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

Nats drop second in row by 1, lose to the Astros

The Nats dropped their second in a row tonight as they could not capitalize on a two run lead they established in the first inning. While they got ahead on the talented Roy Oswalt, when e settled in he caught fire stopping any chance the Nats had on significantly building on the lead. Zimmerman did his best, in vintage style making the plays in the field and with the bat…but it wasn’t enough for the Red, White, and Blue.

A days rest goes a long way

Lucky Jarmes had called for, I think we all deep down felt it was a good idea too. Zimmerman was struggling and couldn’t get anything done at the plate. He was the focal point of young franchise that was struggling, he wanted to be the reason the team turned it around, he wanted to save HIS team. In baseball, as in life, sometimes the best thing you can do is just take a step back…as Zimmerman did by taking the night off for the first time in 200 plus games.

It’s seemed to have worked…since taking the day off and recieving the day of rest before the Nats road trip, Zimmerman has gone 5 for 9 with two homers and a double. Tonight Zimmerman carried his team driving in every run for the Nats who inevitably came up short. While it may be rough watching the Nats drop two in a row, it sure as hell is good to see our number three hitter hit like he can.

Odalis Perez

Odalis has had trouble in his career staying consistent. He broke onto the scene in 2002 as a talented 25 year old lefty starter for the Dodgers. He posted great numbers; 15 wins, 3.00 ERA 0.99 WHIP, only 38 walks in over 200 innings, but to this day he hasn’t been able to come anywhere close to matching that break out year. In all of his starts along the way he’s had solid starts, got settled, and lost focus. He’s had to battle weight problems and has not been able to turn it around on or off the field. His laziness seems to set in when he starts to feel comfortable, and it is often what can turn a good start for Perez into a lousy finish.

Perez had a couple flashes of laziness today which scares me. First he falls apart on the mound in the 4rth inning with a combination of what must have been a 500 foot home run, hit batters, and an RBI single allowed to Roy Oswalt. The next inning, after ripping the ball to the pitcher, Perez forgot out run out the groundball. This may just be an anomaly. Perez could be having a bad day, ate a bad hot dog, or could even have just been distracted by a hot chick behind home plate…whatever the reason lets hope its one of the latter rather then a regression into the tactics of Perez that have made him a journeyman as opposed to a staple in a teams pitching rotation.

Game Notes:

Wily Mo Pena was waved home in 7th off of a hard hit single to center by Felipe Lopez. He never had a chance, which isn’t really his fault, he was waved in. It’s rough seeing a rally end at home plate, especially when it would have been the go ahead run. What’s more frustrating is when your linebacker of an outfielder slides feet first into home on a throw that beat him by 5 steps. Come on Wily Mo…be a man…take out grandpa Ausmus behind home…it’s your only chance of scoring and there is NO WAY it will hurt you as much as it does him…show some fight for your team for god sake.

Christian Guzman botched a couple plays with poor hands and just plain slow feet. Is he really still effective at short stop? More to come on this in the mail bag...

Box Score

Photo's courtesy of AP/Dave Einsel

"Folks you can all exhale, the losing streak is over"

You said it Don. Finally on Sunday at home, the Nats busted their 9 game losing streak by sneaking one past the Atlanta Braves. It wasn’t pretty though; the Nats got some luck with Glavine leaving after only 17 pitches in the first inning, they nearly blew a 5 run lead and were only a few feet away from loss number 10.


The Game:
The Nats bats, or at least their eyes came out early today. With Glavine’s early control problems and early departure the Nats got on the board quickly. Guzman started the game with a ripped double off the wall, fallowed by a beautiful bunt for a hit by Milledge giving the Nats a first and third situation with no outs. An infield single by Zimmerman scored Guzman and so the least exciting rally in baseballs young season started. Several walked in runs, or runs scored from bases loaded double plays found the Nats up 5-0.
Tim Redding came out dealing today (5IP 6H 3ER). Through the first five innings he was basically unhittable allowing only three hits. His 12-6 curveball at times seemed dominant, he worked the count well and didn’t make any mistakes until the 6th. The 6th inning however was Redding’s undoing, after only 99 pitches he had to come out of the ball game fallowing a single to Escobar, a homer to Chipper and a double off the very top of the wall to Teixeira. The game quickly went from a 5-0 easy win to a 5-4 nail biter.
Ray King(the only lefty in the Nats pen), came on to retire Kotsay to stop the bleeding. A combination of Rivera, Ayala, Cordero and Rauch led to the ultimate victory for the Nats.

