Aaron Nola leaned on an unexpected weapon and produced a vintage start Monday, throwing a right-on-right changeup he has scarcely used in recent years en route to six scoreless innings and a 1-0 Phillies victory over the Miami Marlins. Nola — in his 12th major-league season — did not walk a batter and surrendered no extra-base hits while holding a Marlins lineup that entered the day with three hitters among the National League’s top 20 in OPS to a 1-for-7 showing. The changeup, one of 14 right-on-right changeups he’d thrown earlier this season, came down-and-in to Otto Lopez, helped set up a deeper curveball and ultimately produced a routine groundout to end the inning.
Monday’s outing capped a stretch in which the Phillies have won six of seven and allowed the interim manager’s staff to breathe a little easier, but the gains remain uneven. Even with the recent run, Phillies starters carry a 4.96 ERA, 26th in the majors, and the club plans to “lean harder” on Cristopher Sánchez, Jesús Luzardo and Zack Wheeler while Nola fine-tunes his repertoire and receives extra rest between turns. The appearance of a more-used changeup this week, the team’s analysis suggests, is less reinvention than a tactical tweak that could help Nola carve different attack lanes against big-league hitters.
Off the field, the Phillies’ outfield construction is again a problem for the roster. With both regular center fielders — Justin Crawford and Brandon Marsh — unavailable with minor injuries, Philadelphia started Garrett Stubbs in left, Adolis García in center and Felix Reyes in right over the weekend. The makeshift alignment highlighted deeper issues: through 34 games this season Phillies outfielders sport a combined .689 OPS, ranking 20th in MLB and barely below last season’s .710 OPS that ranked 19th. The club has not had an outfield finish in the top half of the league in OPS since 2023.
The nature of opposing contact has amplified the pain. The Phillies have permitted an astonishingly high .208 batting average on fly balls and popups to the outfield this year; the next-closest team, Houston, has a .153 on those batted balls. Philadelphia has allowed eight singles on fly balls or popups to center field in the first 34 games of 2026 — nearly matching the 10 such hits conceded in all of 2025 — and those center-field singles have averaged only 214 feet in distance, down from 243 feet last season. On average, Phillies center fielders have been positioned 324 feet from home plate this year, about four feet deeper than a year ago, but that alignment has not solved the problem.
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Individual depth options have yet to provide answers. Felix Reyes, who homered in his first big-league at-bat, is 2-for-28 (.143) with the Phillies and has not drawn a walk since joining the roster. Triple-A center fielder Steward Berroa, acquired in a small trade last month, has shown promise at Lehigh Valley with a .261/.342/.464 line, while Bryan De La Cruz has gone 2 for his last 29 and has not produced an extra-base hit since April 21. Gabriel Rincones Jr., expected back in minor-league games before April ended while rehabbing knee inflammation, has not yet returned to action.
Roster construction choices have drawn scrutiny too. The Phillies carried Garrett Stubbs as a 26th-man utility option rather than Dylan Moore; Stubbs has been used as a pinch runner and emergency outfielder and gives the club flexibility so J.T. Realmuto can be used as a pinch hitter in games Rafael Marchán starts. On the mound, winter bullpen additions have helped: Chase Shugart from Pittsburgh and Tim Mayza have performed well in low- to mid-leverage work, and Zach Pop and Nolan Hoffman have provided depth. Still, some expected high-leverage pieces — Jonathan Bowlan, José Alvarado and Tanner Banks — have been inconsistent, even as Banks and Alvarado had positive outings on Monday.
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The club is set to make another change this week: according to MLB.com, Jhoan Duran is expected to be activated Tuesday, which will necessitate a corresponding roster move. For now, Philadelphia’s rotation has stabilized enough to win close games, but its outfield and the run of weak outcomes on relatively soft contact remain questions the front office will have to address as the season unfolds.
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