It looked like Martinez would pull him. This is how the coach has dealt with similar situations this season. Reliever Hunter Harvey warms up in the bullpen, but Gray seemed intent on convincing Martinez to let him finish the inning.
“Honestly, I’m just keeping to myself, ‘Keep me in here,'” Gray said. “So I looked at him as he came up the stairs and I didn’t see him signaling. So I just had a hunch he wasn’t going to take me out.”
His suspicion was correct. Martinez kept his head down until he reached the hill and never signaled the bullpen.
“Yes, it was kind of a [Max] Funny moment,” Martinez joked. “He looked at me and said ‘Davey.’ I said, ‘Hey, you don’t have to say a word. I just came out to give you a little breather.” I said, ‘You’re going to finish this inning. You are the right one.” “
Gray confronted Patrick Wisdom and knocked him out with a slider to record his tenth strikeout of the game. The 24-year-old is often balanced on the mound, although he does occasionally flash a little passion. And he did on Monday as he leaned forward and clenched both fists. He jumped in the air and screamed as he hopped and bounced off the hill.
“Probably number one,” Gray said of where that celebration ranks in the game for him. “I knew I had to go out there and get three more outs. I knew my pitch count was up there and I was really excited to get that finale out. If he jumped out, I would have screamed. Obviously getting the strikeout is better.
Gray, who came to Washington a year ago when the Nationals sent Trea Turner and Scherzer to the Dodgers, rewarded his manager’s confidence, which seems remarkable for the rebuilding Nationals fresh from the trade between Juan Soto and Josh Bell. A handful of the team’s top talent are a long way from their major league debuts. So watch the development of the big league club’s players – players like CJ Abrams, who made his Nationals debut on Monday, and MacKenzie Gore, who could return this season – will be important.
Gray and Martinez found themselves in a similar situation last Wednesday when Washington faced the Cubs in Chicago. Gray had pitched six scoreless innings before allowing Nico Hoerner a solo homer to open the seventh. He recorded one out before giving up a single.
Rather than stick with Gray to work his way out of the jam, Martinez turned to his bullpen in what would ultimately mean a loss in Washington.
“He never wants to get out of the game,” Martinez said of Gray that day. “And I love that about him. There’ll be a moment where you know what? I close my eyes and sit down and say, ‘Go get it, big boy.’ ”
That moment came just a week later.
“For me, it was one of those growth moments that I think he deserved and was ready for,” Martinez said Monday night.
Martinez also noted that Gray’s next leap as a pitcher will be to get deeper into the games — he’s only made it through seven full innings once this season. But Martinez said after the game he felt Gray still had his best stuff late and was in a good rhythm. It was just a moment in a lost season for Washington, but it was easy to see it as something more as well.
“I wanted to get those three outs and put the team in a position to win,” Gray said. “So he came out and had this full confidence, kind of cheered me up, got the strikeout and just let it out. It was a really fun moment.”