Can Ranger Suárez win 20 games? Recent history suggests it will be tough.
Bryce Harper had a message for the Phillies dugout as the team regrouped for the bottom of the fifth inning of Wednesday’s game against the Mets.
“Let’s get him a W,” Harper said.
He was referring to starting pitcher Ranger Suárez, who was going to be pulled with Spencer Turnbull warming in the bullpen. Suárez allowed only two unearned runs through five innings, but was in line for a loss or no-decision if the Phillies could not score at least two runs in the bottom half.
Harper ended up driving in two himself with a two-run bases loaded double as part of a four-run bottom of the fifth that propelled the Phillies to a 10-5 victory Wednesday night over the New York Mets at Citizens Bank Park.
Suárez didn’t have his best command as he battled through miserable conditions, but he did what good starting pitchers do: win.
He now has eight this season, two more than any other pitcher in MLB. He’s the first Phillies pitcher ever to win eight of his first nine starts in a season.
Individual pitcher wins are devalued in today’s baseball for good reasons. They are coincidental. It just so happened the Phillies took the lead when Suárez was the pitcher of record.
But the accumulation of many wins throughout a season matters more than ever. High win totals are an indication of consistency. Bad pitchers don’t stumble upon 20 wins. It means a pitcher is consistently giving his team at least five reasonably good innings and in today’s game, the population of pitchers who can be expected to do so is shrinking.
Since 2000, 12 pitchers, not including Suárez, have won eight of their first nine starts in a season. Of those 12, only four, Brandon Webb (2008), Josh Beckett (2007), Dontrelle Willis (2005) and Curt Schilling (2002) went on to win 20 games.
The list includes both notable greats and one-year wonders. Roy Halladay (2009) and Chris Sale (2016) both fell three wins short of 20.
In some cases, a strong start didn’t lead to a great ending. The last pitcher to win eight of his first nine, Jack Flaherty (2021), missed most of the remainder of the season after suffering an oblique injury while batting and won only one game after returning. Ubaldo Jiménez (2010) famously had 15 wins before the All-Star break and won only four games in the second half.
There have been 23 20-game winners in baseball since Halladay last reached that mark for the Phillies in 2010. The earliest any of those 20-game winners reached eight wins in a season was through 11 starts. The 23 20-game winners since 2011 averaged around six wins as the calendar turned to June.
The Phillies would love to see Suárez get to 20. Not because it’s a nice round number that could help his chances in the Cy Young Award race, but because it means he has stayed healthy and consistent throughout the season. Nagging injuries and late starts to spring training have kept him from reaching that mark.
It is virtually impossible to win 20 games while making less than 30 starts. The only other pitchers to have accomplished that feat in the Wild Card Era are Clayton Kershaw (2004) Pedro Martinez (1999) and Randy Johnson (1997).
The 28-year-old has not made more than 30 starts in his seven-year big league career. Manager Rob Thomson treated Wednesday as a “pullback” game for Suárez, who is third in the league in innings pitched at 59. It was also a convenient opportunity to get Turnbull three innings and keep him stretched out.
That was done with the bigger picture in mind.
“I just want to be healthy and 100% by the end of the season,” Suárez said through team interpreter Diego D’Aniello Perez.
Does Harper think Suárez can reach that number? He prefers not to think about it.
“I mean, you never know, right? Just got to take it one step at a time and I think he does a great job of doing that, not get ahead of himself,” Harper said.
The Phillies refuse to get ahead of themselves, but that doesn’t mean we have to refrain from it. Suárez’s 1.37 ERA through nine starts of a season is the lowest by a Phillies pitcher since 1912, when earned runs became an official stat in the National League, according to Sarah Langs.
It’s fun to dream about what a complete Suárez season could look like.
“I’ve always said pitching wins championships,” Harper said. “We’ve got a really good opportunity with the guys that we have.”
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