The Home for Washington Nationals Game Talk

Today is the season finale with the Atlanta Braves, and the last time that the Washington Nationals will ever be scheduled to play in Turner Field aka Trea Turner Field. The stadium nicknamed the ‘Ted’ by Braves fans in honor of media mogul and former Braves team owner Ted Turner has been ‘owned’ by Trea Turner since his call-up last year to the Majors. Trea Turner hit his first career home run in Atlanta last year and now has 5 home runs in Turner Field with 10 RBIs and 4 stolen bases and a full slash line of .395/.429/.842/1.271. Don’t fret Braves fans, Trea is hitting .500 in Camden Yards and Progressive Field, and Trea Turner dominates more than any stadium in the Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati where he is batting 1.000. Continue reading →

Today marks just fifteen games remaining in the season, and Dusty Baker is resting Wilson Ramos today as Pedro Severino gets a rare start. Danny Espinosa is back in the line-up as he returned from California mid-game last night. Danny was able to be with his wife Sara for the birth of their son Ty Espinosa who was born on Thursday. Technically, MLB allows for 3 days of paternity leave, but Danny only used one day which was the day-off on Thursday to schedule the birth with his wife Sara. Danny flew back yesterday afternoon from California to arrive near game time. Dusty Baker encouraged Danny to take his time as we saw with Ryan Zimmerman who took the full 3 days for the birth of his second daughter, and Danny had to make two long cross-country trips. Continue reading →

The Nationals dropped the Magic Number to 6 while going to a season’s best 29 games over .500 as Max Scherzer won his 17th game while Trea Turner gave Max all the offense he needed with 4 runs scored on 4 hits. The Nats won 7-2, and it was never really close.

Max Scherzer was good as he got to face a Braves line-up without Freddie Freeman who was on paternity leave. Scherzer was charged with 2 earned runs, and it is possible that the first run is changed to unearned as Matt Kemp stopped at 3rd base on a single, but then ran home on a fielding error which was followed by a walk and 2 strikeouts.

Trea Turner’s night just adds to his legendary status as he went 4-5 with 8 total bases highlighted by a 408 foot home run off of a 79mph off-speed pitch where Turner had to supply most of the power. Turner stole 2 bases and scored 4 runs and had 2 RBIs. Turner raised his batting average to a rookie leading .349 BA and .927 OPS for rookies with at least 250 plate appearances. Possibly the most amazing stat is Turner leads the Majors in the 1st at-bat of the game as he is now batting .460. Continue reading →

As Danny Espinosa and his wife Sara welcomed their baby boy Ty into this world, the team is expecting to be without Danny Espinosa, and he will join the team tomorrow. Dusty Baker is back at the helm of the Nats tonight after he had a death in the family per the team’s report, and bench coach Chris Speier flawlessly (except for a missed defensive shift Speier confessed to botching) led the Nats to a 1-0 win over the Mets to put the Nats in a very comfortable situation for the remaining sixteen games this season as the 87-59 Nationals now hold a 10.0 game lead in the NL East with a Magic Number of 7.

Max Scherzer is pitching for the Nationals tonight in his hopes for win number 17 that eluded him 6 days ago. Continue reading →

They Nationals will get another try to get the better of rookie Robert Gsellman today in this season finale with the New York Mets. Tanner Roark will start for the Nationals, and Chris Speier will manager this game as Dusty Baker has left town to mourn the death of a person close to him.

The winner of this game will win this series, but the Nationals had already clinched the season series even before this series started on Monday and is now 11-7 in favor of the Nationals. Continue reading →