Umpires:
HP: Mark Carlson. 1B: Tim Welke. 2B: Todd Tichenor. 3B: Clint Fagan.
Weather:
78 degrees, cloudy.
Wind: 0
mph, None.
T: 2:54.
Att:
39,473.
Along with
St. Louis, Atlanta had been the Nats’ kryptonite since October of 2012, beating
them out for the 2013 NL East title and dominating them in head-to-head play.
The trend continued in 2014, with the Braves winning 7 of the first 8
encounters, including a disheartening loss Friday night where the Nats tied the
game in the bottom of the ninth with a two-run Anthony Rendon homer off the
normally-untouchable Craig Kimbrel but went on to lose in extra innings. Things
looked up on Saturday, when the Nats won behind a clutch pitching performance
by Doug Fister, so with a victory on Sunday the Nats could at least split the
4-game series.
The Nats
took a 2-0 lead off Ervin Santana in the bottom of the first on a walk, two
singles and a sac fly. Santana and Nats starter Tanner Roark then traded zeroes
for the next several innings. In the top of the fifth, with two outs and
Santana on first, Braves second baseman Tommy La Stella worked a walk off Roark
with a 12-pitch at-bat, including 5 full-count foul balls. This effort seemed
to take a lot out of both Roark and Santana, who had to head for second on each
of the 3-2 pitches. After their first-inning outburst, the Nats had had little
success against Santana, consistently swinging and missing at his offspeed
stuff, but they plated their third run in the bottom of the fifth on a Sandy
Leon single, a two-strike sacrifice bunt by Roark, and a double by Denard Span.
Roark was
named the player of the game, but the award could well have been shared by all
four Nats pitchers who appeared. Craig Stammen relieved Roark with two on and
one out in the top of the sixth and retired all 5 batters he faced. Clippard
pitched a 1-2-3 eighth. We thought Soriano might need a day off after pitching
4 of the previous 5 games, but he wound up putting an exclamation point on the
win by striking the side out in the ninth to earn the save.
No traffic
issues either way, with a little bit less of a backup on the Legion Bridge than
usual. Went with a bowl of Cincinnati chili from Hard Times.
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