How Jesús Luzardo blossomed into a frontline pitcher

Cristopher Sánchez and Zack Wheeler are co-aces for the Phillies, two of baseball’s top pitchers headlining a dominant rotation.

Those two are supported by Jesús Luzardo, who has pitched like an ace himself and has blossomed into one of the top pitchers in baseball. Acquired from the Marlins during the 2024-25 offseason, Luzardo had a strong debut season with the Phillies last year, posting a 3.92 ERA with 216 strikeouts, while finishing seventh in NL Cy Young Award voting.

The left-hander has leveled up in 2026, posting a 3.23 ERA with 185 strikeouts through his first 25 starts of the season and earned his first All-Star appearance. Here’s a look at how the 28-year-old has dominated and given the Phillies a three-headed monster atop their rotation.

Dominance across the board

Regardless of what metric you look at, Luzardo ranks among the top pitchers in the sport.

By good old-fashioned ERA, Luzardo’s 3.23 mark is tied for 17th among qualified starters but he ranks much higher in several other categories and ERA indicators:

• 3rd in expected ERA (2.88)
• 6th in FIP (2.76)
• T-6th in strikeout rate (29.8%)
• 7th in xFIP (2.94)

ERA indicators essentially have Luzardo as a top-5/10 starter in baseball. While a lot of that is due to his ability to generate boatloads of whiffs, he’s also quite good in other vital areas of pitching, too.

Luzardo only walks 7.4 percent of opposing batters, comfortable above the league-average mark and places him in the 64th percentile of qualifying MLB pitchers. In terms of Luzardo’s ability to limit quality contact, he fares well there too: his 31.8 percent hard-hit rate is in the 91st percentile and his 5.8 percent barrel rate is in the 75th percentile.

How he does it

Luzardo has always had excellent stuff, evidenced by his pair of 200-plus strikeout seasons in 2023 and ‘25 and his likely third such season in 2026. But we’ve really seen him take his overall arsenal to another level in terms of pure stuff and diversification.

The biggest and most important change to his arsenal was the introduction of the sweeper before the 2025 season (his first with the Phillies). It’s a truly dominant pitch, an 86 mph breaking ball that is his most utilized pitch (38.1 percent) and for good reason.

Luzardo has generated 113 strikeouts on the pitch, the second-most of any individual pitch behind Jacob Misiorowski’s four-seamer (141 Ks). Opposing hitters have a .117 batting average against Luzardo’s sweeper, the second-lowest among any qualified pitch. As a result, Luzardo’s sweeper has been worth 19 runs according to Run Value, fifth-best among all pitches.

Luzardo also has a pair of 96-97 mph heaters in his four-seamer and sinker that give him multiple paths to success against both left-handers and right-handers. Luzardo rounds out his arsenal with an excellent changeup that he mainly uses against righties, which produces a whiff on nearly four out of every 10 swings.

This arsenal comes together with a brilliant balance:

• 38.2 percent sweeper usage
• 25.1 percent four-seamer usage
• 18.7 percent changeup usage
• 18.0 percent swinker usage

He’s gotten better as season has progressed

Blow-up outings were an issue in an otherwise excellent season in 2025 -- Luzardo allowed 12 earned runs in a start and eight in another outing. In his other 30 starts, Luzardo spotted a 3.03 ERA.

It looked like that issue would resurface again to begin the ‘26 season. He allowed six earned runs in his first outing, five earned runs in his third outing and eight in his fourth outing. Through his first 13 starts, Luzardo had a 4.56 ERA, albeit with much better underlying numbers (such as his 3.38 FIP and 3.62 expected ERA).

Since making his 14th start on June 10, he’s arguably been the best pitcher in the sport. In a dozen starts, he’s posted 3.0 WAR (per FanGraphs), the top mark among all pitchers. He’s also struck out an MLB-best 105 batters in that time and has a 1.98 ERA, second-best among qualified starters.

For much of the last two years, Luzardo has flashed signs of being a true ace. But these last few months have really hammered home the idea that this is one of the top pitchers in the entire sport.