Gibby waiting to name Opening Series starters

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- Patrick Corbin and Trevor Cahill are slated to start for the D-backs on Friday and Saturday.

If you were to schedule the rest of the spring out on a five-man-rotation basis, Corbin and Cahill would be lined up to start the two-game Opening Series against the Dodgers on March 22-23 in Sydney, Australia. But manager Kirk Gibson said not so fast.

"You're assuming they're going to go every fifth day," Gibson said when asked about it. "There's a lot of flexibility in the schedule. If you look at just the week before the games, there's a lot of downtime there. That's one way to look at it, but that's not necessarily the truth."

The Dodgers have discussed the possibility of not starting ace Clayton Kershaw in Sydney as a way of lessening his workload this season.

With Corbin having thrown a career-high 208 1/3 innings last year, it's possible the D-backs could think about doing the same thing with him.

"It's one of the thoughts," Gibson said. "He threw a lot of innings last year. We've had a lot of conversations. Obviously, we talk all the time about different scenarios. I have an idea of what we might do, but it's not set in stone and it's reversible. We're just not there yet."

The D-backs want to get through the rotation at least once this spring before making decisions about Australia.