LOS ANGELES – Marlins ace Sandy Alcantara is one of the most confident players in the game, but he finds himself in the midst of an existential crisis.
A dejected Alcantara walked off the field after an early exit for the second time in his last three starts during Tuesday night’s 15-2 Marlins loss to the Dodgers at Dodger Stadium. This is certainly not the Alcantara the baseball world expected to see after a 17-month absence from Tommy John surgery.
“I feel good physically, but I feel terrible just being out there and having the same result and I can't do nothing when my teammates need me the most,” Alcantara said. “I know this is a process, but I'm tired. I'm tired of having the same success out there, and I don't feel happy about it.”
Coming off his first quality start of the season his last time out, Alcantara surrendered seven runs on seven hits and five walks across 2 2/3 innings. He threw two wild pitches, giving him four on the season – tied for second most in MLB. Alcantara also permitted four steals for an MLB-high 11 allowed in 2025.
This is a far cry from the pitcher who earned a workhorse reputation by tossing the most innings of any Major Leaguer from 2019-22 and won the ‘22 National League Cy Young Award.
“We just have to kind of go back to work there and try to figure that out,” Marlins manager Clayton McCullough said. “It's so uncharacteristic for him, and so that's probably No. 1, just getting command back and strike-throwing. It was really a struggle from the first inning tonight, just never really could catch a rhythm and get settled in. Some pitches that were kind of more heart of the plate, they put some good swings on. But I think for me, it's just as much trying to get back to commanding and executing pitches at the rate that we're all accustomed to.”
So used to being on the right side of a leaderboard, here is where Alcantara ranks among 119 Major League pitchers with a minimum of 25 innings this season:
- 8.31 ERA -- fourth highest
- 1.65 WHIP -- tied for seventh highest
- 5.88 BB/9 -- fourth highest
These were his career totals from 2018-23:
- 3.31 ERA
- 1.157 WHIP
- 2.7 BB/9
Alcantara has given up as many hits (26) as innings he has pitched (26). His 8.31 ERA is the highest in any six-start span in his career. Alcantara believes his atypically poor command could be due to his arm not being “on time” with his different release points.
“Just keep positive,” Alcantara said. “I know we’ve got like five more months left to get better, and I think I will be better. Nobody in this world is perfect, especially myself, and I’ve just got to keep working and keep positive.”
Even for an eight-year veteran, the game can speed up. Shohei Ohtani ambushed Alcantara’s first-pitch sinker and deposited it over the right-field wall for the third first-pitch homer in 144 career starts against Alcantara.
Seven other Dodgers would bat in a three-run first that included a mound visit and a pair of PitchCom issues while Alcantara was caught by Marlins No. 4 prospect Agustín Ramírez for the first time.
“It was big,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “Sandy is on his way back, he’s coming off Tommy John. This is a guy that we really respect, and he’s still trying to find his footing, but to be able to score three runs after we gave up [one] early says a lot about the offense and where we’re at.”
So what can Alcantara and the Marlins do to help him regain his Cy Young form?
The FanDuel Sports Network Florida broadcast speculated whether the organization might place him on the 15-day injured list so he could work on things. Alcantara, however, appears to be healthy. The more likely option would be going back to the drawing board during his pitch design session in-between starts.
“We'll put our heads together with him and just see what we think is the next best step to try to right the ship a little bit,” McCullough said. “We certainly all know there's a much better version there. Right now, it's not clicking for him, and so we'll just have to go in tomorrow and see what we can all do to try to get it going.”