Philadelphia Phillies Starter Off to Red Hot Start

The once highly touted A's pitching prospect is off to a great start for his new team.

Apr 10, 2025; Atlanta, Georgia, USA; Philadelphia Phillies starting pitcher Jesus Luzardo (44) throws against the Atlanta Braves in the first inning at Truist Park. Mandatory Credit: Brett Davis-Imagn Images | Brett Davis-Imagn Images

This past off-season, the Philadelphia Phillies went out and acquired starter Jesús Luzardo from the Miami Marlins to help bolster an already great group of starting pitchers. The Phillies sent shortstop prospect Starlyn Caba and outfielder Emaarion Boyd to the Marlins in the deal.

Luzardo spent a couple of years in the Marlins organization after being sent there in a big deadline deal that made Starling Marte an Oakland Athletic back in 2021. In Luzardo's first two full seasons in Miami, he posted 3.32 and 3.58 ERAs.

The southpaw spent parts of three seasons with the A's. In his first two seasons in the green and gold, he looked like a promising pitcher for the club's rotation. However, after a rough start to his 2021 season and the team about to tear down the roster, the A's decided to move the lefty and his potential for an extra piece to help them contend for a postseason berth.

The trade was quite underwhelming for the A's as Luzardo became a solid pitcher for the Marlins, and Starling Marte only played for about two months in Oakland, and the team ultimately missed playing in October. To be fair, that failure wasn't Marte's fault, with the outfielder batting .316 with a .359 OBP, five home runs, 30 RBI, and 25 stolen bases across 56 games.

Marte was incredible, but with the team not making the postseason, giving up Luzardo's years of team control became a questionable call.

Heading into Phillies camp this year, Luzardo joined the stacked rotation, including Zack Wheeler, Aaron Nola, Christopher Sánchez, and Taijuan Walker. His spring campaign wasn't great, as he posted a 9.49 ERA in just over 12 innings.

Those stats didn't get to him, however. Luzardo has now made three starts for the Phillies in the regular season and has dominated in all of them. The left-hander has a 2-0 record with a 1.50 ERA, and is becoming one of the most dominant starters in the league, which has always been his upside potential.

Two factors have really been helping him this season. The first is that his four-seamer is averaging 96.4 miles per hour, an increase of +1.2 mph from year-to-year. Essentially, he's back to where he'd been during the 2022-23 seasons.

The other change he's made is that he's utilizing a sweeper, according to Baseball Savant, a new pitch in his repertoire. The sweeping slider has given his a fifth pitch back in his arsenal, and hitters are struggling with it, batting .133 against the new addition in the early going.

His sweeper has also made it so that Luzardo has had to throw fewer sinkers, a pitch that hitters had some success against, this season.

Luzardo was originally acquired by the Athletics from the Washington Nationals as the big piece in the big piece in the Sean Doolittle/Ryan Madson deal. The Athletics also received Blake Treinen and Sheldon Neuse in that deal.

The A's trading Luzardo away looks like it could have been a mistake, particularly with the start he's off to this season, in retrospect. Of course, if the A's had made the postseason, then Marte could have been a huge spark plug for that offense and been a real difference-maker, but with zero October games played that year, the trade doesn't look great these days.