The Home for Washington Nationals Game Talk

The Nationals faced an uphill battle this afternoon in the final game of this weekend’s series with the Red Sox. They had to overcome another ineffective outing from a starting pitcher and had to go up against one of the toughest starting pitchers in all of baseball. Despite this, the Nationals managed to stay within striking distance all afternoon, even displaying some excellent hitting against Red Sox starter Garrett Crochet.

If we’ve learned anything from watching these first two games against the Red Sox, it’s that the way the Sox play the game is something the Nationals need to make note of. The Red Sox got extra bases on multiple occasions simply because they go hard out of the batter’s box every single time. They cut down on the Nationals’ scoring opportunities by charging every single ball hit to the outfield with aggression that borders on reckless, and they have a clear approach to every single at-bat they take. All of these things are things that the Nationals either don’t consistently do or don’t do at all. The Nationals haven’t looked like they belong on the same field as Boston, and considering we’re talking about a 45-45 team, it’s not something that can be written off as “oh well, they’re just a better team, this was supposed to happen.” Lose the first two games of the series? Fine. Do it in a dignified manner, at least make it look like you’re supposed to be playing in the same league as your opponent. This was the third loss the Nats have had in the past four days that just was not competitive at any point, and that’s an embarrassment.

The Nationals looked like a team playing their fourth game in 48 hours this afternoon, leading to an 11-2 loss to kick off the weekend series against Boston. An alarming trend has emerged from the Nats’ starting pitching, which has now allowed runs in the first two innings in seven of the last eight games. The stadium was packed at nearly 38,000 for this matinee game on Independence Day, and the weather was perfect — but the home team had little to cheer about.