Phillies starting rotation feeding off each others’ success: ‘You get better watching them’

During the 2023 playoffs, Bryce Harper dubbed Zack Wheeler and Aaron Nola “Ace one and Ace two.”

Through 20 games in 2024, the rest of the rotation are making a case for their own nicknames. Spencer Turnbull’s Friday night outing against the White Sox, where he took a no-hitter into the seventh inning, was just the latest in a streak of stellar performances by Phillies starters.

“When their rotation’s going well, they get on a roll and they want to sort of outdo each other, kind of a competition,” said manager Rob Thomson.

Against the Colorado Rockies on Wednesday, Cristopher Sánchez allowed zero earned runs and struck out 10 through six innings. The day before, Ranger Suàrez threw a shutout, just the second complete game across the majors this season. Wheeler, who gets the start on Saturday against the White Sox, is the only Phillies starter without a win — though most of that is due to a lack of run support.

“It’s almost like you get better watching them, just because right now everybody’s having pretty good starts,” Nola said. “It’s really cool to see [that] every single night something really cool can happen.”

With Turnbull emerging as an unexpected weapon and Taijuan Walker set to make his return from injured reserve as soon as next Sunday, the Phillies will have some decisions to make soon. But, Thomson said, it’s a good problem to have.

“When I came up, we didn’t have options like we do,” Nola said. “I think that’s special, and I think a ballclub needs it, and I think good ballclubs have it.”

While it’s still early in the season, the Phillies’ rotation has some elite company.

Their five starters have a combined 2.39 ERA across four appearances each. That’s lower than the 3.47 ERA that the Phillies’ 2011 rotation of Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee, Roy Oswalt, Cole Hamels, and Joe Blanton had in the same amount of games. That 2011 starting rotation was considered one of the best in the game, with Halladay, Lee, Oswalt, and Hamels often called the “Fab Four” or the “Four Aces.”

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Lee was an established star who signed with the Phillies as a free agent ahead of that season, so expectations for the 2011 rotation had been sky-high. But, with the exception of Turnbull, the 2024 success has been a result of in-house improvements with the same starters as last year.

Nola, whose MLB debut in 2015 coincided with Hamels’ last season with the Phillies, said it’s special to be in the same conversation as that group.

“Those guys are on an island of their own,” Nola said. “I loved watching them, personally.”

The game has changed a lot since the Fab Four. Halladay threw eight complete games in 2011, Lee had six, and Hamels had three. Last season, only Michael Lorenzen went all nine innings for the Phillies, during his no-hitter in August. Suàrez’s complete game last week has already equaled that, less than a full month into the season.

Nola said he loves when he and his teammates go deep into games, and hopes they can take some inspiration from those players.

“I think when we look at pitching, those are pitchers, and I think our game needs to go back to that,” Nola said. “Just because the way the game is going, pitching is important, and we need to try to strive to throw deep in the game.

“Especially in Philly, those are the guys that we look at that did it — did it for a long time, too. We have to try to kind of base it off those guys.”