The Nationals have turned a rough patch into a steady run, and they’ll try to keep it rolling in a two-game set against the Braves. Washington is coming off a bounce-back win after absorbing a tough defeat, then handing Miami a blow-save-loss the same way the Marlins did to the Nats on Sunday. That put the Nationals at 4-1 over their last five and pulled them even with their 2025 win total, with 22 games still left on the schedule.
There’s still plenty hanging over the final stretch. Since the 2019 World Series season, Washington has not finished with more than 71 wins.
Getting past that mark would require six more victories. With 21 games remaining in the 2026 season, the Nats need seven more wins just to get to 73 and avoid a 90-loss season.
If they want to finish above .500, they’d have to go 16-5 the rest of the way.
A big part of the recent surge has been Daylen Lile, who kept his hot streak going last night after earning Player of the Week honors for last week. Lile was also the 2025 Player of the Month for September, and the hope is that he can keep matching those September 2025 numbers.
Manager Blake Butera likes what he’s seeing. After yesterday’s game, he said:
❝Man, we’d be in a really good spot if this is the real Daylen, and I do believe it is. No doubt, he’s hot right now, but I think this version of Daylen.
The way he’s taking his at-bats right now, and the way he’s laying off pitches and waiting until he gets something in his zone, we all know how good his swing is. We all know how athletic he is.
The ability to drive the baseball when he’s hunting a certain pitch and a location. He’s not missing it right now.❞
Washington also made its two Sept. 1 roster additions, bringing up corner infielder Yohandy Morales and left-hander Jared Simpson. Both were Rule-5 eligible, and Morales is set to start at DH tonight. The active roster now sits at 28 players.
Another name worth watching is reliever Erik Tolman, who is doing things the team says it has never seen before. His story, as told on MLB Network Radio today, includes tragedy, a medical miracle, and a long stretch of perseverance in baseball. Tolman said he was yanking his fastball, and that he recently corrected it with some new drills.
The numbers paint a fairly strong offensive picture for Washington. The Nationals rank second in MLB in runs scored this season with 726, which works out to 5.21 runs per game.
The pitching staff has allowed 4.66 earned runs per game, and the gap has been shaped by the unearned runs tied to errors. Overall, the Nats have a plus-19 run differential.
Butera’s bullpen chart is also in focus as the season enters its final stretch, and the FanGraphs WAR chart has enough of a sample now to start pointing toward full-season value. The OAA defense stat is also beginning to show what this Nationals team has - and what it doesn’t.
In Other News...
Nationals Give Jared Simpson His Shot As Roster Change Turns Costly
September call-ups always bring a little roster churn, and this one came with a familiar bit of late-season bad luck for Washington. The Nationals selected the contracts of pitcher Jared Simpson and Yohandy Morales, giving both players a path to the big leagues as the organization starts to take a longer look at some younger pieces. To make room, the club had to clear a 40-man spot, and the move came at the expense of Drew Millas, whose season has been interrupted by injury.
Simpsons arrival is the more immediate baseball story for Washington. The 26-year-old has moved between Double-A and Triple-A this season while showing the kind of strikeout and ground-ball numbers that can get a pitcher noticed, and now he gets his first major league opportunity. For the Nationals, it is a chance to see whether his performance can translate in the majors, even if the first assignment figures to be in relief and the bigger question is how he fits into the bullpen picture going forward. [Read more 🡒]
Nationals Win Put One Growing Standard Front And Center
A win can cover a lot of ground for a young club, but the Nationals still walked away with a reminder that standards matter as much as the scoreboard. Blake Butera has been reinforcing that message since taking over, and it showed up in a recent game when a mistake on a routine pop-up led to a quick benching. For a team trying to build habits as much as results, the point was hard to miss: effort and discipline are part of the expectation every night.
The backdrop made the lesson even clearer because Daylen Lile is starting to look more like the player Washington hoped he could be after working through a slump. His bat gave the lineup a real lift, and his recent progress has been one of the more encouraging signs for the Nationals. In that sense, the night offered both sides of the same coin for Buteras group, a glimpse of the upside when things are going well and a firm reminder that the margin for lapses is still thin. [Read more 🡒]
Yohandy Morales Just Gave Nationals Fans Another Young Bat To Watch
Yohandy Morales arrived in the majors and wasted little time giving Nationals fans a reason to keep watching. In his MLB debut, the young infielder announced himself with a home run for his first major league hit, joining a rare bit of club history in a 9-5 Washington win.
Morales became the eighth player in Nationals history to homer for his first career hit, and the second to do it this season, which only adds to the sense that the organization may have found another bat worth tracking closely. He also came up a triple shy of the cycle, leaving just enough unfinished business to make his next few starts feel a little more interesting. [Read more 🡒]