Analyzing Don Mattingly’s Pitching Management and Decision-Making Strategy
You can’t argue that the Phillies have gotten better under Don Mattingly. The Phillies are 33-17 since Mattingly replaced Rob Thomson as interim manager after his sacking on April 28th and have revived their chances of winning their NL East division crown. That mark is the best in the MLB over that span entering Monday. Whether you believe this run was inevitable regardless of who the manager is or not, Mattingly deserves credit for directing this stunning turnaround.
That doesn’t mean, however, there haven’t been some fascinating judgments by Mattingly along the way. Most importantly, he’s more willing to push his starting pitchers deeper into the regular season than Rob Thomson was. We saw two examples of such over the last week in Jesús Luzardo and Zack Wheeler. Luzardo threw 106 pitches over seven innings in his last appearance on June 16. It was the first time this season that Luzardo has thrown more than 100 pitches, and the third-largest pitch count of his career in one start. Even with the Phillies up 8-0 and the lefty at 89 pitches to start the inning Mattingly decided to push Luzardo into the seventh inning. Luzardo got through the inning, but not before giving up a double and a home run to the first two batters he saw.
The other example is a more recent one with Zack Wheeler on Sunday. Wheeler looked to be tiring in the sixth, walking three to load the bases with one out in a 6-1 game.Jonathan Bowlan was warming up and ready in the bullpen when Mattingly came to the mound but the manager opted to leave Wheeler in to face one more hitter even though the right-hander was at 101 pitches and the situation was a little dicey. Wheeler got A.J. Ewing to ground into a force out but the Phillies couldn’t turn a double play and a run scored. Mattingly then chose to take Wheeler out after 104 pitches, matching his season high and just the second time he’s thrown over 100 pitches since returning from thoracic outlet surgery. Bowlan was able to get Marcus Semien to strike out on four pitches to end the inning.
It’s evident that Mattingly believes in his starters, and he has every reason to feel that way, since the Phillies rotation boasts the third best ERA (3.25) and fourth best WHIP (1.14) in baseball since he took over as manager. But it’s also fair to question the high pitch counts this time of year, particularly in this case with two pitchers with injury histories like Luzardo and Wheeler. One attribute that was undeniable for Thomson in his time as manager was his knack for getting the squad, and his rotation, mostly healthy to the postseason. Clearly, the judgment is still out on whether Mattingly can do the same.
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