Jackson Tetreault does what he can in rough outing vs Marlins...

In back-to-back wins after a rough-ish MLB debut, Jackson Tetreault, 26, had given up four runs, one earned, in 13 innings pitched (0.69 ERA, 3.13 FIP), with opposing hitters in those outings putting up a .204/.264/.245 line against the right-hander, who put up solid if not spectacular numbers in five season in the Nationals’ system after Washington drafted him in the 7th Round in 2017.

“This kid comes up here and he’s very much under control,” Davey Martinez said after start No. 3 for Tetreault, a six-inning outing in Texas in which he gave up four hits and one run.

“He’s got a good idea what he wants to do, and he works hard every day. So, we’ll get him back out there in five days, but he’s done well.”

“I believe I deserve to be up here, and I belong up here,” Tetreault told reporters, as quoted by MASN’s Mark Zuckerman after the outing against the Rangers.

“Whenever I go out there, I’m just trying to compete for the team and trying to win for the team. That’s really my mentality every time I’m out there, and I’m super grateful every time Davey hands me the ball and sends me out there.”

Start No. 4 in the majors for Tetreault was a less-than-stellar outing in which he gave up five walks, four hits, one a two-run home run by Jesús Aguilar in the first, and four earned runs overall in four innings, throwing 84 pitches and escaping the fourth only after he’d given up a run and the Marlins had loaded the bases with one out, but he did get an inning-ending double play out of Aguilar to escape the jam and keep it a 4-2 game in Miami’s favor.

Jackson Tetreault’s Line: 4.0 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 5 BB, 1 K, 1 HR, 84 P, 44 S, 6/3 GO/FO.

Having thrown 59.8% four-seam fastballs overall on the year, he cut down to 51% Saturday, and upped the cutters (28.8% to 42%) while using his curve just about as frequently (7%).

“We’re going to hone in on why, but his ball was cutting today,” Martinez said after the 5-3 loss to the Fish. “He couldn’t figure out why, I think he was yanking, his extension might be a little longer than normal. We’ll take a look at it. His misses weren’t terrible, but they were misses. He couldn’t locate his fastball today at all. He built his pitch count up. I thought he fought through just to give us four innings, which was good, and you could tell his demeanor is really good. He was frustrated when we took him out, but he wanted to know, he said, ‘I’m much better, I need to be better, and I’m going to figure this out before five [days].’ And I like that a lot. He fought through it, and he knew his command was off a little bit, but he got through four innings, and even that last inning, bases loaded, to be able to get the ground ball double play, I thought that was good.”