washingtonnationals Page 7 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Wonderteen Juan Soto Homers On First Pitch Of First MLB Start
Nineteen-year-old Nationals outfielder Juan Soto became the youngest position player to start in the majors since 2012 tonight, and he immediately proved his worth. On the very first ball that he saw off Padres pitcher Robbie Erlin, Soto crushed a three-run oppo dinger 422 feet into left, earning a ...
Max Scherzer Is A Fire-Breathing Dragon
The marquee pitching matchup of the day had former Cy Young winners Max Scherzer and Jake Arrieta pitching the rubber match of the Phillies-Nationals series. Arrieta was fine—he allowed a run on two hits and two walks in six innings—but Mad Max was downright historic:...
Pedro Florimon Ruins The Nationals With Slick Glove Fake-Out
Phillies starter Vince Velasquez and four relievers held a banged-up and disappointing Nationals lineup to just two hits in Saturday’s 3-1 Phillies victory. The Nats engineered eight walks in the game, but left eight runners on base and were 0-3 with runners in scoring position. They did, however, p...
Bryce Harper Makes For One Badass Leadoff Hitter
New Nationals manager Dave Martinez moved Bryce Harper to the leadoff spot on May 1, with the Nationals sitting at a disappointing 13-16 on the season and mired in an offensive slump that saw the team produce more than four runs in a game just once over its previous nine games....
The Mets Previewed A Dark, Mets-y Future Last Night
The New York Mets entered Monday night’s game against the Nationals with the National League’s best record, its sturdiest bullpen, and a way-too-early-to-matter 36 percent chance of winning their division. They carried a 6-1 lead into the eighth, then sent their fans home feeling awful thanks to the...
Bryce Harper Delivers Sweet, Sweet Broken-Bat Home Run
Bryce Harper entered today with a major-league leading seven home runs, and he didn’t waste any time in boosting that total tonight. In the first inning of this evening’s game against the New York Mets, he took a Jacob deGrom fastball deep—and broke his bat at the same time, leaving him clutching ju...
A Squeeze! We've Got A Squeeze Here, Folks
The Nats—who’ve been playing like the friggin’ Nots to start this season—came into Saturday at risk of getting swept at home by the Colorado Rockies after getting dropped Thursday and Friday in crappy, dispiriting performances. Desperate times, my friends:...
Anthony Rendon Lays Into Umpire Marty Foster For Erratic Strike Zone And Quick Temper
Marty Foster’s ejection of Anthony Rendon Saturday was puzzling enough that it immediately overshadowed the circumstances of the pitch that caused the conflict. Let’s get to that: it looked inside to Rendon; it looked inside on the broadcast; it, in fact, was inside—Foster’s strike zone was a little...
Angry Baby Umpire Ejects Anthony Rendon For Absolutely Nothing
Anthony Rendon had never been ejected from a game in the majors headed into Saturday’s home game against the Mets. That streak—640 regular season games—came to an end in the bottom of the third inning, after Rendon struck out looking to end the inning, and was blatantly disrespectful to umpire Marty...
Call Bryce Harper Overrated At Your Own Peril
Bryce Harper hit the dick off two baseballs during yesterday’s 6-5 win over the Reds, and the second dinger was a particular source of embarrassment for one of the Cincinnati fans in attendance....
Matt Adams's Tater-Mashing Power Is In Mid-Season Form
Matt Adams joined the Nationals this offseason after arguably his best season as a hitter in 2017, when he produced a career-high .841 OPS and 20 dingers in 131 games split between the Cardinals and Braves. With Ryan Zimmerman’s availability never all that secure and kick-ass bench masher Adam Lind ...
How Old Is Edwin Jackson?
Driving to every major league ballpark that Edwin Jackson has called home, one by one, in order, would require driving for more than 16,000 miles to reach 11 stadiums. (Toronto not included on this hypothetical road trip; he was on the Blue Jays’ roster for a few hours between trades at the 2011 dea...
Nationals Hire Cubs Bench Coach Dave Martinez To Replace Dusty Baker
The Washington Nationals have reportedly hired Davey Martinez, a man with no previous managerial experience, to replace Dusty Baker. ...
MLB Admits That Nationals Got Screwed By Botched Call In Game 5 Of NLDS
MLB chief baseball officer Joe Torre confirmed today that the controversial passed-ball call during Max Scherzer’s meltdown in Game 5 of the NLDS was, in fact, wrong....
Ray Knight Charged With Assault And Battery
Two-time All-Star, 1986 World Series MVP, and current Washington Nationals TV analyst Ray Knight was arrested for assault and battery over the weekend, according to the Fairfax County Police Department. Police say that officers were called to Knight’s home at 4:00 a.m. on Sunday after an argument be...
The Nationals Fired Dusty Baker Because They're Just Thrashing Around
For a nice cathartic kick, I recommend USA Today’s Bob Nightengale’s take on the Nationals’ dumb but depressingly predictable firing of Dusty Baker, done via telephone Friday:...
Max Scherzer Did His Job And It Didn't Matter
If you want to get a feel for just how cruel the game of baseball was to Max Scherzer last night, watch a little bit of his postgame interview, in which he stood shell-shocked in front of his locker and tried to explain how a fifth inning that started with two quick outs ended with four runs crossin...
Washington Nationals Lose Playoff Series, Again
The Nationals continued their existence-long stretch of playoff futility tonight, falling to the Cubs in an NLDS Game 5 that combined a shaky Gio Gonzalez start, a blown lead, a historically weird inning-long meltdown, some very intense replay review and a failed attempt at a comeback before finally...
MLB Rulebook Suggests Umps Botched Call As <em></em>Nationals Unlock Special Version Of Two-Out Hell
There are seven different ways to allow a baserunner, and the Nationals engaged in far too many of them in a nightmarish fifth inning that saw their 4-3 lead turn into a 7-4 deficit. ...
Stephen Strasburg Was Electric
Stephen Strasburg wasn’t supposed to pitch today. After a ridiculous 24-hour news cycle in which he was alternately said to be unable to start because he pitched a Tuesday bullpen session, to have actually pitched that Tuesday bullpen session on Monday, to really only be unable to start because he w...