Over the past 18 months, the Washington Nationals have been devastated, harassed and embarrassed by the St. Louis Cardinals. Friday, for one night at Nationals Park, the script reversed. The Nationals played crisp baseball and stared down their tormenters until, at the most crucial moment, the Cardinals cracked. For one night, the bully stepped on a rake.
Before their 3-1 victory over the Cardinals – and even during both the game’s go-ahead rally and the night’s defining escape – the Nationals may have wondered what it would take to beat St. Louis. The Cardinals treated every meeting like they were filming an instructional video: relentless at the plate, smart on the bases, flawless in the field, oppressive on the mound.
For once, the Cardinals broke character. After Gio Gonzalez and Michael Wacha locked horns for seven innings, the Nationals broke a 1-1 tie when Wacha unfurled a wild pitch with the bases loaded and Ian Desmond made a bold dash home. Yadier Molina, the game’s best catcher, flipped the ball past Wacha as he covered home plate. Just as Wacha threatened to squirm out of the bases-loaded, no-out jam, the Nationals finally got to watch the other team self-combust.
Once the Nationals wrested the lead, they held on for dear life. Tyler Clippard put the first two hitters he faced on base and made 26 pitches to record one out. Drew Storen, victimized so infamously in the game that started the Cardinals’ streak against the Nationals, relieved him with two runners in scoring position and one out. Five pitches later, with Matt Holliday and Allen Craig in his wake, Storen slapped his glove and walked off the field with the Nationals’ two-run lead preserved.
Rafael Soriano worked the ninth for his fourth save, and the Nationals snapped an eight-game losing streak to the Cardinals that began in Game 5 of the 2012 National League Division Series. The Nationals will throw Jordan Zimmermann and Stephen Strasburg at Lance Lynn and Shelby Miller over the weekend with a chance to win the series.
Gonzalez, another Game 5 goat, supplied seven sterling innings. After the Cardinals used three straight hits to score their only run in the fourth, Gonzalez retired the final 11 batters he faced, striking out four. Overall, Gonzalez struck out seven, walked one and yielded only four hits.
Gonzalez ensured Anthony Rendon’s third-inning solo homer would be enough to keep the score tied. In the seventh inning, the Nationals grabbed the lead.
Adam LaRoche sparked the go-ahead really with a bloop single to left field. Desmond continued the surge by shooting a single to right. Danny Espinosa tried to push them both into scoring position with a textbook bunt toward third base. Wacha scampered off the mound but rather than taking the sure out, he spun and tried to snare LaRoche at third. The ball popped out of Matt Carpenter’s glove, an error on Carpenter that loaded the bases with no outs.
For a moment, the Cardinals played like they usually do, as if the natural order of things dictated that everything works okay for them in the end. Wacha struck out Nate McLouth, who dropped to 2-for-26 on the season. Jose Lobaton hit a dribbler that Wacha handled and flicked home for a force out.
With Gonzalez’s spot in the order coming up, Manager Matt Williams sent recent call-up Zach Walters to pinch hit. He flailed at Wacha’s first change-up as if Wacha had presented him with a miracle of modern science. Walters stayed patient for two balls, and Wacha uncorked an 87-mph change in the dirt.
The ball scooted away, to Molina’s right, and Desmond decided immediately: he bolted.
The Nationals have been criticized for their aggressive base running under Matt Williams, but here was an ideal moment for it, and it worked brilliantly. Desmond slid home, into Wacha’s legs, as Molina’s misfire skipped into the dugout. Espinosa scored, too, and the Nationals had taken a two-run lead.
Clippard immediately endangered it. Jon Jay greeted him with a double, and Carpenter followed with a walk. Jhonny Peralta ended a 12-pitch at-bat with a laser back at Clippard, which he fielded for an out.
With Clippard on fumes and Holliday lumbering to the plate, Williams called on Storen. Storen fired his first pitch 95 mph and down the middle of the plate, but it tailed inside enough for Holliday to hit off the trademark and pop up. Craig hit a one-hopper to shortstop, and the Nationals had escaped.
Last September, in their first meeting with the 6-foot-6 right-hander, Wacha carried a no-hitter into the ninth, recorded two outs and induced a chopper over the mound from Ryan Zimmerman. The tapper, mercifully for the Nationals and cruelly for the Cardinals, turned into an infield single.
The first time through their order, Wacha carved through Nationals hitters with rapid ease, threatening to reprise his dominance. Espinosa reached on a drag bunt, but otherwise Wacha overpowered the Nationals with high fastballs and a smattering of changeups.
Wacha then confronted the Nationals hitter who, at the moment, is least likely to be cowed by a flame-throwing pitcher. Wacha twirled a first-pitch curveball to Rendon, and the hanger did not fool him. Rendon clobbered it into the visitors’ bullpen, which raised his OPS over .950. While playing error-free defense at both second and third, Rendon has been the Nationals’ best hitter.
With Rendon’s third homer, the Nationals had scored first for just the seventh time in 17 games. Did it seem like the Nationals had been playing from behind all season? That’s because they had. Entering Friday night, the Nationals had played 146 innings and had held the lead after only 53. Even when they avoided the strain of losing, the stress of catching up weighed on them.
Their rare early lead Friday wouldn’t last long. In the top of the fourth, the Cardinals struck with three consecutive opposite-field hits, the kind of pesky batting that makes them so difficult to beat. Craig roped a 3-1 fastball off the right field wall. Molina poked a first-pitch fastball to right. Mark Ellis lined a 2-1 fastball to shallow right, and the ball skidded under Jayson Werth’s sliding attempt. Craig trotted home, and the Cardinals had tied the score at 1.