Umpires:
HP: Gary Cederstrom. 1B: Lance Barksdale. 2B: Toby Basner. 3B: Alan Porter.
Weather:
71 degrees, partly cloudy.
Wind: 1
mph, In from LF.
T: 2:31.
Att:
27,920. [with a lot fewer actually in the stands]
Complete-game
shutouts are an increasingly endangered species in baseball, dominated as it is
by bullpens and pitch counts. Through Saturday, there were only 33 by National
League pitchers during 2014, so I feel fortunate to have seen two of the three
produced this season by Nats pitchers – Tanner Roark’s gem in April and Doug Fister’s
effort this afternoon.
Fister
yielded harmless singles to Miami second baseman Donovan Solano in the first
and fourth, and hit catcher Jarrod Saltalamacchia to lead off the eighth, with
none of the runners making it as far as second base. We gave Fister a standing
ovation when he finished the 8th just in case, although since he
hadn’t hit the 100-pitch mark yet we hoped that he would be back for the 9th.
Things got interesting in the final frame, when with two outs Solano sliced a
ball just inside the foul line into right field for a triple. Casey McGehee
then lined a shot that looked destined to be an RBI single to right, but
Asdrubal Cabrera made a leaping grab to snag the ball and preserve the shutout.
The Nats
gave Fister all the runs he would need in the first inning, starting with a
one-out homer by Anthony Rendon. They added a second run later that inning on a
LaRoche single, Desmond double, and a passed ball. They wasted chances in the
second and third against Marlins starter Jarred Cosart, getting five walks but
not being able to manage even a single hit. They finally nicked Cosart for
another run in the fifth, when walks to Zimmerman and Desmond were followed by
a Cabrera RBI single. Fister helped himself in the bottom of the sixth, lining
a leadoff double off hard-throwing Miami reliever Sam Dyson and eventually
scoring on a two-out Zimmerman single.
The Nats
played flawless ball, despite this being the third game in a set of
back-to-back day-night doubleheaders. Needing one win to clinch home-field
advantage through the National League playoffs, Matt Williams went with his A
team in the afternoon game, sitting only Jayson Werth (Zimmerman was in left
with Harper in right) and Wilson Ramos.
Section
130, Row M, Seat 1 – A couple of weeks ago, I decided to trade in my ticket for
the Wednesday night game with the Mets, and to upgrade to a lower-level seat.
Starting earlier this month, you can now pick a particular location when
getting single-game seats, so I found an aisle seat in Section 130 just beyond first base, about a
dozen rows back from the field. (Oddly enough, this was only one section away
from where we were sitting for Roark’s shutout.) In hindsight, the exchange was a great choice, as the Wednesday night
game wound up being rained out, and there was still some rain during Thursday
afternoon’s makeup. Friday’s weather, on the other hand, was fantastic. I got
to the Shady Grove Metro station in plenty of time to get a parking space, and
ate lunch at Nando’s prior to walking over to the park, where I later took advantage
of junk-food specials – $1 for a Cyclone popsicle and $2 for a bag of Cracker
Jack. (Ironically, my Cracker Jack prize was a Phillies sticker.)
