First cut’s deep for Jackson

The Dodgers made their first round of roster cuts before Sunday’s 10-9 win over the Washington Nationals, optioning three pitchers to minor league camp, reassigning seven other players and releasing infielder Damian Jackson.

Jackson took the news hardest, toppling chairs as he stormed out of the clubhouse -- and perhaps out of baseball.

“I no longer have anything to do with baseball,” said Jackson, an 11-year major league veteran invited to camp as a nonroster player.

“He was disappointed,” said Kim Ng, the Dodgers assistant general manager who, along with Manager Grady Little, made the cuts Sunday morning. “He did make some comment that he was thinking of hanging it up anyway.”

Jackson, 33, hit .198 in 67 games with the Washington Nationals last summer and was just two for 16 (.125) in eight games this spring. General Manager Ned Colletti said the Dodgers released Jackson early to give him an opportunity to sign elsewhere if he decides to keep playing.

“He’s not going to make this club,” Colletti said. “If I wasn’t going to make the club I’d rather know on March 11 than March 31.”

Among the players reassigned were former big leaguers Fernando Tatis, an infielder; catcher Ken Huckaby and pitchers Travis Smith and Dario Veras. Tatis, who hit .260 in parts of eight seasons for Texas, St. Louis, Montreal and Baltimore, is the most veteran player of the group. But the 32-year-old, who didn’t play in 2004 or ‘05, had just three hits in 19 at-bats (.158) this spring.

Also reassigned to the minors were pitcher Scott Elbert, catcher A.J. Ellis and infielder Chin-lung Hu. Pitchers Eric Hull, Mike McGrew and Zack Hammes were optioned.

The trims bring the Dodgers spring roster down to 47 players with less than three weeks left in spring training.

Repko update

Jason Repko said his strained groin was much better Sunday morning but Little said it could be some time before the outfielder returns to the lineup -- or even resumes baseball activities such as batting practice.

“Hopefully it won’t be as long as it could have been. But it will be a while,” Little said. “Those kinds of things sometimes take a couple of days to assess just how long it might be.”

Repko, hitting .333 with a home run in 24 spring at-bats, hurt himself Saturday running down a fly ball in an exhibition game against the Florida Marlins.

Touching the bases

Brad Penny, hit hard for the second start in a row, said he was continuing to work on his secondary pitches during a three-inning outing in which he gave up four runs and nine hits. The right-hander, who said he was concentrating on his split-finger pitch Sunday, has yielded 10 runs and 16 hits in his last five innings and has a spring earned-run average of 12.86.... The Dodgers won on Larry Bigbie’s RBI single, which capped a three-run ninth-inning rally. Tony Abreu, Wilson Valdez and Jeff Kent homered.

kevin.baxter@latimes.com