The Washington Nationals are back to the stadium where they won the World Series in 2019. Beside Jose Altuve and first base coach Gerardo Parra, both teams have almost completely turned over their rosters from that 2019 season. But but but all teams but the Nats keep their star players. Sure.
For the Astros, they have their ace, Framber Valdez, on the mound and interim-manager Miguel Cairo will sit lefties James Wood and Luis Garcia Jr. to start this game. This is a rare start for Daylen Lile against a lefty. A big test to see if he can be more than a platoon bat against only right-handed starting pitchers.
After the game, the Nats’ winning pitcher seemed to be giving hugs to hundreds of his family and friends from Minnesota where he was born and raised. Did Irvin really hold up the flight? Maybe he did. The Nats’ American Airlines AA9721 charter didn’t arrive in Houston until 9:37 PM ET. That’s okay, Irvin deserved his time basking in his big win for the team.
In the bad news department, the Nats’ top pitching prospect, Travis Sykora, tore his UCL and will have surgery in early August. That will almost certainly setback Sykora until early to mid-2027. That leads to the question, does that change the strategy with trading MacKenzie Gore? While nobody was counting on Sykora for 2026, they certainly were for the 2027 season.
The Nats only have 3-games with today’s game, and less than 4-days remaining until the trade deadline. Rumors are flying all over the internet on who will be traded. It is that time of year to be on “hug watch” in case any player gets traded mid-game.
“We’re playing with energy. We’re doing the little things the right way. We got men on third twice and we got RBIs. So we’re doing the little things the right way, what we’re supposed to do as a team. It’s been good. We’re going to keep doing it. We’re going to keep preaching that.”
— Miguel Cairo said after yesterday’s game
The bullpen usage looks like this:
Here are your Nats’ WAR leaders with James Wood at +3.3, MacKenzie Gore at +2.8 CJ Abrams at +3.0, and . Add those up, and you get a total of +9.1 WAR. The issue is the large gap between those players and the next tier.
On defense, the OAA stats give you a good picture of the team’s overall defense which is the good, the bad, and the ugly. The good news is that besides Nathaniel Lowe, the defense under interim-manager Miguel Cairo has drastically improved. All of a sudden, Luis Garcia Jr. looks Gold Glove in the month of July.
These are your stats leaders on BBRef. There are certainly some surprises on there — good and not so good. The issue is the consistency on this team.
“[Irvin] kept throwing strikes, and the defense played really good behind him. Like I said before, we’re preaching throwing strikes, get ahead and make them swing the bat, and today he did an excellent job. It was nice to see him pitch seven innings.”
— Cairo said after yesterday’s game
The Nats starting pitchers have a combined ERA of 4.76 and 26th best in MLB. You might be surprised at the team just ahead of the Nationals in the rankings. The reliever’s ERA sits at a 5.63 and now the worst in baseball in ERA.
Here is how the starters rank by ERA:
No. 5 Starter: Brad Lord 3.39 (starting/relieving)
No. 4 Starter: Michael Soroka 4.85
No. 3 Starter: Mitchell Parker 4.91
No. 2 Starter: Jake Irvin 4.69
No. 1 Starter: MacKenzie Gore 3.52
Washington Nationals vs. Houston Astros
Stadium: Daikin Park, Houston, Texas
1st Pitch: 8:10 pm EDT
TV: MASN2
Radio: 106.7 The Fan radio and via the MLB app; In Spanish on DC 87.7 FM and La Pantera 100.7 FM/1220 AM. On Sirius/XM, tune to Channel 185 for the home broadcast and the road team is online only.
Line-up subject to change (without notice):
