Photo by Andrew Lang for TalkNats
For five innings last night, Jake Irvin was tremendous. The Nationals held a 3-0 lead as he began the bottom of the sixth inning, and that’s when things began to fall apart in his face on the first pitch of that inning. The Nationals played bad defense, got some rough calls from the umpires, and had some collapses on the bump last night, leading to a loss in game three of this four game set. If only.
This one was a pitcher’s duel early, and the Nats broke through first in the top of the third inning against Eury Perez. In his first at-bat of the game, Robert Hassell III singled home a run in the third to put Washington on top 1-0.
Jake Irvin took that one run lead and ran with it, retiring the first ten Marlins he faced, and through five innings, he’d allowed no runs on just three hits. The offense gave him some additional run support in the top of the sixth inning with a much needed two-out rally. Daylen Lile drove in a run on an RBI triple, his fourth triple in the last six games, people around the country are beginning to take notice of what he’s doing at the plate, and I’m so happy to see it. Luis Garcia followed him with an RBI single, bringing Lile home to score, and putting the Nationals in command of a 3-0 lead. Unfortunately, that would be their last run of the game.
The bottom of the sixth inning is where this one took a nose dive. The inning began with an error by CJ Abrams, and that would prove to be a tone setter for the rest of the frame. The next batter singled, and that set the table for Jakob Marsee, whose RBI single got the Fish on the board, and then we hit the most controversial moment of the series. I’ll hold my thoughts on the accuracy of the call, I’ll simply tell you that Otto Lopez hit a ground ball to Luis Garcia who went for an out, appeared to get one, it was not called that way, and even after a challenge by Miguel Cairo, the call stood. Was it right? Probably not. Was it even first base umpire Laz Diaz’s call to make? Also, probably not? Did it change the game? Yes because we allowed it to. In protest, Jake Irvin and Cairo were both thrown out of this game for arguing with Diaz, and say what you will about Cairo as a manager, but I love that he’s never unwilling to stand up for his players, a complete change from the predecessor. Regardless, this sent a 3-2 game off to the Nats’ bullpen a little earlier than I’m sure they were hoping for.
PJ Poulin came in and immediately gave up an RBI single to Agustin Ramirez to tie the game at three, but truth be told, Poulin dotted three strikes and should have been out. The ump wouldn’t call a clear strike that was framed perfectly by catcher Jorge Alfaro, then the next batter Eric Wagaman brought home the go-ahead run on an RBI single of his own. Clayton Beeter eventually came in and got the Nationals out of the inning, but by then it was 4-3 Miami.
The Marlins added one run to the lead in the bottom of the seventh on an RBI single by Otto Lopez, but that 5-3 score wouldn’t hold for long. Jackson Rutledge had his first bad outing in a couple weeks last night, and it boiled over in the bottom of the eighth inning. The Nats were in a position where a clean inning would send the game to the ninth with a two-run deficit, definitely a possibility for a comeback there. That was until Xavier Edwards blasted a three-run homer off of Rutledge to make it 8-3 Marlins. That home run definitely felt a little cheap, as it traveled just 342 feet, meanwhile James Wood hit a ball 403 feet in this ballpark on Monday and it went for just a double. But that’s just baseball, I won’t spend time complaining about the layout of ballparks.
Positives tonight out of the pitching staff were slim, I’ll give Jake Irvin credit for the job he did over the first five innings, he was brilliant in those frames. Clayton Beeter did a good job out of the bullpen as well. Offensively, Josh Bell, Luis Garcia, and Daylen Lile all stayed hot with multi-hit games for each of them last night.
The series will conclude tonight at 6:40 as MacKenize Gore (5-13, 4.15) will make his to the rotation after spending 15 days on the IL. He’ll face a fellow lefty in Ryan Weathers (1-1, 3.28 ERA). There’s a few things about this matchup that make me nervous, Gore is 0-2 against Miami this season, and the Nats are facing a left-hander, not exactly their strong suit this season. Regardless, the Nats have a chance to take three out of four in a division opponent’s stadium, and our ace is on the mound to do it.
