This might not be the best timing coming off of an outing where Patrick Corbin gave up 5 ER over 6 innings yesterday, but we’re going to do this anyways. It’s been widely assumed that the Nationals would be stuck with Corbin and the nearly $60 million left on his contract through the 2024 season. All of a sudden, it doesn’t seem all that outrageous that they could potentially deal him in July. To be clear, if they were able to deal him, they would be picking up a significant portion of the money he’s owed. He is owed $24.4 million in 2023 and then $35.4 million in 2024. My best guess would be that in order to move him, the Nats would have to pick up around 70% of that (around $42 million). At that point, the acquiring team would be taking Corbin on at essentially a 2 year/$18 million deal. That’s not a terrible flier given his career numbers and a deal like that is not likely to be detrimental if things don’t work out.

Some might wonder from the Nats perspective why it even makes sense to deal him at that point. Afterall, one thing Corbin has given the Nats is reliability. He made 33 starts in 2019, 11 starts in the shortened 2020 season and then 31 starts last season. The Nats rotation right now is anything but reliable. Josiah Gray has looked generally great this season, but there’s not much behind him. The Nats are unsure what to expect from Stephen Strasburg upon his return. The same can be said for Joe Ross, who is a free agent after the season. Erick Fedde has been fine this season, but he threw a career high 133 innings last season, so how much could be expected out of him this season? Maybe 150 innings? Gray and fellow rookie starter Joan Adon figure to be on innings limits, so Corbin really does provide some value to the Nats.

With that being said, if there’s a team that comes asking about him in July, the Nats should absolutely still deal him. Teams are always looking for starting pitching and a left-handed starter is especially attractive. Yes, the Nationals are going to need a reliable starter to give them innings for the rest of 2022 and for 2023. But, they should be looking hard at the top-end of the SP market this offseason and saving $9 million a year from Corbin’s deal would help. Any kind of return for Corbin prospect-wise (which would be minimal) is a bonus.

So what is behind Corbin’s potential turnaround? Well, if you look at Corbin’s Savant page over the past 4 years, there haven’t been many huge differences. He’s throwing his sinker more and his slider slightly less (even though it’s still his best pitch). A change in approch to throwing his slider more again could even produce better results since his fastball and sinker are getting pounded. In 2018 he threw his slider 40% of the time and in 2019 he threw it 37% of the time. That’s dipped to 32% this season. 

One significant change, however, is who Corbin is throwing to. Corbin has always been a pitcher who develops a connection with a certain catcher. In Arizona, it was Jeff Mathis and Alex Avila. In his first year in Washington, it was Kurt Suzuki. After Suzuki left following the 2019 season, Corbin exclusively threw to Yan Gomes in 2020 and his results were below-average, at best. In 2021, the Nats brought Alex Avila in thinking it might help. It didn’t. In 34 innings, Corbin had a 6.09 ERA while pitching to Avila last season. There was one catcher last season that he only threw to in one game, but he turned in one of his best starts of the season. That catcher was Riley Adams. Last season, in Corbin’s lone start with Adams behind the plate, he threw 6 ⅓ innings, gave up 1 ER, 3 hits and 7 K’s. Now, this season, Corbin has a 3.56 ERA through 30 ⅓ innings when throwing to Adams. It could still be a fairly small sample size, but through 6 starts, the two seem to be on the same page

Davey should ride this as long as he can though. Make sure Corbin is consistently throwing to Adams (the jokes really do write themself for this one) and hope that his success continues. If it does, the Nats just might be able to unload him at the deadline.