Ranger Suárez hit around as Phillies drop series to Angels
PHILADELPHIA — A season ago, Ranger Suárez struggled after the All-Star break. He missed a month starting in late July with a lower back issue. He owned a 5.65 ERA in eight starts and 36 2/3 innings. Suárez’s 2024 second half was no good following a first half that earned him the first All-Star selection of his career.
In Sunday’s 8-2 Phillies’ loss to the Angels, resulting in a series loss by Philadelphia, Suárez struggled in his first outing of the second half. The left-hander’s command wasn’t crisp. He threw 100 pitches; 58 were strikes. His velocity was down. Suárez’s final line included eight hits, four walks and six earned runs across 4 1/3 innings.
“Not a whole lot of swing and miss,” manager Rob Thomson said of his starter, “which is unusual for him.”
Suárez had problems from the jump. He got out of the first inning after firing 24 pitches, 12 of which landed for strikes. He hit the second batter he faced, Nolan Schanuel, and walked Taylor Ward two batters later. Sandwiched between Schanuel’s hit by pitch and Ward’s walk was a strikeout of Mike Trout. Despite a lack of command, Suárez escaped the first inning unscathed by sitting Jo Adell down on strikes.
It was in the second inning when things got wonky. Suárez allowed five runs on five hits. The Angels didn’t use much power in the frame, something they’d done in the series’ first two games, hitting a combined six home runs and 11 total extra-base hits between Friday and Saturday. Four straight one-out singles in the second is how LA scored its first run against Suárez.
Following a two-out, bases-loaded walk of Mike Trout on a questionable ball-four call, making it 2-0 Halos, Ward stepped to the plate for his second at-bat of the afternoon. The bases were still juiced. Ward had already homered in each of the first two games this weekend. This time around, he settled for a double.
Ward split the left-center field gap on a 1-2 offering from Suárez. The bases cleared, making it 5-0 Angels. Ward’s two-bagger came on a center-cut four-seam fastball from Suárez. It was Suárez’s hardest thrown pitch of the afternoon (92.1 mph).
Ward added to his big weekend with another double in the top of the seventh, giving the Angels an 8-2 lead. The LA left fielder finished his three games at Citizens Bank Park 5-for-9 with eight RBIs.
After tossing a scoreless third inning, aided by a 4-3 double play, Suárez allowed another run to score in the fourth. Trout was awarded his second RBI of the day by driving in Zach Neto from third base on a sacrifice fly to right field. Suárez was removed an inning later in the fifth. After posting a 2.15 ERA in the first half, Sunday’s outing increased Suárez’s ERA on the year by half a run to 2.66.
Thomson said it was Suárez’s command problem that got him into trouble. He’s not worried about the velocity dip, something that’s been a slight issue of late.
“If it was down, it was down a tick,” said Thomson regarding Suárez’s velocity. The average velocities on all of Suárez’s pitches were down more than one mph on Sunday when compared to their respective season averages.
Thomson added: “I don’t have concern if he’s got his command because he can pitch. He just didn’t have his command today.”
Thomson doesn’t think a 41-minute rain delay had any effect on Suárez, who barely got into his warm-up routine before stopping once rain began to fall. Maybe it was just a bad day resulting from more than a week off between outings.
“The time off (between starts) maybe effected him,” said Thomson. “We just gotta see what he has the next time out.”