The Phillies ask their starting pitchers to do a lot. Can it last through the playoffs?

WASHINGTON — Zack Wheeler’s beard is flecked with gray that wasn’t there when he first signed with the Phillies. Think of it as a symbol. He’s six years older now, and wiser in the ways of pitching.

More durable, too? Oh yes, he’s definitely more durable.

Early in his career, when he was all promise and projection, Wheeler lost two seasons to Tommy John elbow surgery. But since 2020, his first year with the Phillies, no pitcher in baseball has worked more innings (974) or, if you include the postseason, thrown more pitches (16,229).

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Surely, then, there isn’t a pitcher who knows better than Wheeler how to get from here — the dog days of August — to there — the regular-season finish line — while making sure to leave enough in the tank for October.

Wheeler pondered the question before a game at Nationals Park the other day.

“I don’t know,” he said, “if I have a good answer for you.”

Rest assured, though, Phillies officials are trying to hash it out. Because at a time when most teams are asking starting pitchers to do less than ever, manager Rob Thomson and pitching coach Caleb Cotham are happy to stand up for the good, old days by leaning heavily on Wheeler, Cristopher Sánchez, Ranger Suárez, and the rest of a throwback rotation that goes six deep with veterans.

Consider: Through Thursday, the Phillies led baseball with 693⅓ innings from their starters. By comparison, the other National League playoff contenders ranked eighth (Reds, 653⅓); 17th (Cubs, 633⅔); 20th (Padres, 629⅔); 26th (Brewers, 605); 27th (Mets, 600); and 30th (Dodgers, 559⅔).

But the Phillies get more than volume from their starters. Entering the weekend, they had 66 quality starts, 11 more than any other team. (The Dodgers and Mets had 33 and 30, respectively.) The Phillies were third in rotation ERA (3.42) and amassed more wins above replacement (15.3, according to Fangraphs) than any other rotation, with Sánchez (4.3) and Wheeler (4.0) among the top seven pitchers in baseball.

It isn’t quite modern Moneyball because starting pitching is not yet a new market inefficiency. It remains expensive. The Phillies have roughly $105 million tied up in Wheeler, Nola, Taijuan Walker, Sánchez, Suárez, and Jesús Luzardo. They traded a top-100 prospect for Luzardo last winter; Suárez figures to cash in as a free agent this winter.

It’s evident, though, that the Phillies, under Dave Dombrowski’s stewardship, value starters differently than, say, the Mets and Brewers. (Not coincidentally, Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns got his start in Milwaukee.) Also, the Phillies’ medical and training staffs have kept pitchers healthier than most teams, notably the Dodgers.

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It has become the Phillies’ competitive advantage.

And now, with six weeks left in the season and a five-game lead in the NL East entering the weekend, nothing matters more to a World Series-or-bust team than making sure the starters — Wheeler, Sánchez, and Suárez, in particular — are functioning at peak levels entering October.

“It’s a big part of the conversation,” Cotham said this week. “It’s really important if we can shuffle, we can pull back, we can push. Because I think it’s like, well, you want to be really recovered [after starts]. Well, some guys don’t respond sometimes to a lot of time off. It’s just keeping guys in a routine that’s consistent enough while maintaining the freshness. It’s a tough [balance] to do.

“You’re trying to do your best right now for the next week, but you’ve got to have an eye on where we’re going and how we want to be at the end. We’re intending to pitch a long time after the regular season.

“So, it’s a huge part of the conversation, definitely starting in a big way now. You kind of start thinking that way after the All-Star break.”

Even more in the last few weeks, with Wheeler and Suárez experiencing dips in velocity and uncommon struggles with their command.

The Phillies have a temporary solution: a six-man rotation.

Aaron Nola is set to return Sunday after three months on the injured list with a sprained right ankle and a stress fracture in his rib cage. And rather than kicking Taijuan Walker — and his 2.93 ERA in six starts entering Saturday — to the bullpen, the Phillies will use a half-dozen starters.

The arrangement figures to be aimed squarely at Suárez, whose next start will be pushed to Monday on five days’ rest. It seems he could use a breather. He has a 6.59 ERA in five starts since the All-Star break. His command wavered Tuesday night in Cincinnati, when he walked two batters, hit one, and gave up 10 hits in 5⅓ innings.

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After that game, Thomson suggested Suárez might be “fatigued.” Suárez shot down that theory.

“I feel good, actually,” he said through a team interpreter. “I know I’ve had a couple rough starts, and everybody’s wondering if it could be fatigue. But it’s not.”

But the Phillies don’t see a six-man rotation as a long-term solution because it forces the removal of one reliever from the bullpen, at least until Sept. 1 when teams can add a 14th pitcher to the roster. So, they are brainstorming other ways to build in extra rest for the starters.

