Nats can't back Corbin after rocky 1st inning

While Patrick Corbin delivered six strikeouts over six innings against the Marlins, the Nationals’ bats were stifled by 11 strikeouts from rookie starter Zach Thompson in as many frames.

“Kept everybody off balance,” manager Dave Martinez said following the Nats’ 3-2 loss Saturday at loanDepot park.

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Corbin allowed three runs on five hits in his third consecutive start of at least six frames. All but one of those hits came in the first, when he surrendered two runs.

“He was really good after that first inning,” Martinez said. “He came out, he made his pitches. His slider was good. He threw his fastballs when he needed to throw them. His location was a lot better.”

Corbin proceeded to toss three straight 1-2-3 innings. But in the fifth -- after the Nationals evened the score in the fourth with a Starlin Castro RBI double -- Jon Berti went deep on a 90.7 mph sinker from Corbin for the deciding run.

“Other than [the first two pitches of the game], I felt pretty good,” Corbin said. “I know the go-ahead run was that homer. But that was a great swing by him. If he can do that, tip my cap to him.”

But as the Marlins pieced together enough offense to edge out a ‘W,’ the 27-year-old Thompson overpowered Washington’s offense. It was the third time this season an opposing pitcher has struck out more than 10 Nationals batters: Tyler Glasnow of the Rays on June 8 (11 K's) and Jacob deGrom of the Mets on April 23 (15 K's) were the other two instances.

“I think he did a decent job of going from cutter to curveball,” said Josh Bell, who went 1-for-4 in his return from right side soreness. “Pretty similar locations on where he started those pitches, and then the curveball would just drop out of the zone. I feel like he wasn’t afraid to use his second and third pitch in any count, which makes guys deceptive.”

In spite of Thompson’s dominant outing, the Nationals had an opportunity to stage a comeback win in the top of the ninth -- with their hottest hitter at the plate. After Josh Harrison's leadoff single, Kyle Schwarber had a chance for a one-out, game-tying RBI or a go-ahead homer. But righty reliever Yimi García got Schwarber swinging, and the streaking left fielder was rendered hitless (0-for-4, one walk, three strikeouts) for the first time since Game 1 of the doubleheader on June 19 vs. the Mets.

“His good at-bats, his results so far have been hitting the ball over the fence,” Martinez said of Schwarber. “But he understands, all he’s trying to do is put the ball in play and keep us going. It just didn’t happen for him today.”

After coming into Miami on a hot streak, the Nationals will look to snap a two-game skid on Sunday and return to Nats Park for a seven-game homestand on a high note.

“You’ve got Max on the bump tomorrow, so that takes a little bit of pressure off of us,” Bell said. “We know we’ve just got to scratch a couple of runs across and let him do his thing. That’s no reason to panic now. We’ve been playing really well, and we’re going to continue to do that.”