WASHINGTON (AP) — Washington Nationals starter Mitchell Parker figured that after eight innings and 99 pitches, his job was done Tuesday night.
So there the left-hander didn’t see a need to plead with or cajole manager Dave Martinez to extend the longest outing of his major league career.
Parker’s work stood up fine even if he didn’t come out for the ninth inning. He allowed just one hit — Cedric Mullins’ third-inning single — and two walks while striking out four in .
“I’ve been saying it all year, just forcing them to do what we want them to do with it,” Parker said. “I feel like we were getting that soft contact and the early fly balls. That was really working out.”
Parker (3-1) retired the final 17 batters he faced and lowered his ERA from 1.85 to 1.39. He’s worked at least six innings in all five of his starts, further settling into his place in Washington’s rotation after going 7-10 with a 4.29 ERA in 29 outings as a rookie last season.
His longest outing a year ago was seven innings, and he breezed past it against Baltimore. He needed 10 pitches to work a perfect eighth, getting Jackson Holliday on a called third strike to end his outing.
“When he pounds that strike zone, he’s been tough,” Martinez said. “He threw the ball really well and he was all over the strike zone today. He puts those guys in swing mode, and that’s when he gets some chases.”
Parker got off to an inauspicious start, issuing a four-pitch walk to Mullins. But he recovered to set down the next seven before encountering his greatest difficulty of the night. Holliday worked a full-count walk with one out and moved to second when Mullins lined a hit to left. Parker then retired Adley Rutschman and Gunnar Henderson on two pitches apiece.
“He kind of did the same thing to us last year,” Baltimore manager Brandon Hyde said. “It’s kind of a high-release sneaky fastball and we were late on it. To the lefties, a lot of breaking balls we had a tough time staying on. We didn’t work the count on him and we didn’t make it tough for him.”
Parker is a little more than a year removed from becoming the first National to win his big-league debut since Stephen Strasburg did it in 2010. The former fifth-rounder wound up as Washington’s permanent rotation replacement for Josiah Gray, who was limited to two starts in 2024 because of an elbow injury.
Now, he’s limiting opponents to a .167 average early in his second season after Tuesday’s gem.
“That was always the battle, consistency,” Parker said. “I feel like we’re in a good spot, but obviously have to keep working on things and just going to keep improving on every little thing we can.”
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