The Washington Nationals are in the midst of very long stretch of games in which they play games for 17 straight days overall, and as such have needed a ton of different pitchers. They have had to shuffle their bullpen repeatedly in order to compensate for poor pitching across the board, and yet another pitcher made their season debut last night.
As for the game itself, the Nationals dropped a 9-4 decision to the Atlanta Braves, as the bullpen once again faltered and blew a lead. After Jake Irvin cruised through the first 5.0 innings, he was met with some trouble to begin the 6th inning and was pulled quickly.
PJ Poulin came in and immediately blew the lead, retiring just 1 batter but allowed a hit, a walk, and 2 earned runs. Things would only get worse as Brad Lord let up a pair of runs over 2.2 innings before giving away to the newest member of the 2026 bullpen, Julian Fernandez.
The righty came in and made it through a full inning, surrendering 2 hits, 2 walks, and 2 earned runs while striking out just 1 batter in his first inning of the season. He was acquired from the Los Angeles off waivers late last season, and he began this season with AAA Rochester, where he had pitched decently.
He had appeared in 9 games for the Red Wings, converting 1 of 2 save chances and recording 4 holds as well. Across the 7.2 innings he pitched down there, he allowed 6 hits and 5 walks while striking out 8 batters, which all lead to him allowing 4 earned runs for a 4.70 ERA and 1.41 WHIP.
He took the place of lefty Andrew Alvarez, who had pitched great on Sunday in the series finale against the San Francisco Giants. He piggybacked off Miles Mikolas, who followed up opener PJ Poulin out of the bullpen. All of this was in an effort to get more out of Mikolas, whose performance this year has been nothing short of disastrous.
Mikolas turned around and fired his best outing of the year so far, and Alvarez also pitched very well in relief. But since Alvarez is on a starting pitching timeline of throwing every 5 days, he was not needed as much as Fernandez would be over the next few games, hence why the Nationals have continued to shuffle their pitchers at the major league level.
What did you think of Julian Fernandez' first game in 2026 for the Nationals? As always, please let me know on X, @DCBerk.
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