Philadelphia Phillies ace Zack Wheeler pitched the Phillies to their first series sweep in almost two months on Sunday. In the 4-2 Phillies win, Wheeler pitched five innings, allowing three hits, two runs, and three walks while striking out seven batters. It was a solid performance, but there are still some lingering concerns for Wheeler moving forward.
If Phillies fans are just looking at the box score, his line looks like just another vintage Wheeler outing, but that couldn't be farther from the truth. Wheeler has been dealing with some shoulder soreness, and that seemed to have an impact on his outing on Sunday against the Texas Rangers even after his start got pushed back from Friday, per MLB.com's Paul Casella.
Zack Wheeler battled through alarming velocity drop, but Phillies won't admit concerns about his health
Wheeler threw 83 pitches over his five innings and worked his way out of jams, including some self-inflicted harm with the walks he surrendered. The biggest problem was Wheeler's velocity throughout his start. According to Statcast, Wheeler was down considerably on all six pitches he threw out there.
Pitch | Sunday Avg. Velo. | Season Avg. Velo. | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
4-Seam Fastball | 94.2 mph | 96.2 mph | -2.0 |
Sweeper | 81.7 mph | 83.9 mph | -2.2 |
Splitter | 85.1 mph | 87.3 mph | -2.2 |
Sinker | 93.0 mph | 95.5 mph | -2.5 |
Curveball | 79.9 mph | 81.2 mph | -1.3 |
Cutter | 89.8 mph | 91.9 mph | -2.1 |
It's not something you typically see in an ace of Wheeler's caliber to have lost more than two miles per hour on nearly every pitch he throws. He still worked around it and when asked after the game, Wheeler seemed to feel just fine.
“Today I felt perfectly normal,” Wheeler said, per Casella.
Wheeler is one of the most trusted pitchers in baseball, and sometimes they need to be reeled in to prevent them from potentially hurting themselves or further aggravating an existing injury. Wheeler was missing a lot of his spots throughout the game, which only added to the confusion about what was going on with him.
Phillies manager Rob Thomson didn't seem too concerned either.
“I'm not concerned,” Thomson said when asked about the velocity, per Casella. “ … He just looks like he's a little bit out of sync, that's all.”
It's understandable to say that the club and their manager aren't concerned about their ace, but a huge drop in velocity is no small deal, and it definitely doesn't match what fans saw today. It'll be something to monitor going forward, with only weeks until playoff time.
Wheeler believes that it'll just take some time before he's back to feeling like his old self, according to NBC Sports Philadelphia's Bob Cooney.
“I felt a lot better. I felt good. I felt healthy,” Wheeler said, per Cooney. “Still just a little off so just got to keep working at that. It wasn’t the prettiest today but got through it. Trying to figure it out. The past four starts have been off, but it’s that part of the season where the innings are starting to rack up a little bit so it’s just catching up to me a little bit. Just got to push through it. It’s all just a cycle so it will come back around and I’ll be fine.”
Wheeler is on another Cy Young track in 2025 with a 10-5 record, 2.68 ERA and 189 strikeouts in 144 2/3 innings pitched. He's still one of the best pitchers in MLB at 35 years old, per MLB.com's Brent Maguire. The Phillies just need to make sure that he takes the proper time he needs so that his shoulder doesn't come back to haunt him in the postseason.