According to Cotham, that could include using two starters in tandem. Presumably, Walker would follow Suárez into a game after, say, the fourth inning and pitch three or four innings.

Walker has garnered praise from coaches and teammates for his flexibility in multiple roles, although it’s not like he had much choice after posting a 7.10 ERA last year, the highest mark for a Phillies pitcher with at least 80 innings in a season since 1930.

But Walker did commit to an offseason program to regain velocity. In ping-ponging between the rotation and bullpen, he had a 3.39 ERA entering Saturday’s start, including a 3.31 mark in 14 starts.

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Walker’s revival has enabled the Phillies to take their time with top prospect Andrew Painter, who has struggled in triple A in his first season back from losing two years to Tommy John surgery. And although Walker wants to keep starting, he has signaled a willingness to do whatever the Phillies need, even if it means returning to the bullpen.

Since the Phillies put him back in the rotation last month, he has stayed on a reliever routine, throwing off flat ground every day rather than long-tossing and doing a between-starts bullpen session.

“I didn’t want to change anything, so when I do go back to the bullpen at any point, it’s just going to be the same routine,” Walker said. “I think that’s helped a lot. Aaron’s coming back, so I assume that I’ll be the odd-man [out], which is fine. I built a pretty good routine. My job is just to go out there and pitch and get outs.”

There is another option. The Phillies could give specific starters a breather by skipping them for one or two turns, as necessary.

It worked once before with Wheeler.

In 2022, the Phillies put their ace on the injured list on Aug. 25 with what they categorized as right forearm tendinitis but Dombrowski downplayed as “one of those things that pitchers deal with.” Wheeler resisted at first, contending that he could keep pitching through the soreness.

The Phillies wisely took it out of his hands.

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There were lessons from that experience. Wheeler spent 27 days on the injured list and went 31 between starts. He returned for his final three regular-season starts, allowing one run in 15 innings, then worked 35⅔ innings over a half-dozen starts in the postseason.

If not for the 3½-week breather/reset, who knows? Maybe Wheeler wouldn’t have been effective in the playoffs. Maybe (gulp) he wouldn’t have been able to pitch at all, in which case the Phillies’ run to the World Series doesn’t happen.

“It’s one of those things where, that’s why our starters are very good,” Cotham said. “They take a lot of pride in pitching consistently and taking the ball a lot. Sometimes you do have to take the ball from them and force them into something you think is best for the medium term. It’s just hard to make those decisions.

“You can’t just say, ‘Hey, you’re throwing a little slow and we’re going to do something.’ But you can make your best case and paint the picture of the juice is worth the squeeze.”

To be clear, skipping Wheeler isn’t being discussed. Not now. But Wheeler did report more soreness than usual in his right shoulder after an Aug. 2 start. The Phillies sent him for an MRI, which didn’t detect structural damage or other serious injury. They gave him two extra days, then started him last Sunday in Texas.

And still, his average fastball velocity was 94.2 mph, down almost 2 mph from his season average (96.1). It was his lowest average velocity in a post-All-Star break start since Sept. 23, 2023.

“I felt great in the bullpen,” Wheeler said this week before starting Friday night in Washington, another sign that he’s back to feeling a normal level of soreness in his shoulder for mid-August.

The Phillies are able to measure a starter’s velocity while he loosens in the bullpen at home. On the road, they’re unable to. It wasn’t until the first inning in Texas that Wheeler looked at the scoreboard and realized the dip in velocity.

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And make no mistake, he keeps an eye on the radar reading.

“I always look at velocity,” he said. “Absolutely. I don’t want to get hit around.”

But Wheeler also knows velocity isn’t always determinative of health, or effectiveness. He has learned how to overcome less heat on his fastball.

“It’s just like, ‘All right, today’s probably going to be a little tougher,’” he said. “Throwing at that velo [92-94 mph], you just don’t have much room for error and maybe you’ve got a ball that you make a mistake with and it doesn’t get a swing and miss or they don’t foul it off.

“But that’s the best I’ve felt in a while [in Texas]. So, you can’t be mad about it, can’t be upset about it or worried about it.”

Indeed, Wheeler is confident that his usual velocity will return. He typically doesn’t like extra rest. But he also concedes that a six-man rotation, or some other form of a break, could help. He has developed close relationships with Cotham and head athletic trainer Paul Buchheit. He trusts them. He follows their lead.

If the last few years have taught Wheeler anything about surviving the dog days and running through the finish line instead of merely reaching it, maybe that’s the lesson.

“They try to help us,” Wheeler said. “Sometimes we don’t like it, building in an extra off-day, or this or that. But sometimes it’s what’s best. Certain points in the season, maybe you’re a little more sore than normal and they can give you an extra day or two, that type of thing. Whatever’s best for everyone involved is what I want to do.”