Last night was a night to remember as a great team win complete with a walk-off celebration. Today is Stephen Strasburg’s turn to put his mark on the calendar before he heads to Miami for the All-Star game.
Right-hander Julio Teheran gets the start for the Atlanta Braves in this match-up. The Braves will need to work around their bullpen issues as Jim Johnson won’t be available today after throwing 30 pitches last night. Jose Ramirez threw 20 pitches last night and might not be available.
The Nationals bullpen last night had to throw a combined 2 1/3 innings with 4 relief pitchers, and they threw less combined pitches than Jim Johnson labored through in his 2/3 of an inning of work.
Speaking of the bullpens, the Nationals lefty reliever, Enny Romero, has not been seen on a mound since July 2nd after he had thrown 3 games in a row and 46 pitches in the series against the Cubs and struggled in the 3rd game in a row and then again on July 2nd giving up 2-runs and 3 hits including a home run. It has been a continued debate over the usage of the relievers including Jacob Turner, Koda Glover, and Trevor Gott.
We checked in with a source who indeed confirmed that Enny Romero had arm fatigue which they had hoped a few days of rest would cure. Today is the sixth day. Trevor Gott went through a similar pattern and needed 11 days off before pitching again. Koda Glover wasn’t as fortunate as he had to be placed on the disabled-list, and we learned the real issue was rotator cuff inflammation.
In other sourced news that came second-hand from a reliable team source and quoted here verbatim from a text message, “Max asked to be taken out after 7 Dusty said No”. This gives some credibility to what we heard after the game that Max Scherzer was not pleased. Scherzer went 120 pitches and labored into the 8th inning and walked Ender Inciarte after he was ahead 0-2 in the count and then gave up a single to Brandon Phillips with 2 outs. Scherzer was pulled and Oliver Perez promptly gave up a 2-run single to Freddie Freeman which tacked on 2 more runs onto Scherzer’s statline for a total of 4-runs in the game. Emotions run high in games like this, and the main hope is that Max Scherzer is healthy.
Dusty Baker has penciled in Jose Lobaton for today’s game as he has hit Julio Teheran well in the past. Adam Lind will be in leftfield and perhaps the biggest news is Dusty Baker has shifted the entire middle of the line-up one spot forward with Bryce Harper in the two-hole followed by Ryan Zimmerman and Daniel Murphy in the clean-up. This has been a well-discussed line-up formation on Talk Nats since Trea Turner went on the DL.
Bryce Harper has his best power numbers against Teheran which includes 7 home runs.
Atlanta Braves at Washington Nationals
Stadium: Nationals Park,1500 S Capitol St. SE, Washington, DC 20003
1st Pitch: 4:05 pm EDT
TV: MASN2, WUSA9, MLB Network (out-of-market), FOX Sports SE, MLB.TV
Nats Radio: 106.7 FM The Fan; SiriusXM® XM 186 Sirius 214 (Internet 869)
Line-ups (subject to change without notice):
- Brian Goodwin CF
- Bryce Harper RF
- Ryan Zimmerman 1B
- Daniel Murphy 2B
- Anthony Rendon 3B
- Adam Lind LF
- Stephen Drew SS
- Jose Lobaton C
- Stephen Strasburg RHP
