TORONTO – The Nationals’ season-opening schedule, with four straight matchups against likely contenders, didn’t look kind on paper. It hasn’t looked kind in practice, either.

The Nats needed a win Sunday to avoid getting swept by the Phillies. They found themselves right back in the same position today against the Blue Jays, with perhaps their first favorable pitching matchup of the young season to hold their hats on.

That matchup didn’t even help. The Nationals couldn’t touch fill-in Toronto starter Easton Lucas, while MacKenzie Gore couldn’t duplicate his efforts from an Opening Day gem. The end result: a lackluster 4-2 loss and a demoralizing three-game sweep at Rogers Centre.

"The at-bats have to get better early in games," manager Davey Martinez said. "We talk about scoring first and trying to get on the starters early. And it just hasn't happened. Late in the games, we've been swinging the bats good. But there's nine innings. We've got to come out swinging from the get-go."

One week into a season of promise, the Nats are 1-5. They’ve gotten decent starting pitching. They’ve hit more homers than in recent years. Keibert Ruiz (who recorded another hit today) and CJ Abrams (who homered again today) have looked great. But they need more than that. And they haven’t gotten more. The challenge doesn’t get any easier, with the Diamondbacks and Dodgers coming to D.C. over the next week.

TORONTO – The Nationals are listing Michael Soroka as their scheduled starter for Sunday’s game against the Diamondbacks, suggesting the right-hander won’t have to miss any time after departing his season debut with a biceps cramp.

Soroka came out of Monday night’s game against the Blue Jays after spiking a slider to the first batter he faced in the bottom of the sixth, his 83rd pitch of the outing. He immediately looked to the dugout and began clinching his fist.

Whatever initial fears the Nats may have had about a potentially serious injury were alleviated when Soroka told them his right biceps muscle cramped on that final pitch, and he didn’t want to take any chances trying to go any further in the game.

He expressed cautious optimism afterward the injury was nothing serious, with manual tests performed by the club’s medical staff revealing no issues. He did acknowledge he would need to throw off a bullpen mound first before knowing for certain he would be fine to make his next scheduled start.

Soroka wasn’t planning to throw off a mound today, merely to play catch in the outfield at Rogers Centre prior to the Nats’ series finale. If everything went well, he would likely throw his bullpen session in D.C. on Thursday (an off-day for the team) or Friday (prior to the series opener against Arizona).

TORONTO – For the second time already in this young season, the Nationals find themselves needing a win to avoid a series sweep. They managed to do it Sunday against the Phillies. Now they need to do it again against the Blue Jays.

The good news: MacKenzie Gore is on the mound, looking to pick up right where he left off Opening Day. The lefty was utterly dominant that afternoon, striking out 13 over six scoreless innings of one-hit ball. Most impressively, Gore issued zero walks and kept his pitch count to a mere 93 even with all those strikeouts. He needs to bring that same approach to this outing against a good Toronto lineup.

The Nationals also need more offense than they’ve been getting, especially early in the game. They’ll be facing an unknown in Easton Lucas, a 28-year-old left-hander with a 9.82 ERA in 14 career major league appearances, all of them out of the bullpen. Lucas isn’t likely to pitch deep into this game, so it could wind up as more of a bullpen game for the Blue Jays. Regardless, now would be an opportune time for the Nats to string some hits together and finally score runs in bunches.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at TORONTO BLUE JAYS
Where: Rogers Centre
Gametime: 3:07 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, 87.7 FM (Spanish), MLB.com
Weather: Indoors

NATIONALS
SS CJ Abrams
2B Amed Rosario
C Keibert Ruiz
LF James Wood
1B Nathaniel Lowe
DH Josh Bell
RF Alex Call
3B Paul DeJong
CF Dylan Crews

TORONTO – He singled. He doubled. He stole a base. He doubled again, this time driving in the tying run. He was diving all around second base, in one instance making one of the best defensive plays of his career.

CJ Abrams was everywhere Tuesday night. And though the Nationals ultimately lost 5-3 to the Blue Jays, it wasn’t for lack of effort by their dynamic shortstop, who had his best all-around game of the young season.

“He’s been doing really well,” manager Davey Martinez said. “I’m happy because he’s hitting, but I’m also happy because he’s playing really good defense right now. He made some really good plays today.”

Yes, even on a night in which he went 3-for-4 with two extra-base hits, Abrams’ glovework stood out above all else. He found himself diving to make several plays at shortstop, none of them more impressive than his sixth-inning robbery of Will Wagner’s sure base hit up the middle.

