Wins matter most for Phillies and Eagles, not Zack Wheeler’s and Jhoan Duran’s ERAs or Jalen Hurts’ QBR

Zack Wheeler was driving angry.

He’d allowed two runs off two hits and four walks over five innings in a 6-4 Phillies win Tuesday night over the Marlins. It was the fifth consecutive start in which he’d failed to pitch at least six innings (one was affected by rain). His fastball velocity this season had been the lowest it’s been in eight years, at 95.1 mph.

He’s 36. He’s coming off surgery to address thoracic outlet syndrome that cost him the last seven weeks of 2025 and the first month of 2026. Was it his age? Was it the surgery?

Did it really matter? After all, the Phillies did win.

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“I was thinking about that on the way home,” Wheeler admitted. “I was, like, ‘I guess that’s not the worst start.’”

He calmed down and drove on.

The Phillies won two of Wheeler’s last five starts. They’re 16-8 this season when he starts, and he’s 10-5 with a 2.92 ERA. Since arriving in Philadelphia in 2020, Wheeler has been the best pitcher in baseball. He remains just that.

When he pitches, the Phillies have a great chance to win, style points be damned. That’s all that matters. But even Wheeler has a hard time seeing the forest for the trees, since the game has changed since he hit the bigs 14 years ago.

“I think the win column doesn’t matter as much as it used to,” Wheeler said. “Just, because, there’s more numbers and all the other crazy stats that there are.”

Nevertheless …

“But, you know, I think when they put your name on a lineup card and we go out as starters, we’re expected to give the team a chance to win.”

And that’s all.

Wheeler’s interim manager, Don Mattingly, believes that, regardless of max velo or walk rate, Wheeler always provides the Phillies an excellent chance to win, even if his fastball sits at no more than 95 mph.

“What I worry more about is, ‘Is this guy giving us good starts and keeping us in the game,’ more than anything else,” Mattingly said Tuesday. “Zack’s not one of the guys I worry about, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Mattingly seemed a bit bemused at the line of questioning, and just a smidge perturbed.

After all, they’d won the game.

Mattingly had the same tone the next afternoon, when he was asked about a strategy on the radio pregame show regarding holding runners.

In the ninth inning Monday, with a 6-4 lead, Duran allowed a leadoff single to Xavier Edwards. Edwards is an effective base-stealer. Duran is generally ineffective at holding runners. The Phillies did not hold Edwards. Edwards took second base on the first pitch, moved to third on a groundout that might have been a double-play ball had he been successfully held at first base. He then scored on a single. Duran retired the next two hitters and the Phillies won, 6-5.

» READ MORE: Alec Bohm, Philly’s latest scapegoat, nears the end of his run as a Phillie. Appreciate him.

In the daily pregame radio show the next afternoon, Mattingly was asked about the strategy of not holding the runner. Mattingly explained that, with a two-run lead, he usually considers that run inconsequential compared with the defensive compromise of having the first baseman hold the runner, which opens a much wider hole between first and second base.

This is not a hard-and-fast rule, just a sound general strategy. Outs with leads equal wins.

In the ninth inning Sunday, with a 7-5 lead and one out, Victor Caratini walked. Caratini is an ineffective base-stealer. The Phillies did not hold him. Caratini advanced to second on a single. Duran stranded both runners with consecutive strikeouts.

In the ninth inning Wednesday, with a 4-1 lead, Duran allowed a leadoff single to Heriberto Hernandez, who is a moderate threat to steal. The Phillies did hold Hernandez, who was forced out at second on a ground ball by Owen Cassie to shortstop.

Mattingly acknowledged that this strategy works best if the pitcher is selfless enough to not worry about giving up an earned run. A single earned run for a reliever, especially a closer, has a much greater effect on his ERA than it would for a starter or a long reliever since closers seldom pitch more than a single inning in a game.

Duran’s ERA rose from 1.66 to 1.86 on Monday. He was asked before Wednesday’s game if he’d cared about risking that earned run.

“It all depends,” Duran said. “In that situation, I understand. They explained it to me. We’re on the same page right now.”

» READ MORE: Batting practice … in a hotel room? It’s part of the ‘routine’ for Luis Arraez, baseball’s most unique hitter

Several factors influence the decision to hold a runner or not. Does the runner run well? Does the batter make consistent contact, especially on the ground to the right side? Does the batter make better contact with a runner on base? It might not get that granular in every situation, but if we know anything about today’s baseball, it’s that things can get as granular as you like.

Monday, the evidence was more empirical than analytical. Duran has blown just two saves this season, but his last was against the Marlins on July 27. In that game, they held the runner, and a soft grounder to the right side got through, a big part of a killer, three-run inning.

“Sometimes, we cover the runner, and they get soft contact that way, and it’s a base hit,” Duran said.

No one gets more annoyed than I do when Jalen Hurts, the Eagles’ 28-year-old sage, drops his saccharine maxims. But one of them resonates every time:

“You gotta keep the main thing the main thing.”

This is Hurts’ general fallback line when asked about the efficiency of the team’s offense, particularly the aesthetic quality of his own often choppy, inelegant passing performances.

No winner in Philadelphia history has been picked apart more than Hurts. I know, because I’ve done it myself. There somehow is an active debate regarding whether Hurts deserves a contract extension because Hurts can’t sling it like Josh Allen or Joe Burrow. Mike Vrabel, who took the Patriots to the Super Bowl last year and won it three times as a Patriot, considers Hurts a “franchise quarterback.”

Hurts wins.

That, more than anything, is what matters.

But even the athletes can lose sight of that, and that includes the Phillies’ two best pitchers.

“You know, we won the game,” Duran said, “but, like, we [don’t] want to give up a free run, you know?”

Wheeler has parameters beyond winning.

» READ MORE: Jalen Hurts, A.J. Brown connect at Eagles-Patriots joint practices, quieting talk of rift

“My mindset is: Six to eight innings every start. That’s what great pitchers do,” Wheeler said. He walked five batters two starts prior, and what bothered him most about Tuesday were the four walks. “It’s hard for me to be, like, ‘Yeah, that’s good.’”

Understood. After all, Wheeler hadn’t walked 10 batters in a three-game span since early in 2019.

“I’m used to doing what I have been doing for a long time now — being great — and that’s just not great,” Wheeler said.

Maybe not.

But, as usually is the case with Duran and Hurts, even when Wheeler’s not great, he’s more than good enough.

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Tony Gwynn Jr. is a former major league outfielder and son of late Hall of Famer Tony Gwynn. Over the last two years, he got to know new Phillies second baseman Luis Arraez, whose contact skills at the plate often draw comparisons to Gwynn. Tony Jr. joined Phillies Extra to discuss his father, Arraez, and the bonds that connect them. Watch here.

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