Coming out of the World Baseball Classic, the energy around an Aaron Nola bounce-back felt imminent. The longest-tenured Phillie had handled the international stage, running his four-seam fastball up to 95 mph and allowing one earned run over nine innings across two starts. After an injury-rid dled 2025 season, when his ERA ballooned over six, there was reason to think a reset had taken hold. Six starts into 2026, the results look far too familiar. Nola enters Monday’s start against the Marlins with a 6.03 ERA. The Phillies need more. After this season, Nola still has four years and more than $98 million remaining on the seven-year, $172 million deal he signed before 2024. His latest outing in Atlanta was his roughest of the season: six earned runs over 4 2/3 innings, his second straight start allowing at least five. It put the key issues on display. After the first two Braves reached to open the game, Nola fell behind Matt Olson, 3-1. He went with a four-seamer up and in, slightly off the plate. Olson was ready to ambush. “I got behind,” Nola said. “He was sitting on it all the way.” Nola did not blame his body or his stuff. The count changed the at-bat. Once he fell behind, Olson could hunt the pitch he expected. “Overall, my stuff felt pretty good,” Nola said last Wednesday. “I got behind in counts, especially against a good team. I’ve got to really get ahead in the count with those guys.” Nola is not built around velocity. He never has been. His career has been based on command, timing, deception and using the fastball well enough to open up everything else. His four-seamer is averaging 91.8 mph. The MLB average for right-handers is 95.1. Among National League right-handed starters, Nola is the only one using a four-seamer at least 28.5 percent of the time while averaging under 92 mph. There are fewer pitchers living that way now. From 2021–25, only four qualified right-handed starters fit that combination — a four-seam average at or below 92 mph with usage of at least 28.5 percent. Their average ERA was 4.31. From 2015–20, there were 27, with a 3.96 average ERA. That does not mean Nola cannot make it work, but the contact against the pitch has been loud. Opponents have averaged 98.5 mph off the bat against his four-seamer this season. The league average exit velocity against four-seamers is 90.8 mph. Overall, the pitch has produced a .400 batting average against and an .867 slugging percentage. Location has been a major factor. Nola’s fastball has not lived down or on the edges consistently enough. When it has leaked over the plate, opponents have not missed it. Aaron Nola’s fastball location in 2026. The red highlights where a majority of his four-seamers are landing. Credit: Baseball Savant The count leverage split is stark — not ideal for a soon-to-be 33-year-old who does not light up the radar gun. Among right-handed starters with at least six starts, Nola has the 10th-lowest first-pitch strike rate against left-handed hitters at 50.7 percent (84 qualifiers). Against right-handed hitters, he owns the best mark in baseball in that same group at 78.3 percent. That contrast explains a lot. Against righties, Nola controls at-bats. Against lefties, he has too often had to pitch his way back into counts. And that is reflected in the numbers. Nola has faced 71 lefties this season. They are slashing .356/.451/.593 with a 1.044 OPS, 11 walks and 11 strikeouts. Righties, by comparison, are at .224/.246/.433 with a .679 OPS, two walks and 24 strikeouts. His most common answer against lefties has also been the pitch taking the most damage. Nola has thrown his four-seamer 35 percent of the time to left-handed hitters, more than any other pitch. They are 11-for-19 against it with three doubles, two homers and an 18.4 percent whiff rate. Even when he has landed it early, lefties have been ready. On first-pitch four-seamers to left-handed hitters, they are 3-for-3 with two homers. Both — Corey Seager and Rafael Devers — ended up deciding games. That is the sequencing trap. Nola needs to get ahead of lefties more often, but the pitch he has leaned on most to do it has not been safe enough. Part of Nola’s career has been built on pitches near the edges. He believes that part of the job has become more difficult. “The strike zone’s a lot smaller,” Nola said. “I don’t really have as much room for play as we used to. I don’t get as many calls that I used to, so that changes the whole game.” Nola has always needed precision, but the ABS challenge system has made borderline pitches harder to live on. “You’ve got to be a little bit more precise nowadays with the ABS,” Nola said. The knuckle curve, meanwhile, still looks like a strength. Overall this season, Nola has thrown it 30 percent of the time. It has generated a .159 opponents’ average and a .273 slugging percentage, along with a 40 percent whiff rate — his highest in a full season since 2018. The contrast is even sharper with men on base. Nola has a 13.50 ERA with runners on. He has allowed five homers and eight extra-base hits in those spots, both the most in the National League. Opponents are hitting .350/.429/.685 with a 1.114 OPS. Most of that damage has come against fastballs. Against Nola’s fastballs with men on — four-seamers, sinkers, cutters — opponents have posted a 1.406 OPS, with four homers and seven extra-base hits. His knuckle curve with men on base has gone the other way: .167/.211/.333 with a .544 OPS against. That does not mean Nola can stop throwing fastballs. He still needs the pitch to make the rest of the arsenal work. But the lefty split points toward a different kind of adjustment: getting to the curveball, changeup and cutter earlier in counts, especially against lefties, before the four-seamer becomes the predictable answer. The front-hip sinker can still help. So can better location. But with ABS in play, Nola is not getting the same gray-area strikes he once could. A strike is a strike. Until the four-seamer is in the zone with purpose, lefties will continue to have success. That goes back to the Olson at-bat. When Nola is behind, and lefties can sit on the four-seamer, the pitch has not been forgiving enough. The answer, at least for now, is not a new pitch. The sweeper has become a major weapon across the Phillies’ rotation, but Nola does not see it fitting him. “I don’t think a sweeper would ever be in my repertoire,” Nola said. “I’ve always thrown a curveball, and that feels comfortable to me. I feel like I can manipulate it if I need to. Certain grips some of the guys use with the sweeper, it just doesn’t feel great to me. “It’s helped a lot of guys, but sometimes it’s not for everybody.” So Monday in South Florida is less about reinvention than execution. The Marlins do not carry the same threat as Atlanta, but the opponent is almost secondary. Nola needs a start where the first inning does not spiral, where lefties are not ready to ambush and where the fastball does not get punished with traffic on the bases. He still believes one outing can change the feel. “All it takes is one game to turn things around,” Nola said. “Believing that we can get out of it is a big part.” The Phillies, who have won five of their last six, still need the version of Nola built on the repertoire he trusts. The margins are just smaller than they used to be. ...read more read less