There’s no other way to say it: Aaron Nola stinks right now. Actually, he’s been bad all season, plopping this big matzo ball onto the Phillies’ collective laps:
Is Nola in the rotation when/if the Phils make the postseason?
Well, after his latest dud — Wednesday’s game against the Brewers when he gave up six runs in five innings, including five in the first — maybe the Phils should go to anybody other than Nola to start a playoff game, maybe even… get ready for an anxiety spike… Taijuan Walker.
Aaron Nola has struggled all season for the Phillies. (Photo by Emilee Chinn/Getty Images)
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Through 13 starts this year, Nola’s statline is gruesome: a 6.78 ERA and 15 home runs given up in just 69 innings, leading to a 3-8 record. He sat out three months with rib and ankle injuries, which we thought caused his early-season slippage. But in four starts since returning from the IL, he’s actually been worse, pitching to a ghastly 8.38 ERA.
His velocity dipped Wednesday, with his four-seam fastball averaging 91.7 mph. But Nola says he’s healthy; it’s just been a struggle to find a groove early in the game. “I just think the first inning’s kind of bitten me on the butt past couple times,” Nola said. “I feel like it’s been all year, and even before I was hurt. The one inning’s been kind of blowing up on me.”
Former Phillies GM and current broadcaster Ruben Amaro pointed to Nola’s poor fastball command that’s sinking his results.
“My concern is his command of his fastball, particularly in the first couple innings,” Amaro said on The Phillies Show that dropped Thursday. “This is a guy who always had good fastball command and it made him who he is. He’s got to get his fastball command together again. And it may be a little bit of a mechanical thing.”
By now — early September — Nola should have pinpoint command. And also by now, the Phillies should know who’ll front the playoff rotation. The first three spots will go to Cristopher Sánchez, Ranger Suárez and Jesús Luzardo. Yes, that’s odd to throw three lefties in a row in the playoffs.
But who gets the fourth and final rotation spot? It sounds like Phillies manager Rob Thomson is leaning to Nola, even after his latest disaster. “I always have confidence in him because he’s always prepared and he competes, and the bright lights don’t affect him,” Thomson said.
Thomson’s “bright lights” comment makes it seem that Nola will be in the playoff rotation no matter how he closes out the regular season.
But Amaro — playing the realist — said the Phillies “need Nola to step it up in the rotation because the playoffs are coming, and they don’t have a right-handed starter.”
A little clarification: The Phillies don’t have a reliable right-handed starter.
Nola still has three or four starts to find the elite fastball command that turned him into one of baseball’s most reliable starters. If that doesn’t happen, there’s also righty Walker, who’s pitched well for most of the season but has skidded in recent starts.
And there’s also a wildcard: Walker Buehler, the right-handed former ace whom the Red Sox cut last week and the Phillies signed.
If Buehler pitches well in his Philly audition that starts on September 13, he could slot into a playoff rotation; that’s also contingent upon Nola (and maybe also Walker) closing out the regular season with a string of dumpster-fire outings.
Buehler has struggled in the past two seasons in his return from Tommy John surgery, but it should be noted that he threw 10 scoreless innings for the Dodgers in last year’s NLCS and World Series.
But the Phillies aren’t there yet, to knock Nola out of a playoff rotation. They still must lock up a playoff spot and hopefully the division crown. And Nola’s next start will be his biggest one of his season: a home game on Monday night against the second-place New York Mets. And if he dominates the Mets, that big matzo ball could fade away like a late summer breeze.
