The Nationals had enough pitching to stay in it, but not nearly enough execution to make the most of the night.
Washington fell 3-1 to Colorado, and the game turned into a parade of missed chances after the bullpen did its job. Andrew Alvarez was lifted after 4 2/3 innings with the Nats trailing 3-1, and Brad Lord came on to keep the Rockies quiet the rest of the way. The relief corps posted zeroes from there, but the offense never matched it.
Blake Butera’s first notable call came in the bottom of the fifth. After Jacob Young opened the inning with a double, Colorado immediately went to a left-handed reliever to face CJ Abrams, who struck out.
Butera countered by pinch-hitting right-hander Andres Chaparro for the lefty Abimelec Ortiz. Young then swiped third, setting up a chance to cash in with a productive out, but Chaparro struck out and the inning went nowhere.
That left Butera with Keibert Ruiz, Jose Tena, and Andrew Pinckney on the bench, and the lack of depth mattered with James Wood unavailable.
The sixth inning brought another opening. Daylen Lile started things with a single, and Colorado again turned to a right-hander, Jimmy Herget, to face Brady House.
House drove an outside slider to the deep part of the park, 372 feet to the opposite field, but it died at the wall. In seven other ballparks, it would have been out.
At Nationals Park, it was just a long out. Jorbit Vivas then chased two pitches out of the zone and popped up for the second out.
With two outs and Harry Ford due up, the situation felt manageable for Washington, especially with Nasim Nunez on deck. Ford had been quiet for most of the season, hitting .160 with a .576 OPS since his first two games in Sacramento, and he was just .111 against right-handers overall. The idea, at least on paper, was to get through that spot and reach the seventh with Jacob Young and Abrams lined up behind Nunez.
Instead, Lile was caught stealing second. That erased the inning’s momentum and changed the shape of the order.
Ford led off the seventh and promptly grounded out on the first pitch. Nunez then struck out on three pitches, and Butera made another move by sending Jose Tena up to hit for Jacob Young.
That one was hard to justify. Young had doubled in his previous at-bat and has been Washington’s best hitter in the second half, batting .322 since July 18 to lead the club.
Keibert Ruiz is next at .300. Butera burned Tena in a low-leverage spot, and Tena grounded out weakly on the first pitch.
Abrams was left waiting on deck, and the bench was suddenly down to Ruiz and Pinckney.
Colorado then went to lefty Brennan Bernardino in the eighth for Abrams, and Abrams struck out. Chaparro followed and chased two pitches out of the zone before lining out softly to left.
Dylan Crews singled, giving Lile a chance as the tying run in a left-on-left matchup, but Lile chased strike three in a 2-2 count. Brady House was left stranded on deck.
The Nationals still had a shot in the ninth, down 3-1 with House, Vivas, and Ford due against Jordan Romano. Romano got House and Vivas on groundouts, then walked Ford, which opened the door for Ruiz to pinch-hit for Nunez.
Ruiz got a first-pitch slider right in the middle of the plate and lifted it to center. He barely missed it.
That was the game in a nutshell: a few smart moves, a few puzzling ones, and too many missed chances to cash in. Washington went 0-for-6, and the lone run came early on a Lile home run.
The bullpen gave the Nats a chance. The bats and a handful of decisions never gave them enough.
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