Nats take first game of the series, win 5-1

Write up by lucky jarmes:

And So it bounced the Nats way:

That's right. Most of what we(I) have been griping about came around tonight. Two pitchers hunkered down in what started to look like a nearly every game occurrence, a pitchers duel we come out on the bottom of. But it happened. An event that shook my very house with family members jumping for joy. Wily Mo Pena hit a home run. I'm probably making too big of a deal of this, but as I've had two girlfriends since his last, it was pretty big news here.

Things progressed as a tight 1-0 game, with excellent pitching from the Brewers Suppan, and the Nationals persistent Odalis Perez, until the Brew Crew tied it up in hte 5th on a Suppan single off of a poorly placed pitch. Tie game again. Damn.

The next inning was one of rare interest. In the sixth, Nationals fans saw something that they rarely see. A rally of sorts. Breaks. Hits. Baseball being played. Following a F.Lop walk, Guzman hit into a tailor made double play. Or it should have been. J.J Harding simply did not field the ball. Upon scooping it up and gunning to first, Guzman was safe. That's two runners on, in a situation the Nats are often on the losing end of. An interesting thing happened next. The runners where hit it. Zimmerman proceeded to double to the gap in right, scoring F.Lop. It continued as our own lovable lump of meat, Dimitri Young was hit by a pitch to load the bases. The Thrilledge, Lastings, productively grounded out scoring Guzman, and bringing up the Nationals stud catcher Jesus Flores, who proceeded to clear the bases with a double. The four runs were all that the Nats would need to lock this up.

CALLED UP:

That was all that was needed thanks in great part to the bull pen pitching phenomenally. A fresh from the minors Brian Sanches came in the top of the sixth to face the meat of the Brewers line up. He not only pitched well, he dominated. He struck out both Cameron and Braun on beautifully placed splitters and a sweet breaking ball, he let up a crushed hit to Prince Fielder, who managed to stay at first (the weight totaly at first base this point of the game was astronomical,)from which he recovered with another strike out to Corey Hart. It was a beautiful performance for Sanches.
We saw two of the three call ups today. As mentioned above Sanches preformed very well. Langerhans, however, showed true last season form. It was pretty ugly.

GUZMAN WATCH:

Guzman dropped to the .300 point today, after going 0-4. He did play fairly well, however. His ground ball in the 6th paired with a great effort on his part led to the break out inning. Guzman actually hustled.

Box Score

Photos Courtesy of AP/Pablo Martinez