On Friday night, the Washington Nationals won maybe the most bizarre game of the season over their Beltway rival Baltimore Orioles by a score of 4-3. This game really had it all, between Nasim Nuñez almost single-handedly winning it late for the Nationals, a home run robbery by Jacob Young, and an electric game-tying homer by James Wood. Even the Nationals bullpen was absolutely lockdown, something we haven't been used to saying very often in 2025.
But while it was a weird game overall, what might have made it the most bizarre was the statline that Nationals ace MacKenzie Gore had on Friday night. Overall, it was not the best start he's had this season, but he really wasn't extremely awful either.
Despite only being able to go 3.2 innings and firing 70 of his 102 pitches for strikes before giving way to Cole Henry in the 4th inning, Gore did an incredible job of being able to limit the damage from the Baltimore lineup. The fact that he was able to somehow scatter a whopping 10 hits and 2 walks to only allow 2 earned runs was truly an incredible job, but somehow Gore just kept finding a way out of difficult situations.
In fact, as Andrew Golden of the Washington Post noted during the game, at one point, through the first 2 innings, Gore had racked up 5 strikeouts out of his first 6 outs, all of them coming while the Orioles had runners in scoring position. The MLB leader in strikeouts added 9 more to his season total, showcasing his fantastic swing-and-miss ability that has lead to a breakout 2025 season so far that might result in his first All-Star selection.
As for how weird of a start this was for Gore, Spencer Nusbaum from the Washington Post did a little bit of research on Baseball Reference, and searched for pitchers with the criteria of throwing 3.2 innings at most, allowing at least 10 hits, and striking out at least 9 batters. The findings of his search revealed no results for any pitcher in MLB history having ever recorded a statline that fit the criteria, making it a miracle that the Nationals didn't find themselves in a massive deficit following Gore's subpar outing.
This was truly a one-of-a-kind start for Gore, and thankfully for the sake of the team, who only managed 5 hits during the entire game, him being able to limit the damage kept the game close enough for the Nationals to steal the series opener in the Beltway series. While the win was likely enough to distract the masses from the abysmal hitting coach practices of Darnell Coles, the Nationals have a serious problem on the offensive side right now. The Nationals will look to claim a series victory over the Orioles tonight as they will send righty Jake Irvin to the mound against righty Kyle Gibson of Baltimore.
What do you think of MacKenzie Gore's statline from last night? As always, please let me know on X, @DCBerk.