Pleasant Returns (Kinda):
Today’s game saw a rough return to Wily Mo Pena in right. Pena struck out three times, made a costly error in right, and the only contribution he gave to the team was grounding into a double play with the bases loaded that happened to drive in a run.
The Chief Chad Cordero returned for a tough save situation in his first day back as well. It was originally proposed that Chad wouldn’t return immediately as the closer but instead would come back in set-up situations until he could complete his rehabilitation. However he was thrown onto the mound at Nats Park to face the 9-1-2 hitters with a one run lead to try and end a 9 game skid. It started well enough, retiring the first two batters but he quickly walked the bases loaded and was replaced by Rauch who came on and got the final out.

Who Let Lastings Out?
Lastings Milledge had himself a day. Three for three with a walk, bunt single, base hit, a double and a stolen base. It’s days like these for the young outfielder that show promise to the future of this franchise. Does every dog have his day? Sure. Does one good day mean anything for the future of any player? No. But the fact that Milledge came out and had himself a big day in a game when his team needed to snap a 9 game losing streak showed for the first time that he could save the day for this city. Here’s to hoping there are many many more instances of Lasting saving the day.

Injuries:
Glavine's Injury is interesting. In his 22 year career Glavine has never gone on the disabled list. He has only twice left the game before recording an out, one was this afternoon, and the other 19 years ago. It will be interesting to see how he bounces back and how quickly he returns.

Paul Lo Duca injured his hand after being hit by a pitch and will be day to day fallowing some tests.

Box Score

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Estrada, Wily Mo, and The Chief rejoin the club as Bergman and Flores are sent to Columbus

Johnny Estrada, Wily Mo Pena and Chad Cordero were all absent during the Nats 9 game losing streak. Bowden and Acta are hoping these now healthy veterans can help turn things around. Whether this is supposed to serve as a motivator or a legitimate baseball move isn’t clear, but it seems to be helping a little considering the Nats are up right now 5-0 in the 6th…scratch that….as I type this it is now 5-2 in the 6th with a Chipper homer.

Wily Mo Pena- Wily Mo will bring tremendous power to a line up that has been missing it so far this season. It will also keep the players cool with how often he will fan. Regardless of whose spot he may be taking, Wily Mo is young, talented, and a full season should be interesting to watch.

Chad Cordero- Having Cordero back on the club will obviously be a positive for the team. Of course if he pitches well the trade rumors will come out again, I know the Tigers have expressed interest with him. Whether or not to trade him we will deal with when the time comes, but for now its good to have the Chief back at the end of the bullpen totem poll.

Johnny Estrada- I’m still confused why he’s anywhere in the Nats system. The Nationals picked him up with worries of losing Lo Duca in the Mitchell Report fall out, which we now know wont happen. As a result we have three catchers in our system; former but over the hill all stars Paul Lo Duca and Johnny Estrada, and the young, possibly future all star Jesus Flores. I got a chance to watch Estrada at a Columbus Clippers game earlier this week, he is overweight and unproductive, and right now he is blocking major league playing time for a future major player in our franchise.

The Dearly Demoted- As evident in his last outing against the Braves Bergman was struggling. He started the season in the rotation, and was thrown into an almost surprise relief appearance yesterday afternoon. Whether Bergman is deserving of this demotion so early in the season or if he is simply a scapegoat for Bowden is up to interpretation, the bottom line however is Cordero is much more valuable coming out of the pen then Bergman.
Jesus Flores going down is frustrating. It was a gamble last year taking a young catcher and putting him in the big leagues for a whole season in order to keep him with accordance to Rule 5. It paid off though as Flores exceeded expectations and played very competently where many felt he was in over his head. For Flores this season it is really an argument in philosophy. Some feel giving him an entire year to get experience playing every day in Columbus will be more valuable to him then sitting in the majors. Others believe letting him start 30% of the games behind Lo Duca in Washington with the possibility to move into the starting role with an inevitable injury may help him become more acclimated to the major league game. It looks however that the Nats are putting their chips on the first philosophy, we’ll see how he does in Columbus.

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