The Unique Challenge of Phillies Upcoming Road Trip

The Phillies have a segmented schedule in the month of April with a week at home, a week on the road, a little over a week back at a home, another week on the road.

They left on Wednesday night for Denver after going 3-3 at Citizens Bank Park against the Rangers and Nationals. The Phils play three this weekend against the Rockies, then fly to San Francisco on Sunday evening for a three-game series with the Giants.

It's early in the season for the Phillies' first of three West Coast road trips, with the others taking place May 25-31 in San Diego and Los Angeles and August 24-September 2 in Seattle, Anaheim and Arizona.

The Rockies series

The Rockies lost 119 games last year. It will be hard to be quite that bad again in 2026 but this is still one of baseball's worst rosters, a team nearly every opponent should expect to win a series against.

The Rockies' first week came on the road in Miami and Toronto. They've already been well-traveled. They went 2-4, scoring 14 runs in one of the wins but three runs or fewer in every other game.

The Phillies have had their share of struggles at Coors Field over the years, even when they're good and the Rockies are bad. They're just 2-8-2 in their last 12 series in Colorado, though the two series wins came in 2023 and 2025.

The Phillies swept the Rockies in four games at Coors Field last May, winning 9-3, 7-4, 9-5 and 2-0. The Phils hit .327 as a team with 10 doubles, a triple and seven home runs in the four games. All of Trea Turner, Kyle Schwarber, Bryce Harper, Alec Bohm, Brandon Marsh and Edmundo Sosa had productive offensive series.

Both legs of this road trip will be a learning experience for rookie centerfielder Justin Crawford, his first time playing in two spacious outfields affected by climate. He was one of the Phillies' biggest standouts on the opening homestand.

Opposing arms in Colorado

This weekend, the Phils face three starting pitchers who are making their first home starts as Rockies: Michael Lorenzen, lefty Jose Quintana and Tomoyuki Sugano. None of them reached five innings in their first start.

Nearly half of the Phillies' career at-bats against Lorenzen belong to Schwarber, who has gone 9-for-24 (.375) with three doubles, two homers and three walks. Harper is 2-for-7 with a homer and four walks.

Quintana, a finesse veteran lefty who tries to record outs by expanding the zone by just a smidge, has given this lineup fits the last four times he's faced it. He's allowed just five earned runs in those 23⅓ innings and held the Phillies to a .190 batting average.

The Phils have never faced Sugano. Adolis Garcia (1-for-3) is their only hitter with at-bats against him.

The Phillies will start Aaron Nola, Jesus Luzardo and Taijuan Walker at Coors Field.

House of horrors

The second leg of the Phillies' road trip, Oracle Park, has been their most difficult road stadium over the last two-plus decades. The park opened in 2000 and the Phillies have gone 28-55 all-time, equivalent to a 55-107 record over a full season.

It's been even worse lately, despite the Phillies contending four years in a row. They've lost 18 of their last 22 games in San Francisco. They're 0-10-1 in their last 11 series since 2013.

The Giants do have a unique home-field advantage because of the wind, outfield dimensions and larger chunks of foul ground at Oracle Park. It's a difficult place to play the outfield and an even more difficult place to hit. Since 2023, only Pittsburgh has been a tougher place to homer and only Seattle has been a tougher place to score.

Harper considered the Giants before he signed with the Phillies and has said at various points through the years that San Francisco was the runner-up. One of the factors in his decision not to sign there had to be his lack of success hitting in the Giants' home park. Harper has batted just .203/.327/.355 with five home runs in 168 plate appearances.

Schwarber didn't hit much in San Francisco the first 16 times he played there, but he's made the stadium look small the last two years, going 10-for-25 with a double and four home runs.

Andrew Painter, Cristopher Sanchez and Nola are lined up to face the Giants, in that order.