The Washington Nationals bullpen and the lack of one extra run in the first 9-innings has cost this team several wins in the past three weeks. Hunter Harvey is at the middle of much of the issues in the bullpen as he has gone from one of the best relievers in baseball in April and May to one of the worst in June.
The Nats will look to Mitchell Parker as the stopper and get the Nats back into the win column. The Mets called up Triple-A starter, Christian Scott, who the Triple-A Rochester team just faced less than two weeks ago. James Wood got a good look at him, and this moved Wood up to third in the batting order.
The team is still making two many mistakes, and scoring two or three runs in a game is putting too much pressure on the team where one crucial mistake will be a major problem as we have seen recently.
The Nats made a roster move with bringing back Riley Adams have optioned Drew Millas back to Triple-A. Adams will be the starting catcher for the July 4th game which has an 11am first pitch.
Yesterday, DJ Herz put up another incredible outing to join Stephen Strasburg as the only Nationals pitchers to have at least 10 Ks and 0 walks in two starts among their first six in their career. There are just 12 Nats pitchers who have pitched to a Game Score of 83 or more, and also had a Game Score of 65 or more. Just last week there were some who thought Herz was going to be sent back to Triple-A when Josiah Gray was activated, and now you see that Herz might be the pitcher to stick in the rotation.
As for Gray, manager Dave Martinez said that his right-hander will get an MRI at some point, and we will wait for the results and hope for the best. While that seems odd that the team is going to wait, it seems to portend that Gray won’t be returning any time soon.
The Nationals are big betting underdogs this evening, at +120 to win on the moneyline. That means if you bet $100 you would win $120. Bet $10 and you win $12.00. Remember, this betting line is based a lot on how the bets are made, and the money is coming in for the Mets.
By the way, there are no more days-off going forward until the All-Star break, and this is another 17-games in a row marathon that the Nats just started on Friday. If there are no rain-outs affecting games, the team is set to play 97-games before the All-Star break, and that would leave just 65-games after the All-Star break.
Manager Dave Martinez in yesterday’s game used both Kyle Finnegan and Hunter Harvey and Harvey gave up the tying run in a 2-1 game to send the game to extra inning. Harvey, as you know, had his worst game of the season on Monday. Dylan Floro and Robert Garcia carried the rest of the workload. The team could be without Finnegan, Harvey, and Floro in this game with Jacob Barnes and Derek Law taking key innings.
Here is what the rotation could look like:
- Wednesday: Mitchell Parker vs. Mets
- Thursday: Jake Irvin vs. Mets – July 4
- Friday: Patrick Corbin vs. Cardinals
- Saturday: MacKenzie Gore vs. Cardinals
- Sunday: DJ Herz vs. Cardinals
- Monday: Parker vs. Cardinals
- Tuesday: Irvin vs. Mets
- Wednesday: Corbin vs. Mets
- Thursday: Gore vs. Mets
- Friday: Herz vs. Brewers
- Saturday: Parker vs. Brewers (All-Star Futures’ Game)
- Sunday: Irvin vs. Brewers (MLB Draft)
- All-Star Break (HR Derby)
- All-Star Break (All-Star Game)
- All-Star Break
- All-Star Break
- Friday: TBA vs. Brewers – July 19
Your top Washington Nationals on the FanGraphs’ WAR leaderboard has the two top pitchers as MacKenzie Gore at +2.2, and Jake Irvin at+1.8 WAR. For the position players, CJ Abrams is at +2.1 and Jacob Young at +1.8. In total, 21 Nats’ players are in positive WAR and another eight are at a neutral 0.0 WAR.
“We need to start winning games in regulation, is what we need to do. We’ve got to start hitting a little better. You can’t score two runs, three runs, and expect to win against a team you know is notorious for scoring a bunch of runs. We’ve got to start hitting better.”
— Nats’ manager Davey Martinez said after yesterday’s game
The Nats starting pitchers have a combined ERA of 3.87 and 13th in MLB. The Nats are 13 points from being a Top-10 starting rotation by ERA. Look at those rankings of teams.
Here is how they rank:
No. 5 Starter: Patrick Corbin 5.49
No. 4 Starter: DJ Herz 4.67
No. 3 Starter: MacKenzie Gore 3.47
No. 2 Starter: Mitchell Parker 3.32
No. 1 Starter: Jake Irvin 3.03
Washington Nationals vs. New York Mets
Stadium: Nationals Park, Washington, D.C.
1st Pitch: 6:45 pm EDT
TV: MASN
Radio: 106.7 The Fan radio and via the MLB app; In Spanish on DC 87.7 FM and La Pantera 100.7 FM/1220 AM. On Sirius/XM, tune to Channel 178 for the home broadcast and the road team is online only.
Line-up subject to change (without notice):
TalkNats is Celebrating the 5 and 100 year anniversaries of World Series Wins by providing Game-by-Game Summaries.
Game 86:
The Nationals won on 07/04 at home against the Marlins resulting in a record of 45-41. They won’t drop below .500 the rest of the season. But you knew this already. Box Score / Standings
The Senators lost on 07/17 at home against the St. Louis Browns resulting in a record of 48-38. Box Score / Standings
