Umpires:
HP: Larry Vanover. 1B: Angel Hernandez. 2B: Adrian Johnson. 3B: Paul Nauert.
Weather:
94 degrees, partly cloudy.
Wind: 5
mph, In from RF.
T: 3:42.
Att:
25,453.
The Nats
started their two-game miniseries with Houston on Tuesday night with a 6-5
victory that took 3:41 to play. On Wednesday, they again won 6-5, in a game
that actually took one minute longer to complete.
Other than
that, the scripts were not particularly similar. On Tuesday, the Nats took a
6-1 lead into the eighth and then survived a 4-run implosion by Tyler Clippard.
Starter Tanner Roark didn’t have his best stuff and only lasted five innings,
but pitched out of a bases-loaded-no-out jam in the fourth inning, only
allowing one run to score.
On
Wednesday, the Nats successfully played small ball to score single runs in the
first and third without the benefit of an extra base hit, relying on walks,
singles, a sac fly by Adam LaRoche, and stolen bases. (Over the first five
innings, the Nats swiped five bags without being caught off the Feldman-Castro Houston
battery.)
Gio
Gonzalez, making his first start since returning from the DL, walked the
leadoff batter in each of the first two innings (and, after I silently
complained about that, allowed a double to the first batter in the top of the
third). He managed to survive unscathed so far, thanks in part to a
first-inning double play and a second-inning caught stealing, but was not so
fortunate in the fourth. He walked the leadoff batter again, and wound up with
the same bases-loaded-no-outs situation that Roark faced the previous evening.
Gonzalez, however, managed to allow 4 runs before the inning ended – the Astros
second 4-run frame of the series. He allowed the leadoff man to reach again in
the fifth, but got out of the inning before Matt Williams mercifully pulled the
plug.
The Nats
cut the lead in half in the bottom of the sixth on Espinosa’s second bunt
single of the night, a successful sacrifice by Ross Detweiler, and a double by
Denard Span, who unfortunately made the final out trying to stretch the hit
into a triple. They gave the run right back in the top of the seventh, however,
as Detweiler walked the leadoff hitter (*&%$@#!), who eventually scored on
a wild pitch.
Perhaps
inspired by the 7th-inning-stretch rendition of “Dancing in the
Streets” (so whatever happened to “Take on Me”?), the Nats dented three Houston
relievers to take the lead for good in the bottom of the inning, starting with
a Rendon home run and ending with a pinch-hit sac fly by Nate McLouth. Clippard
redeemed himself with a 1-2-3 eighth, and Soriano again took care of business
in the ninth for his 15th save. By that time, however, the crowd had
really dwindled – our section was about as empty as I’ve ever seen it during a
game.
Our
upper-deck seats weren’t too uncomfortable despite the heat, especially after
the sun went down. I took advantage of the “Dollar Dogs” special for dinner,
and later bought a lemonade after finishing my bottle of water. Metro did not
distinguish themselves in the afternoon; there were fewer inbound Red Line
trains than usual (I did overhear a garbled announcement about a medical
emergency somewhere), so from Dupont Circle on my car was so packed that I don’t
think anyone was actually able to get on at Metro Center. I just missed a Green
Line train at Gallery Place, and the schedule sign indicated that the next one
wouldn’t arrive for another 10 minutes, with 3 intervening Yellow Line trains.
Needless to say, the second leg of my trip was sardine-like as well. I just
breathed a sigh of relief that the pressure of those trying to get on at L’Enfant
Plaza or Waterfront didn’t force them to offload the train. Fortunately, the
trip back was relatively uneventful, although due to the molasses-like pace of
the game I didn’t arrive at Shady Grove until midnight.
