The Washington Nationals are headed into Game No. 140 with a bullpen game, and it comes after a weekend that showed just how fast one decision can snowball into the next.
Sunday’s loss was a gut punch in the ninth inning, finished off when an airmail throw with two outs sailed into the dugout. That came on the heels of Saturday’s blown save, a game Washington still managed to win on a walk-off.
But even in victory, the bullpen took a hit. The way Saturday was managed left the Nats short later, and the ripple effect showed up again a day later.
A lot of the frustration circles back to one simple move in the seventh inning on Saturday: Blake Butera never upgraded the outfield defense. Jacob Young was on the bench, which meant Washington had its best defender - and the third-best defensive outfielder in MLB - available. Instead, Butera went with Tom Cosgrove, a pitch-to-contact reliever, and left Dylan Crews in center field.
That choice proved costly. Crews got to the ball that led to four runs scoring, but he couldn’t finish the play; the ball clanked off his wrist after he dove too far for it.
Young is arguably the best defender in baseball at outfield walls, and if he catches that ball, it’s three outs, the Nationals move on to the eighth with a 4-0 lead, Brad Lord handles the final two innings like he did, and Washington wins without extra innings. In that version of events, Orlando Ribalta never has to pitch Saturday and could have been available Sunday as the closer after Clayton Beeter threw 2.0 scoreless innings.
That’s a chain of “what ifs,” sure. But the point is that Saturday’s mistake fed directly into Sunday’s mess.
By the time the ninth inning arrived, the “A” bullpen had already been burned. Crews at least got something out of the moment - his first career walk-off hit on Saturday - but the broader result was a bullpen that was worn down when Washington needed it most.
The same theme showed up again on Sunday. With a runner on third and one out, Butera pulled Young for a pinch-hitter.
Young can actually hit against right-handed pitchers in Hi Lev, but the move sent Pinckney into center field. The call-up then got too aggressive, missed his cut-off man, and the ball ended up in the dugout, allowing two runs to score and turning a tied game with two outs into a 4-2 deficit.
Young likely wouldn’t have made that same throw. Still, it wasn’t all on Pinckney - Jorbit Vivas didn’t block the throw, and Cosgrove didn’t back it up.
After the game, Butera made his position clear: ❝… My job is to do the best job I possibly can with the team we have - and the bullpen we currently have. … We can’t keep giving up these leads.❞
The loss snapped Washington’s modest three-game winning streak. There are 22 games left in the regular season, and the math is simple from here: the Nats need eight more wins to avoid a 90-loss season, and 17-5 to finish with a winning record.
Even with the late-game frustration, the offense has been carrying its share of the load. Washington has scored the second-most runs in MLB this season with 720, good for 5.20 runs per game.
The pitching staff has allowed 4.67 earned runs per game, and the difference has come down to those unearned runs created by errors. The run differential is there in the numbers.
Now the Nationals move into another bullpen game, with the charting and the defensive metrics offering a clearer picture of what this roster has - and what it doesn’t.
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