Phillies’ five-game winning streak is snapped in Jesús Luzardo’s return to Miami

MIAMI — Jesús Luzardo grew up about 45 minutes away from LoanDepot Park in Parkland, Fla. During the Phillies’ current road trip in South Florida, that’s where he has been staying.

This week has been a homecoming for him in more ways than one, as he spent the last four years with the Marlins before being traded to the Phillies this offseason.

But in the Phillies’ 8-3 loss on Monday, he wasn’t as sharp as he would have liked to be. He allowed a season-high four walks to his former team, three of which ended up scoring.

“Uncharacteristic, really,” said Phillies manager Rob Thomson. “I thought he had really good stuff. He was just missing. It wasn’t like he was wild or anything. He was just missing it.”

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Luzardo said he didn’t have the best feel for his slider. He has thrown less sliders overall this year after adding a sweeper to his arsenal this offseason, but it has been one of his go-to pitches throughout his career.

“Just losing feel of it right now, which is frustrating,” he said. “Obviously having my changeup, fastball, and sweeper, that’s what helps. But got to find a way to command that better.”

A leadoff walk to Heriberto Hernández in the second inning came back to bite Luzardo when Eric Wagaman barreled up a fastball for a home run.

After that, Luzardo scattered five singles but held the Marlins off the scoreboard until the sixth. His pitch count was at 92 at the start of the inning, and he walked the first two batters.

Tanner Banks took over, and both inherited runners scored after a pair of soft infield grounders and a bases-clearing triple.

Miami tacked on another run when Max Kepler — starting in right due to Nick Castellanos’ benching — dropped a fly ball while trying to make a basket catch. Thomson said Kepler lost the ball in the lights.

Though Luzardo was charged with his third loss of the season, he said it felt different from his last two losses, where he gave up a total of 20 earned runs to the Brewers and Blue Jays.

“Today I felt like I struggled, and that was obviously not a good result, but it didn’t spiral out of control, like the last two that happened,” he said. “So that’s obviously a positive. If that’s a bad start, which you never want, at least we can keep it under control and it doesn’t spiral out of control.”

On offense, the Phillies had some missed opportunities. The first time through the Phillies order, Marlins starter Cal Quantrill had a perfect game going. He had retired nine consecutive Phillies before Trea Turner ended that with one swing, sending a slider 413 feet to left field for his ninth homer of the year.

“[Quantrill has] got so many different pitches, and he just keeps people off balance,” Thomson said. “And he was throwing strikes for the most part.”

The Phillies temporarily took a 3-2 lead in the fifth inning. Otto Kemp started the rally by getting hit by a pitch, something that happens to the Phillies rookie quite frequently, and the Phillies went on to score two runs on three hits. But they could have done even more damage, if not for some baserunning blunders.

Miami center fielder Javier Sanoja misread a line drive from Brandon Marsh that flew over his head and bounced off the wall for a double. A late jump led to Kemp getting held up at third.

Kemp ultimately did score on a single from Johan Rojas. But Rojas was overaggressive trying to take second base, and got caught in a rundown. After that, Marsh failed to tag at third on a fly ball from Turner that Xavier Edwards caught over his shoulder in shallow right field.

Thomson defended their decisions postgame, however. Rojas went for second when he saw the relay throw from the outfield fly over the second baseman’s head. Miami reliever Ronny Henríquez happened to be standing in front of the mound to pick up the ball and throw him out.

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“The pitcher’s standing in the wrong spot,” Thomson said. “He’s supposed to be backing up. If he’s backing up, Rojas is standing at second base.”

On the Marsh play, Thomson said the fly ball was a “tweener,” and that if Marsh had been tagging, he likely wouldn’t have scored regardless.

“So as far as I’m concerned, they both kind of did the right thing. It just didn’t work out,” Thomson said.

Joe Ross gave up a solo home run in the seventh. Two more runs scored on Michael Mercado in the eighth, who had not pitched since Wednesday.