Why has Dave Dombrowski invested even more in the Phillies’ starting pitching? Check his record: ‘It’s worked’

Close your eyes and pretend that (a) baseball’s next offseason won’t be blighted by an owners-vs.-players rock fight, and (b) Jesús Luzardo actually became a free agent.

Now imagine where the lefty might’ve ranked in that market.

“Very highly,” Dave Dombrowski said Tuesday, chuckling at the hypothetical. “We didn’t really want to test that out ourselves.”

In that case, the Phillies can breathe easy. They took Luzardo off the auction lot seven months before he’d have gotten there by signing him to a contract extension that was comparable to what he probably would’ve found in free agency.

» READ MORE: Jesús Luzardo finds the stability he craved with his Phillies extension as part of a change atop the rotation

Terms of the five-year deal, in case you missed them: $135 million, a major league source confirmed, with a club option for a sixth year. It takes effect next year and will cover Luzardo’s ages-29 to 33 seasons.

And it will tie Luzardo for sixth in annual salary — $27 million — among active lefties, trailing Framber Valdez ($38.3 million), Blake Snell ($36.4 million), Garrett Crochet ($28.3 million), Max Fried ($27.25 million), and whatever record mark Tarik Skubal winds up setting next winter.

It’s a lot of money, especially for a team that’s already invested heavily in its starting rotation. But it’s also consistent with Dombrowski’s long-held roster-building philosophy.

“Any time you have a good starting pitcher going out there that can set the tone,” the Phillies president of baseball operations said Tuesday at a news conference with Luzardo, “it gives you a better chance to win that particular game.”

So, rather than just filling in the blanks behind Justin Verlander in Detroit, Dombrowski traded for Max Scherzer, Aníbal Sánchez, and later Doug Fister. He built a super-rotation in Boston by signing top-of-the-market free agent David Price and trading for Chris Sale and later Nathan Eovaldi.

And with the Phillies, he went to seven years to retain Aaron Nola, made Zack Wheeler the highest-paid pitcher in baseball ($42 million per year), overpaid in free agency for Taijuan Walker, locked up Cristopher Sánchez to a team-friendly extension, traded for Luzardo when fellow lefty Ranger Suárez was still here, then extended Luzardo after Suárez walked out the door but with top prospect Andrew Painter poised to graduate to the majors.

Including Luzardo, the Phillies now have $208 million committed to nine players for 2027, nearly half of which is going to four starting pitchers (Wheeler, Luzardo, Nola, and Sánchez) at a time in the sport when most teams are asking their starters to pitch less than ever.

» READ MORE: John Middleton on Phillies’ high payroll amid looming labor war, Dave Dombrowski-Bryce Harper saga, and more

But it’s worth it to Dombrowski because, well, check the record books.

Eleven of Dombrowski’s last 14 teams made the playoffs dating to the 2011 Tigers. There’s only one World Series champion in the bunch (2018 Red Sox), but those clubs averaged 93 wins and combined for nine division titles.

To Dombrowski, stressing starting pitching will always be the least stressful path to October — and a puncher’s chance of winning it all.

“I can’t speak for others because I don’t know what their mentality is, but basically, it’s worked,” Dombrowski said. “When you go out there daily and you look who’s on the mound, do you have the edge or not? I really like having the edge myself when you look at the guy out there vs. the other club.

“Normally it works out for you in the long haul when you work percentages. And fortunately we’re in the spot that we’ve had some of the best [pitchers] in the game of baseball. So, it’s really worked out throughout the years for me.”

Five-year contracts for pitchers don’t always work out. But the Phillies view Luzardo as an ascending talent. The 28-year-old lefty started throwing a sweeper last season, and it’s already his second-best pitch.

And from an actuarial standpoint, the Phillies believe Luzardo is less risky than most, including Suárez. Not only is Luzardo two years younger, but he also bookended an injury-filled 2024 season for the Marlins with 178⅔ innings in 2023 in Miami and a career-high 183⅔ innings in his first year with the Phillies. Suarez hasn’t topped 160 innings in a season.

» READ MORE: Zack Wheeler’s outlook might be a mystery, but he says there’s no reason he can’t ‘be who I am’ in 2026

Luzardo’s previous injuries, including a stress reaction in his back in 2024, happened under the watch of other teams. The Phillies trust their medical, training, and strength and conditioning staffs with keeping pitchers healthy. They’ve had a strong record of success since 2021 under head athletic trainer Paul Buchheit.

It’s all part of investing in starting pitching.

“From time I’ve spent with this organization, they value starting pitching extremely highly,” Luzardo said. “You can just tell, not only with me but with all the guys that they get their hands on, they just make us better overall. There’s a lot of emphasis in that, a lot of hard work behind it. There’s a reason they’re so good at keeping us on the field.”

If anything is keeping Dombrowski up at nights this spring, it’s the rotation depth in triple A. But not having to outbid other teams for Luzardo whenever the dust settles on the labor battle is one less thing to worry about.

“If he pitches the same way this year that he did last year — and we don’t see any reason why he will not — he’d be one of the top guys [in free agency]," Dombrowski said. “It’s a good feeling to have that. It gives you a lot of comfort when you know you can go forward with those type of individuals.”