As we wrote in the gamer article, the Nationals had 6 players that started tonight that either were on the Opening Day bench or in Syracuse, and they tallied up a 6-1 win tonight. The Nationals swept the Orioles in the 2-game home series behind a Joe Ross 7 1/3 inning one-run gem and some 1st inning offense by the Nats’ players.
Joe Ross had 12 strikeouts and no walks while only giving up 4 hits and 1 run. Ross had great movement on the slider and 2-seam fastball tonight. He was not pushing the velocity in the game which also helped as his maximum velo was only 93.1 and he averaged 91.3 on the sinker. Ross only threw one change-up which was the pitch he had been working on, but he once again threw his 2-speed slider that acted like a change-up.
The Nats’ bullpen has now been unscored upon in 12 of their last 15 games as Oliver Perez and Blake Treinen got the last 5 outs in the game.
Trea Turner had 2 infield hits to go with his 3 hits on the evening and 3 stolen bases. Bryce Harper had 3 infield hits of which one was a double on a check swing grounder against the shift. Stephen Drew had 2 hits and the only home run on the evening.
The defensive play of the game was the rangiest play you may have seen by a shortstop in Nationals history as Trea Turner went 30 feet to his glove side to dive behind the 2nd base bag to throw out Mark Trumbo.
The game moved quickly and finished in under 3 hours in front of a near sold-out crowd of 37,833 fans that saw quite the game.
