and 96.9 mph off the bat and became base hits. It is a decent pitch, though arguably still a work in progress against righties.<\/p>\n
And at this point, everything is a work in progress for the Phillies \u2014 that much Thomson emphasized after the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve got to keep grinding,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re going through a tough time right now in all phases of the game. I don\u2019t think that\u2019s any secret. But we\u2019re going to get better. We\u2019re a good club.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Phillies recorded five hits. Shota Imanaga drew 26 whiffs from batters, the most of any pitcher in the majors this year and a figure that ranks among the highest for the Phillies in the Statcast era. The versus-left lineup continues to be a problem, one that could be on display this weekend, with the Atlanta Braves starting lefties Friday and Saturday.<\/p>\n
For now, the Phillies have an off day before they play 10 straight, including a seven-game trip. Perhaps it will be time to reset before more baseball is played, another game when they try to put it together Friday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHILADELPHIA \u2014 The chaos was already underway when Adolis Garc\u00eda jumped to his feet in the right-field corner…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":676858,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2399],"tags":[5,138,24,4245,161,4,25],"class_list":{"0":"post-676857","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago-cubs","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-chicago","10":"tag-chicago-cubs","11":"tag-chicagocubs","12":"tag-cubs","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-philadelphia-phillies"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116414011707735125","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/676857","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=676857"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/676857\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/676858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=676857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=676857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=676857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}