Simplifying windup and timing, Roark hopes for better results

JUPITER, Fla. - In his quest to correct what ailed him in 2017 and recapture the form that made him one of baseball's most effective starters prior to that, Tanner Roark has a simple plan: Simplify.

Simplify his mechanics. Simplify his timing. Simplify his windup. And simplify his thought process when he's on the mound.

"I was just in my head, just thinking too much," Roark said in explaining his struggles last season. "And when you think, you suck."

While a line like that might be worthy of a segment of "Jack Handey's Deep Thoughts" it does serve a purpose for Roark. When things didn't go well for him early in 2017, he tried to compensate by racking his brain in search of an answer.

Along the way, he found himself spending more time thinking about what he was doing than simply doing what came naturally to him. So this spring he's trying to eliminate all the clutter in his mind and just pitch the way he always has.

"You go out there, and you know what you need to do and you focus on the things you need to do," he said. "Most of the time, it's just the small little things that you need to do that'll fix everything else, and you don't need to change anything."

Roark tried it all out this afternoon in his spring debut, and the results were encouraging. He tossed two scoreless innings against the Marlins, striking out the side in the bottom of the second.

"He was good," manager Davey Martinez said. "He kept the ball down, threw strikes. He got his work in. He was really good."

The back-to-back-to-back strikeouts in the second inning were the highlight of Roark's abbreviated outing. He caught Eric Campbell, Tomas Telis and Monte Harrison looking, all of them with two-seam fastballs.

That bread-and-butter pitch, so critical to Roark's success, eluded him too often last season. He particularly struggled to put away hitters with two strikes, among the biggest reasons his ERA ballooned from 2.83 the previous year to 4.67.

Roark blames poor timing for his struggles locating the two-seamer. Given his across-the-body delivery, one small glitch in his mechanics can throw everything out of whack.

"It's either I'm going too fast to the plate, or my arm is not getting up quick enough," he said. "So sometimes you've got to tell yourself get your arm going, just deliberately slow down your windup."

In a further attempt to simplify things and perhaps help him get in a better position to deliver quality pitches with more consistency, Roark is trying out a simplified windup this spring. Instead of rocking back and to the side with his left leg before kicking and dealing, he's keeping that front leg in front of the rubber and only slightly stepping before kicking and dealing.

Asked who came up with that idea, Roark pointed to himself.

"I mean, I've seen people do it," he said. "Pitchers do it. But I wanted to try it and see how it felt. And simple is always better. ... That's why I did it. I tried it and I like it."

Other notable moments from today's 3-2 loss to the Marlins ...

* Victor Robles made his first start of the spring, batting second and playing center field. The 20-year-old top prospect delivered a bloop single in the top of the first to leave him 2-for-2 with a walk to begin his Grapefruit League season, but he popped out and struck out in his next two at-bats.

General manager Mike Rizzo has made it clear Robles will play every day this year, whether in the big leagues or Triple-A. And barring an injury to one of the Nationals' three starting outfielders, there likely isn't a straight path from Florida to D.C. for Robles this spring. He's trying hard not to think in those kind of terms, though.

"It's not difficult at all," Robles said, via interpreter Octavio Martinez. "I have the same mindset as I've always had: Just come here, do my work, play baseball. I obviously want to make the team, but that's not what I'm worried about. I can't control that. I have the same mindset that I've always had: Just come out here and do my thing."

* Bryan Harper's spring debut was a big ragged; he opened the bottom of the seventh with a four-pitch walk, followed by a double and an RBI single. But the left-hander rebounded to get two ground balls (including a 6-4-3 double play) that got him out of the jam. Besides, the results were far less important on this day than the mere fact he was on the mound in a game.

Harper (Bryce's older brother) had never pitched in a Grapefruit League game before, and he hadn't pitched in any kind of game since late 2016 when he was shut down at Triple-A Syracuse and wound up needing Tommy John surgery.

"I was really pumped to be back out there," the 28-year-old reliever said. "Obviously not the results I wanted. Obviously wanted a 1-2-3, shoot-for-the-moon type of stuff. But it was good. It was really good to be back out there."