The Home for Washington Nationals Game Talk

The Washington Nationals had several opportunities to take the lead yesterday in Miami. It wasn’t an issue with the Nats scoring runs, it was more of a problem of the Nats’ pitching that allowed the Marlins to score their season-high of seven runs. It was another one-run loss for the Nationals. This goes back to our previous articles on the value of one singular run.

Today’s series finale will send the Nationals to Pittsburgh either one game under .500 or three games under .500. On the mound for the Nationals will be their Opening Day starter, MacKenzie Gore, as the Marlins go with RHP Cal Quantrill.

The Washington Nationals started the season at 1-6. Teams will have those stretches in a long season. But when you start your season that way, negativity will creep into your fan base. As bad as that start was, the Nats can completely turn around that record to 6-1 with a win today. These Nats are on a 5-1 hot streak capped off by a Nathaniel Lowe hit reminiscent of Michael Jordan meets Jayson Werth moment if they did a collaboration of the flu game and Werth’s epic 13-pitch at-bat in the 2012 NLDS.

From a scheduling nightmare in the first dozen games of the season, the Washington Nationals had to face in NL succession the past three NL World Series teams plus the tough Toronto team in their home stadium. The Nats finished at 5-7 to take us to this 10 day road trip in Miami.

The team arrived Wednesday night just before midnight from their American Airlines AA9721 charter jet, and the players bonded over day-off activities and a dinner with teammates. This is a work trip, and the work begins today.

Let’s get philosophical. Time changes all. The difference a day makes. The difference a week makes. A week ago, the Washington Nationals were 1-6, and the fans were getting restless early. We warned that manager Dave Martinez‘s Washington Nationals teams during his previous 7-years have always started slow. One day can change everything in baseball, and now the Nationals are on a 4-1 hot streak heading to play a weekend series against the Marlins.

Baseball is a game of curveballs — figuratively and literally. You never know what will happen in a baseball game. Brad Lord, a former Home Depot seasonal worker, started his first MLB game — and his first strikeout victim of his career was Shohei Ohtani, the best player in the game of baseball. Lord would face Ohtani again, and strike him out. Lord was on a strict pitch count and went 3.0 innings of shutout baseball to help his Washington Nationals’ team to clinch a series win after taking the first two games from the reigning World Series champion Dodgers.

The morning discussion on MLB Network between Eduardo Perez and former-GM, Steve Phillips, was that the Washington Nationals showed “urgency” last night. Yes, manager Dave Martinez went after that Curly W, and it felt like a playoff game for Martinez. If Kyle Finnegan‘s arm is healthy, then all is good as he has thrown 68 pitches the past three days en route to 32-pitches last night to get the final 5-outs of the game.

The Washington Nationals were able to win the past two games against the Diamondbacks to take some positivity into this three game series against the reigning World Series champs. In fact, the Dodgers are at the White House today.