On the play, Abrams dived to his left to snag the ball well to the right side of second base. Then he hopped to his feet and fired to first just in time to get Wagner. The Blue Jays challenged the call at first base, but replays were inconclusive and the call stood, much to the Nats’ delight.

TORONTO – A Nationals lineup that had been having a devil of a time scoring runs since arriving north of the border finally found a way to scratch out a few clutch hits, turning a sleepy game at Rogers Centre into a tight contest late.

Now it was up to a beleaguered Nats bullpen to keep this game against the Blue Jays tied and give that lineup another shot at plating the go-ahead run.

That proved too much to ask on this Tuesday night in Toronto. Jose A. Ferrer, tasked with completing two innings of relief, gave up a two-out, two-run single to Bo Bichette in the bottom of the eighth, the decisive runs in a disheartening 5-3 loss.

"At the end of the day, it is a game of inches," Trevor Williams said. "We executed what we could. The guys were laying it all out on the line behind me. On defense, we had a lot of diving plays, a lot of really close plays where guys were leaving their feet. You chalk it up to one of those games where they beat us by inches today."

The Nationals fell to 1-4 on the young season and for the second time in a week will need to win a series finale to avoid a three-game sweep. They did it Sunday against the Phillies behind Mitchell Parker. They’ll ask MacKenzie Gore to lead the way Wednesday afternoon.

TORONTO – Davey Martinez insists he planned to give Dylan Crews the night off all along. True or not, the benching comes at an appropriate time for the slumping rookie, who is still seeking his first hit of the 2025 season.

So for the Nationals’ game tonight against the Blue Jays, it’s Alex Call in right field and batting eighth, not Crews.

“Honestly, this was kind of pre-planned coming into the series,” Martinez said. “Look, it’s hard to play this game for 162 days, and I want to get everyone involved. I wanted to get Alex in there today. But it kind of worked out to give Dylan a little bit of a mental break today, get him off his feet.”

It’s been a difficult opening week for Crews, the highly touted rookie who enjoyed a good spring and looked poised to get his season started on the right foot. He’s 0-for-15 through four games, striking out 10 times (including one stretch of eight consecutive at-bats Saturday and Sunday).

Crews did make solid contact Monday, driving a ball 399 feet to the base of the wall in center field, a hit that carried an expected batting average of .820 but was nevertheless caught by Toronto’s Nathan Lukes. That one swing, though, is an anomaly during an otherwise rough start for the 23-year-old.

TORONTO – The Nationals have done some things well through their first four games, but not enough things well. Which is why they enter tonight’s contest with a 1-3 record, in search of a win before things really turn upside down on them. Their best path to making that happen? More offense.

Though they’ve actually hit for power so far, with eight homers through four games (fifth most in the majors), they’re not scoring runs the old fashioned way. They’re batting just .121 (4-for-33) with runners in scoring position (fifth worst in the majors). So while the big swings have been nice, a few more clutch hits would be even nicer.

They’ll try to solve that problem tonight against Blue Jays ace José Berríos, who had a rough one on Opening Day. The Orioles got to the right-hander for six runs and nine hits (three of them homers) in five innings.

Trevor Williams makes his season debut as the Nats’ fifth starter. The veteran hopes to prove last year was no fluke, when he finished with a 2.03 ERA and 1.035 WHIP in 13 starts despite missing more than three months with an elbow strain. Williams’ task: Keep the ball down in the zone and keep Toronto’s hitters from getting the ball in the air.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at TORONTO BLUE JAYS
Where: Rogers Centre
Gametime: 7:07 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, 87.7 FM (Spanish), MLB.com
Weather: Indoors

TORONTO – CJ Abrams knew the situation when he stepped to the plate with one out in the top of the sixth. The gigantic scoreboard in center field at Rogers Centre can’t be ignored altogether, and the zero in the Nationals’ hit column was right there in plain sight.

Abrams knew Bowden Francis was no-hitting the Nats to that point. He also knew it would do no good to let that fact creep too deep into his mind.

“I don’t want to think about that at the plate,” he said. “I just want to get a good pitch to hit.”

Abrams did get a good pitch to hit, a 1-1 changeup from Francis that stayed up and over the plate enough to ripe for the taking. And when he proceeded to launch that pitch over the right field wall, Francis’ no-hit bid was over in style.

