Photo by Sol Tucker/TalkNats
The Washington Nationals find themselves in unchartered territory today with their first chance to sweep a series in 2026. If they can accomplish the sweep, it takes some pressure off the team as they fly to Pittsburgh tomorrow and face the reigning NL Cy Young winner, Paul Skenes. The Nats have won the first game of every series except the one started by Miles Mikolas. There is a reason they play the games — and back to today’s game, the Nats have Zack Littell on the mound for his third appearance and second start of the season.
Last night was arguably the best start of the season as was turned in by Foster Griffin for the Nats and the bullpen was good enough to seal a 3-1 win for Washington. Griffin had a no-no going through the 5th inning, and he hit the wall in the 6th inning, and was saved by Brad Lord who stranded both of Griffin’s inherited runners. What a great sight to see. My hook would have been first sign of trouble — but it worked out.
Here is a wild stat we discovered: Griffin’s first three MLB career starts were against the previous year’s three division winners. He had to face the Phillies, Dodgers and Brewers and comes away with a 1.76 ERA. Those teams averaged 95.33 wins in 2025. From what we can tell, that was a first in MLB history — and if not a first, it certainly would tie the mark. We tagged Sarah Langs to see if that indeed was a first.
The bullpen has had two good ERA games in a row. Cionel Perez got his ERA under double-digits and pitched a perfect 8th inning for the hold last night. Interestingly enough, neither Gus Varland or Ken Waldichuk have pitched in a while. After the mind-boggling usage of Cole Henry in the St. Louis series, he hasn’t pitched in three days while Clayton Beeter has taken on the bulk of the bullpen work the past two games including a nail-biting save last night.
Varland and Waldichuk seem to be in the “B” bullpen. How can the coaching staff get them back to “A” quality? Here is a chart of usage on manager Blake Butera‘s bullpen:
The FanGraphs WAR chart is accumulating data. This will start to give us a clearer picture in six weeks when the sample sizes get larger. The OAA defense stat requires a minimum of 10 defensive plays. We will start adding more statistics as the sample sizes get larger.
Washington Nationals vs. Milwaukee Brewers
Stadium: American Family Field, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
1st Pitch: 2:10 PM EDT
TV: Nationals.TV
Radio: 106.7 The Fan radio and via the MLB app. On Sirius/XM, tune to Channel 183 for the home broadcast and the road team is online only.
