Baffled by recent rough stretch, Wheeler looks to 'zone it back in' vs. Angels

ANAHEIM -- There has been no shortage of questions surrounding Zack Wheeler over the past month.

What changed from his stellar first half? What's with all the walks? Is he healthy?

Well, after his outing last Monday in Seattle -- one in which he made the wrong kind of history -- Wheeler was left searching for answers of his own.

"To be totally honest with you, and as humble as I can be, it's been a while," Wheeler said when asked if he remembers feeling this way before. "That's why it's so frustrating. I haven't had a stretch like this in a while, and I mean, I just don't really have anything else to say, to be totally honest with you."

That was a big difference from less than a week earlier when he was his usually confident self despite a four-walk outing against the Marlins.

"I know I’ve still got it," Wheeler said after that Aug. 18 outing. "There's no question about that."

Well, those questions continue to linger after he was tagged for eight runs over four-plus innings on Monday against the Mariners. Wheeler allowed four home runs and five walks, becoming the first Phillies pitcher on record (since at least 1900) to do that in a single game.

Wheeler has now walked at least four batters in three of his past four outings. Prior to that, he had walked four batters in only three of his past 109 outings -- a stretch that dated back to September 2022.

Now, Wheeler did provide an answer to the most important question mentioned above.

"To be totally honest with you, I feel perfectly fine. I'm healthy, strong -- everything's there," Wheeler said. "So, I don't know. Just got to zone it back in and figure it out."

When Wheeler takes the mound for Sunday's series finale against the Angels, he'll be looking for his first win since July 12. Excluding his rain-shortened outing on Aug. 2 in Baltimore, he has a 9.27 ERA over his past five full starts. He has not pitched more than 5 1/3 innings in any of those outings.

"I’m just really struggling the past few," Wheeler said after his last outing. "All I can really throw for a strike -- a good quality strike -- is a fastball right now, and that's not even fully consistent. So when you're pitching kind of with one pitch, it's pretty hard up here."

For most of this stretch, Wheeler has had either his fastball or his offspeed stuff working on a given night -- just not both of them together. But that last outing in Seattle was the first time he really struggled to command any of his offerings.

Wheeler routinely missed his spot with four-seam fastballs. He had minimal control over his sweeper. Even his sinker wasn't hitting catcher J.T. Realmuto's target with regularity.

The result was a lot of deep counts -- and a lot of walks.

"It's just building my confidence back up to being able to throw all your pitches," Wheeler said.

That journey continues Sunday afternoon at Angel Stadium.