“The at-bats before, I kind of swung at his pitch,” Abrams said. “I was a little early on the ones I swung at. So I wanted to go to left field, and I got a changeup and I got to pull it.”

TORONTO – They didn’t make their season-opening rotation plans with this in mind, but the fact Michael Soroka’s debut with the Nationals came in his home country was a happy byproduct, something everyone had looked forward to for weeks.

"He's from here. He gets to pitch his first game for the Nats here in Toronto. It's awesome," manager Davey Martinez said of the Canadian right-hander (who is from Calgary). "Long time coming. He's worked hard this whole spring to get himself ready. He hasn't started in a while, but he's excited and we're excited to see him go out there and compete."

That Soroka’s homecoming wound end abruptly in the bottom of the sixth, the 27-year-old waking off the mound alongside a trainer clenching his fist after an errant pitch, turned the whole affair sour.

The Nationals lost to the Blue Jays, 5-2, in their first road game of the season. They also feared they lost their biggest offseason pitching acquisition, putting added strain on a rotation that pitched extremely well over the weekend but is suddenly razor-thin in the depth department. By night's end, there was a more encouraging outlook, with Soroka merely dealing with a biceps cramp and not something more significant.

"I think we'll be OK," he said. "It's just one those things you don't want to feel, and not something that's worth (pitching) through, especially at that point in the game and at this point in the season."

TORONTO – Keibert Ruiz is behind the plate for the Nationals tonight, his fourth straight start to begin the season.

As much as Davey Martinez suggested he might try to give his workhorse starting catcher a few more days off this year, Ruiz’s early production has not only kept him in the lineup. It has bumped him up the lineup.

After batting seventh in each of the Nats’ first two games against the Phillies, Ruiz moved up to the cleanup spot for Sunday’s series finale. And now he’s batting third tonight in the series opener against the Blue Jays.

“He’s getting a chance to hit third today,” Martinez said, not exactly committing to this look long-term. “I wanted to break up our lefties, because (the Blue Jays) do have three left-handed relievers in their bullpen. But he’s swinging the bat well.”

That’s an understatement. On the heels of a miserable 2024 in which he slashed .229/.260/.359, Ruiz homered in each of this season’s first two games, once from the left side of the plate, once from the right. He added another hit and scored two runs Sunday, leaving him 5-for-10 with a double, two homers, three RBIs and a 1.745 OPS to date.

TORONTO – The Nationals’ first road trip of 2025 takes them north of the border for their biannual series at Rogers Centre, longtime home of the Blue Jays. The current wind chill here in 38 degrees (Fahrenheit, not Celsius). Fortunately, the roof is closed and will remain closed.

The guy on the mound tonight isn’t bothered by cold temperatures or metric conversions. Michael Soroka is from Calgary, so his Nats debut is sort of a homecoming for him, even if we’re clear on the other side of the country from his hometown. Soroka looked very good most of the spring before stumbling in his final tune-up start. The Nationals are banking on the right-hander to be a stabilizing force in their rotation. We’ll get our first real look at him tonight against a Blue Jays lineup that boasts a formidable 1-2 punch in Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Anthony Santander.

The Nats lineup, which surprisingly outhomered the Phillies 6-5 in the opening series, will now try to take aim at the hitter-friendly dimensions here. They face an unfamiliar foe in Toronto right-hander Bowden Francis, who went 8-5 with a 3.30 ERA in his first full big league season. Only four members of the current Nationals roster have ever faced Francis before, and only Nathaniel Lowe has more than three plate appearances against him.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at TORONTO BLUE JAYS
Where: Rogers Centre
Gametime: 7:07 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, 87.7 FM (Spanish), MLB.com
Weather: Indoors

NATIONALS
SS CJ Abrams
LF James Wood
C Keibert Ruiz
1B Nathaniel Lowe
DH Josh Bell
2B Luis García Jr.
3B Paul DeJong
RF Dylan Crews
CF Jacob Young

As he watched from the dugout Thursday afternoon as MacKenzie Gore carved up the Phillies with one of the most dominant pitching performances in Opening Day history, Mitchell Parker could’ve felt intimidated. Instead, he felt emboldened.

“I said after MacKenzie’s, seeing the guys do that, it’s contagious,” Parker said. “Everybody wants to keep it rolling. It’s contagious on the whole pitching staff. It’s awesome.”

