Jesus Luzardo Discusses Return From Injury

Phillies newly-acquired starter Jesús Luzardo chatted with the Philadelphia beat over Zoom on Monday. The southpaw finished the 2024 season on the injured list but indicated he’s going into next season at full strength.

“I feel 100%. I’ve felt 100% the whole offseason,” Luzardo said. “Last year, the back was really the problem. Now that we’ve got that all figured out, thankfully everything’s back to normal.” He added that he has had a typical offseason, so it seems fair to assume he’ll be a full go for Spring Training. A lumbar stress reaction sent Luzardo to the 15-day IL in the second half of June. It didn’t take long before Miami transferred him to the 60-day injured list. The Marlins shut him down for good in early August.

Luzardo’s final season with the Marlins was a disappointment. The 27-year-old lefty struggled to an even 5.00 earned run average over 12 starts. He struck out a slightly below-average 21.2% of batters faced. Luzardo missed a couple weeks early in the year with elbow tightness, but the back proved much more problematic.

A fully healthy version of Luzardo is a #2 or #3 caliber starter. He showed that upside in 2023. Luzardo turned in a 3.58 ERA while striking out 28.1% of opponents across 178 2/3 innings. Luzardo averaged nearly 97 MPH on his heater and missed plenty of bats with both his slider and changeup. His 14.1% overall swinging strike rate ranked sixth among qualified starting pitchers.

Philadelphia sent highly-regarded shortstop prospect Starlyn Caba to Miami as the headliner of the Luzardo trade. A return to his ’23 form would arguably give Philadelphia the best front five in MLB. He’ll slot behind Zack Wheeler and Aaron Nola and alongside Ranger Suárez and Cristopher Sánchez in Rob Thomson’s staff. The depth isn’t great, though the Phils have added Joe Ross on a $4MM free agent deal to join Taijuan Walker as candidates for swing roles.

Pitching prospect Andrew Painter could eventually be a factor, but that won’t happen within the season’s first month or two. Philadelphia is being very cautious with the touted 21-year-old righty, whom they’ve seemingly kept untouchable in trade talks. Painter is working back from July 2023 Tommy John surgery. President of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski told reporters (including Matt Gelb of the Athletic) last week that the Phils won’t have Painter pitch in games during Spring Training. He’ll continue throwing on the side in the spring and will subsequently need to build into game shape in the minors.

Painter made six appearances and tallied 15 2/3 innings in last year’s Arizona Fall League. That’s his only game action since the conclusion of the 2022 season. The Phillies will need to keep a close watch on his workload and certainly envision Painter as a factor in a potential pennant race. It’s understandable they’d prefer to start him slowly and concentrate on saving his bullets for what they hope will be another playoff push. That’s especially true now that Luzardo is in the fold, allowing them to open the season with both Ross and Walker in the ’pen if their top five arms are healthy.