Washington Nationals news & notes: Patrick Corbin & the Nats’ rotation; Davey Martinez talks pitching…

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Patrick Corbin would have started Tuesday’s series opener in Detroit, Michigan, had the game gone according to normal schedule, but before the final game of a four-game series against Atlanta in the nation’s capital on Sunday, Washington manager Davey Martinez announced the Nationals’ starting three for the game against the Tigers as Mitchell Parker, Jake Irvin and Mackenzie Gore.

So… no Corbyn this time? What are your thoughts?

“It’s to give him some rest,” Martinez explained. “We value our young guys, but we also need to value our veteran guys, so we’re going to use Parker, Irvin and Gore in Detroit.”

Corbin, 34, has 71 points in 13 starts. ²⁄₃ This season, in the final year of his six-year, $140 million contract with Washington DC, he has a 6.15 ERA, a 5.23 FIP, 27 walks (3.39 walks per 9 innings), 44 strikeouts (5.53 strikeouts per 9 innings), 12 home runs allowed (1.51 home runs per 9 innings), a .321 ERA, a .374 on-base percentage, and a .558 slugging percentage in his last five starts (0 wins, 4 losses).However, the Nationals’ seven total runs scored in those games are at least partially to blame for the team going 0-5 in those games.).

Corbin posted a 6.52 ERA and a 6.84 FIP with a .288 ERA/.350 on-base percentage/.586 slugging percentage in 29 innings.

So, is this “break” a mental break or a physical break?

Photo: Scott Tetch/Getty Images

“A little bit of both, obviously,” the manager said.

“He’s part of our pitching staff. He pitches a lot. He’s a guy who regularly pitches five, six, seven innings for our team. So we wanted to give him some rest.”

“He’s pitching well.”

With Josiah Gray and Cade Cavalli each recovering from injuries, will Corbin’s time as a part of the Nationals’ starting rotation end before his contract is up?

Speaking of pitching:

Manager Davey Martinez, ahead of the fourth of four games against the Braves, spoke at length about the pitching staff as a whole and the work that pitching coach Hickey and pitching strategy director Sean Doolittle have done with the staff this year, Hickey’s fourth year as manager and Doolittle’s first.

“They’re really good,” Martinez said. “I’ve known Hickey for a long time and his attention to detail, mechanics and teaching guys how to use every pitch has always been great. He’s great with the young guys too. Tampa had a really young staff when we were together and he hung out with all of those guys, especially all of those guys. If you know those guys, [Alex] Cobb, [Jeremy] Hellickson, [James] Shields, they all have really good changeups and he helped them develop those pitches, but really, the whole point of it is throwing strikes. He’s a big believer in attacking the strike zone, and as you can see, we’ve done a pretty good job of that.”

Photo: Scott Tetch/Getty Images

And what about Doolittle, the Nationals’ relief pitcher turned assistant pitching coach (in effect, if not in title)?

“Then we brought in Doolittle and he really helped us with pitch order, throwing order, interacting with the catcher,” Martinez explained. “We talked about game planning and game progression. So those two together. [Bullpen Coach] Ricky [Bones] The whole bullpen was really good.”

Martinez also spoke Sunday about the individual personalities of the young starting pitchers currently making up the rotation, including DJ Hurts (23), Mitchell Parker (24) and Jake Irvin (27), who pitch every five days, along with Patrick Corbin (34) and Mackenzie Gore (25).

But what is the nature of the current group of young members of the starting rotation, particularly the young trio of Hurts, Parker and Irvin?

“They’re all different, but they’re all very competitive in their own way, they really are,” Martinez said. “I mean, Parker; [who is] Very calm, very collected. He doesn’t seem to get upset about anything, but he’s very competitive. Hurts has a little bit of passion, you can already tell that. Irvin is also a very quiet guy, but he can get emotional, especially in the dugout. And Gore, you know, is a different type. Very emotional. But I love all of them. They’re all competitive, they all want to do well, they all want to help us win. So it’s great.”

Gore is the most experienced pitcher on the young team after Corbin, but is he now a stalwart of the starting rotation?

Photo: Rob Carr/Getty Images

“I think he’s still young,” Martinez explained. “…But he sits down and watches the game and when something happens, when a pitch comes, he starts talking about other pitches on his iPad or watching the hitter and what he thinks. So he understands the game really well, and even when he’s not pitching, he’s sitting there watching the hitters, because there will come a time when he has to face these guys. And he really pays attention to other left-handed pitchers when they pitch. He really likes watching other left-handed pitchers. I know they made the comment that they have five left-handed starting pitchers, and I was like, ‘Four is weird enough. Five? That’s a lot.'”

What did he think of Parker, Irvin, Gore and Hurts starting in the series against Atlanta?

“I can’t say enough about them,” he told reporters after Sunday’s game. “They’re a good hitting team and like I said before, when they’re aggressive in the strike zone, they attack the strike zone hard. They’ve been really good defensively too, so that helps. They’ve thrown the ball well. They’ve got a long way to go, but I like where they are right now and I like the way they’re attacking hitters, so they’re fun to watch.”