Inside the training routine that makes the Phillies’ Aaron Nola baseball’s most durable pitcher

CLEARWATER, Fla. — Dong Lien always knew when it was almost Aaron Nola’s turn to pitch. The music coming from the Phillies’ weight room — “The Red” by Chevelle, something from Shinedown, maybe a little Greta Van Fleet — gave it away.

“I’d walk into the gym and there’s nobody in the room, nobody’s lifting, but I know because of this music that behind the corner, over there by the mirrors, there’s Noles working on his forearm, making sure his biceps are good, making sure his arm is ready for tomorrow,” Lien, a former Phillies strength and conditioning coach, said by phone this week. “He’s going through those checkpoints. He knows his body so well, and I’m in awe of it.”

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Nola is known for his meticulous preparation. His work ethic and attention to detail are unassailable. From running in the outfield and soft-tissue treatment in the trainer’s room to weight training and hydration, the Phillies co-ace and longest-tenured player is less a professional athlete than a machine.

It isn’t coincidental that Nola has made more starts (143) and thrown more innings (871⅔) than any pitcher in baseball since 2018. Only Nola and the Yankees’ Gerrit Cole have worked 200-plus innings in three of the last four full seasons. The other 32 pitchers in Phillies camp have combined to do it once (Zack Wheeler in 2021).

Nola hasn’t missed a start for a non-COVID reason since 2017. José Berríos is the only other pitcher with four seasons of at least 32 starts in the last five years.

There’s plenty of quality to go with all that quantity. Nola, who will turn 30 in June, has the third-most strikeouts (1,007) since 2018 and a 122 ERA+, meaning he’s 22% better than average adjusted for league and ballpark. He finished third in the Cy Young voting in 2018 and fourth last season.

But it’s Nola’s reliability that sets him apart in an era when starters are asked to pitch less than ever. As sure as the Phanatic will provide between-innings high jinks and Harry Kalas’ rendition of “High Hopes” will play after every Phillies victory at Citizens Bank Park, Nola will take the ball every fifth game.

And he’s about to get paid for it.

Talks with the Phillies on a contract extension have picked up over the last few weeks, according to sources, with the sides reportedly swapping initial offers. But whether an agreement is reached in spring training or Nola tests the free-agent market after the season, he stands to receive a nine-figure deal in a world where Carlos Rodón, six months older than Nola, signed a six-year, $162 million contract with the Yankees despite never reaching 200 innings in a season and making 30 starts only once.

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“We generally don’t [comment] on negotiations with players,” Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski said Thursday. “I can just say that Aaron is a player that we want to keep in the organization for an extended time.”

How has Nola been able to stay so healthy while performing a craft that is so unforgiving on elbows and shoulders?

To hear Lien tell it, Nola’s secret is a level of discipline that rivals the late Roy Halladay’s.

The Phillies drafted Nola seventh overall out of LSU in 2014. Thirteen months later, he made his major-league debut. A year after that, he narrowly avoided the worst injury scare of his career.

“Almost tore my elbow,” Nola said the other day before a spring training workout. “I don’t want to do it again. It’s not fun. It’s something where, you’ve got to get back to normal. If I stay healthy, I think about only getting better every time and improving my craft. That’s the main goal.”

Before the elbow strain, which caused him to miss the final two months of the 2016 season, Nola said he was a slave to routine. He did the same things in between starts in April that he did in July, even though his arm didn’t always feel the same.

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Not all starts are created equal. Nola might sail through seven innings in 100 pitches one night, then grind out five innings in 110 pitches five days later. Some games put more strain on his arm than others and require additional recovery time. The toll of a workload feels different early in the season than it does at the All-Star break.

So, Nola learned to listen to his body.

“My routine has changed a lot since I came up,” Nola said. “Jake Arrieta taught me when he was over here in 2018, he said, ‘If I want to work out one day, I work out. If I don’t, if I’m too tired one day, I just don’t.’ I learned that from him. The biggest thing I’ve learned about my routine is to enjoy it more and not stick with the same thing every single day because I think I have to.”

There are a few staples. Nola goes for a long run the day after a start “just to kind of flush everything.” His goal is to get rid of the soreness by the second day, then throw a bullpen session on the third. He goes through a checklist of exercises in the weight room and drinks nearly a gallon of water on the day of a start.

Over the years, Nola has incorporated massage therapy. He uses heated cups on his skin to reduce pain and improve blood flow. Arrieta got him into Pilates to optimize flexibility and loosen up his lower back. Some days, he switches out the stationary bike for running.

Lien, who spent 10 years on the Phillies’ major league staff and 18 overall in the organization, said Nola comes up with new challenges to keep the workouts fresh. He may try to move the weights more quickly or vary the speed or distance while running on the warning track.

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“But it’s not random,” Lien said. “There’s a foundation built there, and it’s built from over the years. He’s got a method each day. He knows what he’s doing. Because he does it on a consistent basis, I truly believe it allows him that longevity in a season.

“The first person that comes to mind who was like that was Roy Halladay. That Roy Halladay-esque work ethic is very similar to what Aaron is like. He knows what he has to get accomplished in that day, and how he goes about it. You don’t have to ask him. He’s just going to go and get it done.”

In 1993, the year Nola was born, 52 pitchers reached the 200-inning mark.

“That’s what you want to do, throw deep in the game and help the bullpen,” Nola said. “That’s why we’re starters, right? That’s how it’s always been. To me, that’s baseball.”

Maybe, but baseball has changed. In 2003, 27 pitchers worked 200 innings. In 2019, the year before the pandemic, 15 pitchers did it. Last year, with workloads normalized after COVID disruptions in 2020 and 2021, there were only eight.

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But teams still must account for more than 1,400 innings in a season. If starters aren’t trained — or in some cases, trusted — to get through a lineup three times, it puts more strain on the bullpen.

Under Dombrowski, the Phillies have taken a traditional approach. They lean on Nola and Wheeler. Ranger Suárez threw a career-high 155⅓ innings last season and said he’s aiming for 200 this year. Pitching coach Caleb Cotham’s goal for newcomer Taijuan Walker is to go deeper in games after pitching 159 and 157⅓ innings over the last two seasons for the Mets.

But the Phillies must also replace Kyle Gibson’s 167⅔ innings. If 19-year-old phenom Andrew Painter breaks camp in the rotation after throwing 103⅔ innings in the minors last year, his workload will be managed. Bailey Falter and perhaps Cristopher Sánchez and prospects Griff McGarry and Mick Abel will play a bigger role. Nick Nelson will be stretched out in spring training.

Imagine trying to piece together the puzzle without Nola. It would be easy to take his 200 innings for granted if he wasn’t such a throwback.

“He’s a tireless worker,” manager Rob Thomson said. “He’s always in shape and always in the weight room. I just kind of assume that he’s fresh all the time.”

Said Nola: “I’ve never been a guy that throws super hard, so I always work on my body and my delivery and commanding all my pitches. I feel like, if I do that, I could throw deeper in the games, which is what I always want to do as a starter. I hope it keeps going back in that direction where starters go longer.”

Meanwhile, Nola will continue to embody a time when they did.

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