All good things must come to an end. The Nationals winning streak ends at 7 in a row. The Nationals got 6 solid innings from Jacob Turner, and he left the game with a 4-3 lead. Dusty Baker turned to Enny Romero for the 7th inning and he gave up a 2-run home run to surrender the lead, and Blake Treinen gave up 3 more runs in the bottom of the 8th inning. Treinen never looked comfortable and was not finishing some of his pitches. He was lifted for Matt Albers who recorded the final two outs of the 8th inning. Unfortunately on this night, the Nats could not mount one of their exciting comebacks, but they sure tried. The Nats lost 8-4.
The Nationals offense put together a 4-run 6th inning started by a Trea Turner double followed by an Adam Eaton triple and an Anthony Rendon RBI single, and the 6th inning was capped off by Ryan Zimmerman’s 7th home run of the season to make the score at the time 4-1.
The Nationals showed life in the 9th inning as they had 2 men on-base and one out with Bryce Harper representing the tying run if Jose Lobaton could find a way to get on-base. Dusty Baker opted to have Lobaton hit for himself.
Lobaton got a hanging slider right down broadway and couldn’t do much more than a lazy fly to centerfield for the 2nd out of the 9th. Bryce Harper no longer represented the tying run and seemed more interested in getting back to the hotel for sleep. He was first pitch swinging and rolled over a weak grounder to 1st base for the last out of the game.
Until this game, the Washington Nationals had won the first game of every series this season which has been a significant part of the team’s success formula for 2017.
Tomorrow is a new day, and the Nationals need their rest. See you tomorrow.
