Aaron Nola had some signs of a bounce-back season in his first start with the Philadelphia Phillies this season.
It looked like Aaron Nola was in line to have a bounce-back season for the Philadelphia Phillies after a strong showing during Spring Training and the World Baseball Classic. Nola’s velocity was up, and it looked like he had more command compared to a year ago.
The Phillies pitcher made his season debut on Saturday, and there was certainly some good, but also some areas of improvement moving forward, from his first outing of the year.
The Good
Nola gave the Phillies a chance to win the game; there’s no denying that. He threw 5.0 innings and gave up three earned runs, all off home runs.
In terms of where Nola really excelled against the Rangers' lineup, it was his ability to generate strikeouts, something even he admitted was a positive after the game. Nola punched out seven of the 22 batters he faced throughout the game.
On top of that, Nola did a nice job generating swing and misses, too. He had 14 whiffs throughout the start, six coming off his fastball and five from his knuckle curve.
The Bad
Nola was turning heads during the WBC because his fastball velocity was clearly a few ticks higher than it was throughout the 2025 season. The 32-year-old was consistently hitting 94-95 mph with his heater a few weeks back.
Even though Nola did touch 93.5 mph during his start against the Rangers, the average velocity sat closer to 91 mph. Even that little bit of extra heat on the fastball can open up so much more for the rest of NOLA’s arsenal, but he just didn’t have that against the Rangers.
That said, the temperature in Philly was much cooler on Saturday than anything Nola has pitched in this season, which could have affected his outing, too.
In terms of where Nola thought he could have been better, he noted that “I needed to go a bit longer.”
Every pitcher would love to pitch into the sixth or seventh inning, but five innings in a cold-weather game for the first start of the season definitely could be much worse.
Even though it may not have been the season debut that Nola was hoping for in his own mind, he still showed plenty of potential that he could very well have a bounce-back season for the Phillies in 2026.
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