On Opening Day, Patrick Corbin suffered through some defensive errors behind him, some bad luck on weak contact by Braves hitters and some poor pitches on his own part. He couldn’t retire the only batter he faced in the fourth while giving up four runs (two earned) and throwing 85 pitches.
In today’s matinee finale against the Rays, he was more efficient with his pitches but at times not all that effective, with the results more of the same in a 7-2 loss to complete a three-game sweep in front of 13,836 fans at Nationals Park.
Corbin kept his pitch count down throughout most of the outing, much better than his first start on Thursday. He had only thrown 69 pitches and 47 strikes while keeping it a 3-2 game through five innings. And he was getting ahead of hitters at a better rate, something he also struggled with against the Braves. Of the 21 hitters he faced through five frames, he got ahead of 12 of them to limit the Rays to six hits and three runs.
But in the sixth he ran into some classic Corbin issues. One out away from a quality start and possibly allowing himself to come out for another inning, he gave up a home run to Harold Ramírez after getting ahead 0-1. The 80-mph slider was just below the zone for the Rays designated hitter to golf over the center field fence to end a streak of 11 consecutive retired batters.
After a single by Manuel Margot, it was time for some of the usual bad luck to strike Corbin again. Victor Robles, who had just made a nice diving grab to rob Isaac Paredes of a leadoff hit, lost Taylor Walls’ fly ball to the Sun Monster, resulting in an RBI double. Then Jose Siri hit an RBI single to right, advanced to second on a throwing error by Lane Thomas and was put out at third on a heads up play by Jeimer Candelario and CJ Abrams.