Corbin roughed up again by Braves in ugly loss

ATLANTA – It’s two starts during the first week of a season that opened on the heels of a condensed spring training. Nobody’s about to draw any definitive conclusions about someone just yet based on such a small sample under these circumstances.

But on the heels of a bad 2020 season, then an even worse 2021 season, the fact this question already has to be raised is beyond discouraging: What do the Nationals do with Patrick Corbin?

The question already is being asked because Corbin faded in the fourth and fifth innings on opening night against the Mets, then was absolutely ransacked by the Braves tonight during a 16-4 beatdown that included every manner of embarrassment for the visitors (aside from Juan Soto mashing a baseball 451 feet to right-center for the 100th home run of his career).

Getting shut down by an opposing starter making his major league debut? Check.

Watching middle relievers take what still could’ve been a competitive game and turn it into a rout? Check.

Handing the ball to utility man Dee Strange-Gordon to pitch the bottom of the eighth and witnessing him surrender three runs via a homer, a single, three walks and a hit-by-pitch on a 52 mph "fastball?" Check.

Creating an instant blooper classic with a botched rundown that defied explanation? Checkmate.

We’ll get to all that in a moment, but we have to start with Corbin, because his ragged start sent this ballgame on its unavoidable path toward the pit of despair.

The left-hander was tagged for six runs and nine hits in only 2 2/3 innings. Eleven of the last 16 batters he faced reached base, six of them scoring. He threw a whopping 83 pitches in the process.

“I felt pretty good,” Corbin said to open his postgame interview, a common refrain from so many of his losses last year. “I don’t know if there’s one thing I can think of. It’s frustrating, obviously. I thought I made some decent pitches there and kind of got the pitch count up there early. A couple mistakes later in the second, later in the third. Just try to learn from this and try to come back my next one and be better.”

The precise details of tonight’s outing need not be re-lived, but suffice it to say it bore ample resemblance to Corbin’s worst outings from last season and will only add fuel to the fire to those questions about the Nationals’ next step with their second-highest-paid player.

Corbin, who still has three years and $83 million remaining on his contract, isn’t going anywhere in the short term. He’s not hurt. And the club isn’t going to make some rash move right now that involves eating the rest of that contract. But the pressure will continue to mount with each passing start for the Nats to do something, anything other than continuing to send him to the mound every fifth day.

“We’ve got to get him back,” manager Davey Martinez said. “The first start was really good for the first four innings. We’ve got to get him back to that. For me, (the problem) was trying to miss bats. We’ve got to get him back in the zone, get the ball down. … We’ll work on that this week, and hopefully in five days, he comes back and gives us five or six innings.”

At minimum, the Nationals might want to try to jigger the rotation to prevent Corbin from facing the Braves again, because he’s given his team no chance to beat them in a long time. Over his last seven starts against Atlanta, dating back to September 2019, he’s 0-7 with a 7.25 ERA.

“I don’t know, I used to pitch pretty good against them, and then I’m not quite sure,” he said. “They work the pitch count. They have some veteran guys over there. Just one of those days today where it seemed like everything went well for them.”

This latest dud from Corbin at Truist Park left the Nationals bullpen in a rough place, needing to fill at least 5 1/3 innings. Austin Voth was asked to inherit a bases-loaded jam in the bottom of the third and did get out of it by inducing a fly ball out of Austin Riley. But then Voth gave up a leadoff homer to Marcell Ozuna in the fourth – Ozuna would add another homer off Paolo Espino one inning later – and that only served as the appetizer to the biggest train wreck moment of the night.

The situation: Runners on first and second, one out. Ozzie Albies hit a sharp grounder to first, and Josh Bell stepped on the bag for the easy out. Bell then tried to throw to second to complete a backwards double play, but the throw sailed wide and pulled shortstop Lucius Fox off the base.

That’s when chaos ensued. Fox started to run Orlando Arcia back to first, but then noticed Guillermo Heredia rounding third and heading home, so he threw the ball to catcher Keibert Ruiz. Ruiz ran Heredia back toward third, and it appeared the Nationals would record the third out via a simple rundown play. Except they couldn’t get close enough to Heredia to tag him.

Ruiz threw the ball to third baseman Maikel Franco, who threw the ball back to Ruiz, who threw it to second baseman César Hernández, who had made his way over to third to back up Franco. Hernández threw the ball to Franco, who now was on the other side of the rundown equation, covering the plate. Franco tried to chase down Heredia, who ran into Ruiz, who was obstructing his path back to third base. Then, as if that wasn’t enough, Franco threw the ball to Soto, the right fielder who remarkably was now covering second base and proceeded to track Arcia all the way to third base, tagging him and then Heredia in foul territory, just in case.

“I didn’t even know what was going on with the play, or anything like that,” said Soto, who added he’d never been involved in a rundown as a defensive player before. “I saw one was on the base and the other one was outside, so I tagged them both just in case.” 

The result of all that? Not a 3-6-2-5-2-4-5-9 double play, because obstruction was correctly called on Ruiz for getting in Heredia’s way near third base. Heredia was awarded the plate, Arcia was awarded third base, Ruiz was charged with an error and the Nationals ensured their place on blooper reels for eternity.

“Franco has to come get the ball,” Martinez said when asked where the play initially went wrong. “Franco stood at the base, and he just stood there and watched Keibert run to where he had to throw the ball. He's got to come down the line a little bit, so when he gets the ball he’s got a running start. There are too many throws, as we all know. Way too many throws. Keibert got caught in the baseline. Smart heads up by Heredia running into him. But for me, that can’t happen.”

Everything that took place after that sequence was required for official baseball purposes. Voth and Espino finished the game and at least prevented Martinez from needing to use up any more relievers. Soto and Bell hit back-to-back homers in the sixth off Bryce Elder, who otherwise was spectacular in his major league debut.

And the Nationals trudged away with their most lopsided loss of the young season only 24 hours removed from their most lopsided win of the young season.

In spite of it all, they’ll take the field again at 12:20 p.m. Wednesday with a chance to take the three-game series from the defending World Series champs.