From Thursday to Friday, the Washington Nationals got a do-over of sorts. With identical tie scores of 2-2 entering the 9th inning at Nationals Park, a disastrous 9th and 10th innings on Thursday went 180° on Friday to a walk-off winner.
Thursday was set-up for Luis Garcia Jr. to be the hero, and Garcia hit an oppo single to send Friday’s hero, Alex Call, from first base to third base with one out to allow Juan Yepez to hit the game-tying sac fly un the bottom of the 8th inning to knot the game at 2-2.
In a battle of young starters featuring Mitchell Parker for the Nationals, and Jose Soriano for the Angels — runs were hard to come by. Parker went 6⅓ innings with no earnies and no walks — however two unearned runs scored on a Parker throwing error. Soriano only gave up one run in his 6.0 innings.
The game was in the hands of the respective bullpens, and the Nats bullpen was just better — and led by Kyle Finnegan in a redemption game of 2.0 shutout innings. Ben Joyce, the reliever with the 104.7 mph fastball, was bested by Call for the walk-off single to score Jacob Young.
— manager Davey Martinez said
“The boys wanted it. They wanted it tonight. You could tell. They didn’t want another extra innings — and not win. They wanted to celebrate.”
This 3-2 extra inning’s win, clearly felt good to watch the boys shower Call with a Gatorade bath. With three hits in this game, Call is batting .415 on the season with a 1.082 OPS.
With Anthony Rendon returning to Nationals Park for the first time since 2019, he was showered with love from the crowd and a pregame video tribute. Call put on a Rendon-esque type of game to lead his team to victory.
