The Nationals mounted a comeback, but came up a run short in a 4-3 loss. The story is the same as the Nationals had one play that turned the game. This time that “one play” came against the opposing pitcher with 2 outs and an 0-2 count and bases loaded — Max Scherzer had Rick Porcello right where he wanted him — and Max threw a fastball inside that Porcello turned on and hit to deep leftfield to clear the bases for a 3-run double. Scherzer knows that he would have had him swinging at a pitch above or below the zone, but Max wanted to blow him away with a heater and missed his target. It was the first at-bat of the entire season for Porcello.
“You’re going to have to ask Max [why he threw the 0-2 fastball],” Dave Martinez said. “I’m sure he had his reasons.”
Scherzer to Porcello fastball — 3-run double
The Nationals clawed back to get this to a 3-2 game with solo home runs from Anthony Rendon and Daniel Murphy, but then Brandon Kintzler gave back a run on a solo shot to make the deficit 4-2. Bryce Harper crushed a pitch in the 8th to make it a 4-3 game which ended up as the final score.
The other story of the game was all the runners the Nats had on-base that were stranded. Not one RISP hit in the game and 10 runners stranded with 6 by Anthony Rendon who also had 2 RISP chances. Soto home runs are great but a RISP hit usually scores a run and keeps an inning going.
Dave Martinez was asked the question about his managing of one run losses.
“I come every day to do my job”, Dave Martinez said in response to the question. “All I can do is give them opportunities to win as many games as possible. We’ve been in every game. You talk about all these one run games. We’ve been in every game. We don’t point fingers around here. We never have. We’re all in this together. They know that. When we go down, we go down together. When we win, we win together.”
This loss was just another frustrating one-run loss where they are 8-16. One-run game results are often credited to the manager or the manager takes the blame depending on whether it was a win or loss. With this loss, the Nationals are only 1-game above .500 at 42-41.
