For Williams, "five and dive" has been a plan for success

Trevor Williams is scheduled to take the mound again Monday evening in Chicago, facing one of the majors’ worst teams in the White Sox. When he does, he’ll do so as the proud owner of a 1.96 ERA.

Which won’t show up on the major-league leaderboard, because by then Williams won’t qualify for the MLB leaderboard due to throwing fewer innings (36 2/3) than games his team will have played (39).

It’s an unusual place for someone pitching so well to reside, but at this point it should be clear this is where the Nationals want him to reside. And Tuesday night’s game provided the latest example of it.

Williams absolutely cruised against the Orioles, allowing just two singles over five innings, walking nobody and striking out eight to match his career-high. He threw only 77 pitches and looked very much like he could keep going deeper into the game.

But when his veteran right-hander returned to the dugout following the top of the fifth, Davey Martinez gave him a handshake and informed him his night was over. And there wasn’t really any doubt in the manager’s mind.

“No, he already had 77 pitches,” Martinez said. “We’ve talked about that 80-pitch mark, for me, is where he needs to be. He gave us five really good innings. I didn’t want to send him back out there.”

The Nationals led 1-0 at the time, with the lefty-heavy top of the Orioles lineup due up in the sixth and Robert Garcia fresh off the injured list and ready to go. And the night ended with them beating the Orioles by a 3-0 count.

So it’s hard to argue the result. Just as it was hard to argue the result six nights prior when Martinez also pulled Williams after five scoreless innings, his team also holding a 1-0 lead at the time. Final score that night in Texas: 1-0.

This is the formula the Nats have devised to try to get the most out of their No. 5 starter. And nearly one-quarter of the way into the season, the formula has worked to near perfection.

Williams is 4-0 with a 1.96 ERA and a 1.064 WHIP. He has yet to allow more than three runs in any outing. And every single one of his starts has finished in either the fifth or sixth inning.

Martinez mentioned the 80-pitch mark as a critical milestone for Williams. He went all the way up to 91 in his season debut. Since then, every one of his starts has ended with a pitch count between 77-81.

“As long as I’m able to give the team a chance to win every five days, that’s all I’m looking forward to,” he said.

That Williams is even in this position is remarkable, given the way his 2023 season went. Signed to a two-year deal in the hopes he could be a reliable back-of-the-rotation starter for a rebuilding club, he wound up going 6-10 with a 5.55 ERA and 1.600 WHIP in 30 starts. Worse, he served up 34 home runs, most in the majors.

Now consider that Tuesday night Williams became the first Nationals pitcher to give up zero homers in his first seven starts of a season since Gio Gonzalez in 2012.

“There’s a lot of stuff that needed to be addressed last year,” he said. “I’m thankful that Davey trusted me in this spot still to give me the ball every five days. We made the adjustments in the offseason, whether it’s pitch selection, not getting beat on my fourth-best pitch. And then also just going to spring training and seeing those results happen.”

Williams nearly didn’t make the Opening Day rotation. Had Zach Davies not been lit up in his final start of the spring, Williams might well have been moved to the bullpen at the end of March.

Instead, he’s somehow become the team’s most consistently effective starter through seven turns of the rotation. That doesn’t guarantee continued success. But with each passing start that includes so few runs on the board, it becomes more and more plausible he can keep this up.

Even if he does it five innings at a time.

“We’ve had bulk starts now in this season, and now it’s time of the year where you have to see how teams will start adjusting,” Williams said. “It’s time to adjust back.”