Mitchell Parker has both of the Washington Nationals wins to start the season
When Mitchell Parker won a starting job out of camp, he was the fifth starter. Now he might be the Nationals second best starter after MacKenzie Gore. Parker doesn’t do anything sexy, but he delivers and gets the job done.
The Phillies and D-Backs are two of the best lineups in the National League. Another thing they have in common is that they have been stifled by Mitchell Parker to open the season. Against those two dangerous lineups, Parker has gone 12.1 innings, allowing just one run.
He doesn’t dominate lineups the way Gore did against the Phillies or the way DJ Herz did last year when he was at the top of his game. Rather, Parker forces weak contact and keeps hitters off balance. He is the modern day crafty lefty.
Even like 10 years ago, when you called a guy a crafty lefty, it meant that he threw like 88. However, these days you can be a crafty lefty and average nearly 93 MPH on your fastball like Parker does. In an era where stuff is king, the pitch models aren’t in love with Parker. However, he finds a way to get outs.
His fastball has average velocity, but has a lot of life on it. His 18.5 inches of rise are well above average. It is why he can throw his 93 MPH fastball over half the time. None of his secondary pitches stand out, but he mixes in a curveball, slider and splitter effectively.
There were a number of Nationals pitchers who broke through last year. This year was all about seeing which one of those guys could keep it up. DJ Herz won’t get a chance to because of injury, and Jake Irvin hasn’t been overly convincing. However, Mitchell Parker has just done his thing and silenced two great offenses.
I am excited to see Parker continue to work as the season goes along. He can go deep into games and save a fragile Nationals bullpen. As we saw Yesterday, the game gets much more dicey when Parker comes out. Long term, he is probably more of a three or four starter, but this year, it looks like he might be the Nationals number two.
I really like how he finished that sixth inning. He was clearly tired and his stuff was waning, but he got the job done. I was coaching my own baseball team, so I couldn’t catch the entirety of the game, but I heard Parker also made a play in the field.
That might sound ordinary, but it was a part of his game that really needed work. Parker’s fielding was the worst I have ever seen from a pitcher last year. So if he can help himself in the field, it will really do good things for his game.
I was more excited about other guys heading into the season. However, I underestimated Parker’s steadiness and reliability. Those attributes will go a long way on a Nats team with so many inconsistent players.