Mandatory Credit: Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports
The Washington Nationals got back into town from their road trip at about 6 a.m. Friday morning and had to play the Milwaukee Brewers 13 hours later. The Nats were out of synch. They committed two errors, the pitchers gave up 10 runs, the hitters didn’t contribute, and all of that added up to a 10-3 Nationals loss in the first game of the homestand.
It wasn’t all doom and gloom. Trea Turner got called up and made his Nationals debut. The crowd was excited and wanted to get a look at Turner on the field. Everyone got to see the speed that Turner brings to the game when he almost beat out a dinky ball he hit to short for a base hit. He was called out, and the call was upheld on appeal but it was very close.
Gio Gonzalez was pitching fine until he took a ball off his ankle hit by Jonathan Lucroy in the fifth inning. He stayed in the game, but gave up three runs after that, putting the Nats into a four run deficit from which they did not recover.
Max Scherzer got the opportunity to pinch hit, an opportunity for which apparently he has been lobbying. He made contact with the ball, but was thrown out at first. At least he didn’t strike out.
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