Phillies Add Rotation Arm, Eagles / Flyers / Sixers Updates

Today’s the 60th send of our small but mighty newsletter. We continue to grow like crazy, and deeply appreciate everyone who takes the time to spend their mornings with us. 🙏

We’re celebrating with a classic “4 for 4” edition of 🚦THE Philly Sports Newsletter this Monday. Sadly, for the first time since September, we will not be celebrating an Eagles victory. But the Phillies made their biggest move of the offseason, we have a Flyers victory to discuss, and the Sixers went 1-1 over the weekend.

Let’s jump in.

In the email today:

• 💪 Phillies Add to Rotation Strength in Trade With Marlins

• 🤕 Eagles Lose Wild Game to Commanders After Hurts Exits Early

• 🍆 Flyers Roar With Four in Third Period, Beat Blue Jackets in OT

• 🙄 Sixers Split Weekend as Embiid Misses Another Game

  • 📆 This Day in Philly Sports History

  • 📊 Poll

  • 🔗 Links

  • 📺 Coming Up

The Phillies traded minor league prospects Starlyn Caba (SS) and Emaarion Boyd (OF) to the Marlins on Sunday in exchange for talented LHP Jesus Luzardo.

Luzardo has nasty stuff, with a 3.48 ERA and 1.15 WHIP across 50 starts in 2022 and 2023. He struggled with injuries last season and posted a 5.00 ERA in just 12 games.

With Luzardo in the fold, the Phils added strength to strength. They now boast a formidable starting rotation for 2025, arguably the best in baseball:

• Zack Wheeler

• Aaron Nola

• Cristopher Sanchez

• Ranger Suarez

• Jesus Luzardo

• (Some amount of) Andrew Painter

With the exception of Suarez, the entire rotation will remain under contract or club control through at least the 2026 season. The Luzardo acquisition may signal a willingness to let Suarez walk after 2025 (the lefty recently hired Scott Boras and will almost certainly test the free agent market next offseason).

The Phillies could even look to flip Suarez for a bat. The view from here, however, is that they’ll see how this season goes and then reassess the rotation next offseason. If all goes to plan, Painter should be ready for a full workload in 2026.

The team will also have a lot of financial flexibility next winter.

Losing Caba in the deal stings. He is an outstanding defensive SS and was the consensus number four prospect in the Phillies’ farm system. But by most accounts, he was a tier below Aidan Miller/Justin Crawford and two tiers below Painter. He’s also just 19 years old.

Boyd is a lesser-ranked prospect who posted a .647 OPS for Jersey Shore in high-A ball last season.

Catcher Paul McIntosh was also part of the deal, moving to the Philly farm system. He’s basically a throw-in, but his Baseball America scouting profile suggests some potential.

On Pattison’s Tim Kelly wrote the following over on the website:

The Luzardo deal is consistent with the theme of the Phillies’ acquisition of OF Max Kepler and RP Jordan Romano this offseason: all three players struggled with injuries in 2024, allowing the Phils to grab them at a discount. It could be a savvy strategy, or it could be a recipe for disaster.

This time next year, we’ll know whether the club’s gambles paid off.

The Birds lost a wild one against the Commanders on Sunday, 36-33. Jalen Hurts exited the game with a concussion midway through the first quarter. Kenny Pickett took over under center.

Most of the day, it looked like the Eagles could win this one without their starting QB. They jumped out to an early 14-0 lead and were up 27-14 after three quarters. Their defense forced a staggering five turnovers, and Saquon Barkley explode for 150 rushing yards and two touchdowns.

But the Commanders kept hanging around. They kept Barkley mostly in check in the second half, and held Pickett to 14/24 passing for 143 yards and one touchdown. Pickett also threw a bad interception.

And as the Eagles tried to put the game on ice, the typically sure-handed DeVonta Smith committed a brutal drop.

We’ll soon see whether this game was an aberration or marked real cause for concern. Hurts’ exit is, of course, the story of the game. But the Birds’ defense struggled to generate pressure on Washington’s Jayden Daniels throughout the game, sacking the rookie QB just once.

The Eagles’ hopes for the top NFC seed are now on life support, but they’re probably still in line for the #2 seed… and possibly a postseason matchup against this same Commanders team.

There are many ways to break a losing streak. Going down 2-0 through two periods on home ice isn’t normally recommended.

The Flyers chose that path Saturday night and lived to tell the glorious tale.

Owen Tippett was the Flyers’ first star of the game. Tippett had four points on the night, including the game-winning goal in overtime.

Travis Konecny had three assists in the third period, helping to fuel the comeback. Noah Cates and Tyson Foerster had a goal and an assist apiece.

Samuel Ersson wasn’t especially good in net, which underscores the Flyers’ unusual decision to keep three goaltenders when there aren’t enough games to go around and none of them are lighting it up.

But this win stopped the bleeding for the Flyers, who remain in touching distance of a playoff berth. They visit the Penguins in Pittsburgh tonight.

As this season takes shape, it becomes clearer every game that the Sixers have very little hope of doing any damage in the playoffs. Which begs the question of what, exactly, the plan is.

Friday night, the Sixers had a healthy (well, as healthy as he gets) Joel Embiid. On those nights, the Sixers are competitive. Embiid had 34 points and nine assists in leading the Sixers to a needed win over the Charlotte Hornets.

Good times, right? Well, Embiid was pretty quickly ruled out of the road half of the back-to-back against Cleveland Saturday night. That ended about as well as you might have expected.

The Sixers were competitive in this game for exactly one quarter. They were down by 11 points at the half and by 22 after three quarters.

Tyrese Maxey had 27 points against the Cavs. No other Sixer had more than 11, one of whom was Paul George. That’s not nearly good enough for $52M a year.

More to the point, though, if this is what the Sixers are, even if they make the playoffs, what chance do they have to win any playoff series if Embiid is so limited and George is going to be a more expensive Tobias Harris?

The Sixers host the Spurs tonight at the Wells Fargo Center.

📆 This Day in Philly Sports History

On December 23, 1979, Dick Vermeil and the Eagles ended a long playoff drought with a W.

📊 Poll

Results from Friday:

🔗 Links

• 🐅 Charlie Woods knocked in his first hole-in-one playing with his father.

• 💰️The Kirk Cousins Era in Atlanta looks like it’s coming to an end.

• ⚾️ RIP to Rickey Henderson, the greatest leadoff hitter in the history of baseball, and maybe one of the funniest.

• 🗽The Yankees are replacing an old first baseman with another old first baseman.

• 🙏 All of us at On Pattison are hoping for a speedy recovery for Jason Myrtetus.

📺 Coming Up

Games before our next send.

Monday, December 23, 2024

• Flyers at Penguins, 7:00 p.m. (NBC Sports Philadelphia+)

• Sixers vs. Spurs, 7:00 p.m. (NBC Sports Philadelphia)

Thanks for reading. See you tomorrow.

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