The Braves are once again on a journey to clear .500 after the Naitonals set them back with a pair of wins this week.
The Atlanta Braves are back home now and they’re getting their star player back. While both of those are developments are good, they’ll be coming back home after having lost two in a row to their divisional rivals in the form of the Washington Nationals. They’re also under .500 again. So much for not having to worry about clearing that mark again!
Anyways, it’s obvious that things changed in this matchup once it switched from Cobb County to D.C. — especially as far as pitching was concerned as the Nationals had no problems putting runs on the board in both games that took place. Atlanta couldn’t keep pace at a high enough level and now here we are talking abut them coming home under .500.
Tuesday, May 20
Nationals 5, Braves 3
Spencer Strider’s return to the mound (for real this time, hopefully) wasn’t a fruitful one, as it started rough and never really got too much better for Strider and the Braves afterwards, The Nationals jumped on Strider by scoring three runs in the first inning. The good news is that Atlanta immediately responded with three runs of their own thanks to a Matt Olson home run and RBI doubles from Eli White and Michael Harris II.
However, Dylan Crews went deep on a heater from Strider to make it 4-3 Washington and that ended up proving to be decisive as Atlanta’s lineup was unable to make anything else significant happen from that point forward. Strider’s return to the mound was unspectacular as he finished with only 4.1 innings pitched, four runs allowed on six hits and one run and just three strikeouts. He’s back but he’s not quite back, you know?
Wednesday, May 21
Rainout
The forecast for this one was bad for a while, as the game was called an hour before the first pitch. As such, Wednesday’s pitching matchups moved up to Thursday and this game won’t get made up until the Braves see the Nationals again all the way in September.
Thursday, May 22
Nationals 8, Braves 7
So, “fun” fact: Eight of Atlanta’s past 10 losses this season have been of the one-run variety. Yeah, that’s not so fun at all but I just figured I’d mention it here just to confirm that it’s not just you thinking that — they have lost a bunch of close games lately.
Anyways, the Nationals withstood a Matt Olson-induced 1-0 deficit by responding with a Keibert Ruiz RBI double to tie it up in the first inning before the Nats plated four runs off of AJ Smith-Shawver in the second inning. Atlanta actually came back to tie this one twice — the first time was in the fourth inning when Michael Harris II brought in two runs with a single and then Alex Verdugo induced a bases-loaded walk out of Brad Lord to tie the game up at five.
Washington went back in front by two runs in the bottom half of the fourth and the Braves spent the rest of the evening trying to overturn that deficit. They got one run back in the seventh and then tied it up in the ninth with a Matt Olson RBI double. The game eventually made it to extras and it came down to which team could play ABC baseball better. The Braves squandered their first chance in Manfredball but the Nationals didn’t and as such, they were the ones celebrating once the game was over.
Welp, back to the lab again! The Braves came to D.C. with a winning record and they’re leaving with a losing record after dropping these two contests. Again, they’re coming back home and they’ve got Ronald Acuña Jr. coming back as well. Still, you would’ve liked to have seen the Braves come home with at least one win under their belts in Washington. Instead, we got a disappointing reminder that this Nationals team is not going to just roll over and be cannon fodder for anybody.
Now the Braves are coming home to face a Padres team that’s actually in the midst of an intense struggle as of late. I’d imagine that the Braves would like nothing more than to pay them back for helping to bring the a ton of misery during the early portion of this season but I’d also imagine that the priority for any big league team is to just play well on any given day. Still, the Braves would like to both put this Nationals series on the backburner while also setting the record straight against San Diego and the only way to do that is to win. They were unable to make it happen in Washington but maybe we’ll see some changes in a positive direction as the Braves return home this weekend. We’ll see!