The Nationals are down to their last 26 games, and Wednesday night was the kind of mess that makes the math feel heavier. Washington got blown open in a 13-1 loss, a game that started with promise in the bullpen plan and quickly spun out once Will Dion and Luis Perales were forced into the spotlight.
Matt Waldron had delivered a zero in his 2.0 innings the night before, but this one went sideways fast. Dion was tagged for two two-run homers and left with Washington staring at a 4-1 hole. After that, the real trouble arrived when Blake Butera’s pregame plan unraveled with Perales.
CJ Abrams was back in the lineup on Monday and DH’d for two nights, and he was supposed to move back to shortstop on Wednesday before the lineup changed again and sent him back to DH. That was one of several moving parts in a game where the Nationals never found much rhythm.
Butera’s postgame comments were the bigger flashpoint. He was blunt about how his club looked, and he didn’t hide from his own role in the criticism.
“Bad. Really bad.
I thought we were pretty flat. I thought we didn’t play as hard as we normally do.
Um, I know the score got to where it got to - I’m not sure if we played a little harder if that would have changed anything. But at the end of the day, like, we have to come out expecting - and playing our butts off every single [game].
I felt like we were short tonight.”
He also pointed to Colorado’s effort as the standard. “Credit to Colorado.
You look at Cole Carrigg hit a groundball to second base, and he is absolutely flying down the line - that’s how you play baseball. And they did that [in that game] and I didn’t see the same from us.”
That broad criticism didn’t land without pushback from the details of the game itself. In the ninth inning, when the Nationals were buried by a 13-1 score, Jacob Young dove for a ball and Dylan Crews raced a double into a triple.
Not everyone mailed it in. Andres Chaparro, though, was the name that stood out most for the wrong reasons.
He was a triple shy of the cycle and accounted for most of Washington’s offense, but he also cost the Nats a run when he jogged out a fly ball that was lost in the twilight. Jose Tena, who reached on what should have been a routine double, might have scored an RBI if Chaparro had been running harder.
The loss also sharpened the bigger picture. Washington’s season has 26 games left, and the team needs one more win to avoid 100 losses.
To stay out of the 90-loss range, it needs 11 more victories. And if the Nationals want to finish above .500, they’d have to go 20-6 the rest of the way.
The numbers around the club tell their own story. Washington leads MLB with 697 runs scored, a 5.16 runs-per-game pace. The pitching staff has allowed 4.72 earned runs per game, and the run differential sits at plus-6, with unearned runs from errors doing plenty of damage along the way.
Butera’s bullpen chart is part of the conversation now, too, as the sample size grows and the FanGraphs WAR numbers become more useful for a full-season read. The OAA defense stat is also starting to show more clearly what the Nationals have - and what they don’t.
In Other News...
Nationals First Rounder Is Giving Fans A Reason To Dream Early
Chris Hacopian is off to a promising start in High-A Wilmington, and the early returns are exactly the sort of thing that can get a fan base thinking ahead. The Nationals 2026 first-round pick has already shown a mature approach at the plate, posting a .263/.391/.342 line through 12 games with eight walks, eight strikeouts and a pair of stolen bases, while also showing some pop with his first professional home run.
For Washington, the intrigue goes beyond a hot first month in the minors. Hacopian is still years from the majors, but his status matters in a broader roster picture because a possible 2027 MLB lockout has already become part of the conversation around player development and flexibility. Players outside the 40-man roster would remain in the minors, which is one reason young prospects like Hacopian are being watched so closely as the organization builds for the future. [Read more 🡒]
Nationals Collapse Now Has CJ Abrams At The Center Of It
Since the trade deadline, the Nationals have drifted from competitive to ragged, with the rotation and the mood around the club both taking a hit. Outside of Cade Cavalli starts, the team has had a hard time finding much of anything to hang onto, and the slide has put a spotlight on the everyday core to set a better tone for a club that suddenly looks short on answers.
CJ Abrams has become one of the players at the center of that conversation, not because of one isolated issue but because the shortstop has been asked to adjust while the losses keep piling up. The larger concern in Washington is no longer just results on the field. It is whether the group can restore some edge and accountability before the season slips any further out of reach. [Read more 🡒]
Rockies Rout Just Pushed A Slumping Team To A Public Breaking Point
An early lead quickly turned into another ugly afternoon for the Nationals, who were beaten by the Rockies and watched the game swing hard in the wrong direction. Washingtons August has been defined by inconsistency on the mound and a lineup thinned by injuries, and this one fit the pattern far too neatly after the club could not hold onto the opening momentum.
Blake Buteras postgame comments made clear how much the loss stood out even against that backdrop. The manager publicly questioned the teams effort and performance, a sharp acknowledgment from a club that has spent much of the month searching for something sturdier than flashes and frustration. With the skid continuing, the bigger concern is no longer just the score from one game but how quickly this group can stop the slide from becoming its identity. [Read more 🡒]