Whether it was contagious or merely quality pitching by all three of their starters, the Nationals’ rotation was electric this weekend. Gore set the bar awfully high with six innings of scoreless, one-hit, zero-walk, 13-strikeout ball. Jake Irvin followed him up with five gutsy innings of two-run ball. And then Parker finished it off with 6 1/3 scoreless innings to win Sunday’s series finale.

Sure, the Nats only won once in three tries against Philadelphia, but the two losses sure weren’t the fault of their starters. They combined to surrender a grand total of two runs over 17 1/3 innings, striking out 20 while walking only four.

That 1.04 ERA was second-best in the majors through the weekend, trailing only – get this – the White Sox, who did not allow an earned run in three games against the Angels.

Josh Bell and Nathaniel Lowe have understood the assignment from the moment the Nationals acquired them. Yes, they were brought here to do multiple things, but the most important thing was to hit the ball in the air with authority.

It took a few days and more than a few swings to get there, but the big boys in the middle of the lineup got there this afternoon. Behind Bell’s three-run homer and Lowe’s two-run blast, the Nats coasted to a 5-1 victory over the Phillies, avoiding a demoralizing weekend sweep.

Thanks to 6 1/3 scoreless innings from Mitchell Parker and some much-needed, lockdown work from a beleaguered bullpen, the Nationals emerged from their season-opening weekend with one win, boosting clubhouse spirits as they prepare to head north of the border for this week’s interleague series in Toronto.

"It's promising, because we were in position to win all three games against a perennial contender," Lowe said. "We just need to execute, take that as a reminder going forward and have a good series in Toronto."

Parker joined MacKenzie Gore and Jake Irvin in holding down the Phillies lineup for five-plus innings. Bell and Lowe supplied the offensive fireworks to give their team the lead for the third straight game. And unlike the previous two, the Nats bullpen this time finished the job.

Dylan Crews may be young, but he’s played baseball at a high level long enough to know how not to make a big deal out of one bad game, especially one this early in the season.

“It’s the second game,” the Nationals rookie said. “There’s a whole lot of games left. We’re just going to keep stacking these days, put it in the past and keep looking forward.”

Crews’ second game of the season, though, was about as bad as they get at the plate. He opened Saturday’s ballgame against the Phillies with a brilliant play in right field. But he then proceeded to go 0-for-5 with five strikeouts, the at-bats progressively getting worse as the afternoon progressed.

Crews was caught looking in each of his first two at-bats, with plenty of credit going to Phillies left-hander Jesús Luzardo, who painted the corner with a 98 mph fastball in the bottom of the first and then a slider in the bottom of the third. His subsequent three at-bats, though, each lasted only three pitches, the first against Luzardo, the latter two against relievers who exploited his overaggressive approach and got him swinging.

“They’re pounding him a lot with fastballs in, and a lot of sliders down and away,” manager Davey Martinez said. “Yesterday, Luzardo got him to think in and then went hard away. Some of those pitches – I looked at them last night – are tough to hit. They were right on the line.”

The last position the Nationals wanted to find themselves in today is the one they’re in, needing a win over the Phillies to avoid an 0-3 start to their season. They certainly had a chance to win Thursday’s opener before falling in 10 innings. And they briefly had a chance to win Saturday’s game, until the bullpen gate swung open in the sixth and turned a 2-2 game into an absolute mess.

We’ll have to see how the bullpen shakes out today. The best thing the Nats could do to help their case would be to score a good number of runs themselves and take some pressure off the pitching staff. The good news: They’ve hit four homers through two games, two of them off the bat of Keibert Ruiz. The bad news: They’re 3-for-21 with runners in scoring position. That has got to improve.

The challenge today is a stiff one against the Phillies’ Aaron Nola, who has been very good in these matchups in recent seasons. In nine starts against the Nationals since 2022, the right-hander is 4-1 with a 1.70 ERA.

The Nats got a dominant start from MacKenzie Gore on Opening Day and a solid start from Jake Irvin on Saturday. They’ll hope for more that today from Mitchell Parker, who actually gets the third game of the season even though he’s technically the No. 5 starter. Davey Martinez wanted another lefty against the lefty-heavy Philadelphia lineup, so Parker gets the call. He faced the Phillies once as a rookie, and it did not go well: nine runs and 10 hits in only three innings of work.

PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES at WASHINGTON NATIONALS
Where: Nationals Park
Gametime: 1:35 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, 87.7 FM (Spanish), MLB.com
Weather: Mostly cloudy, 76 degrees, wind 13 mph out to center field

Jake Irvin had gutted his way through five innings of two-run ball. Keibert Ruiz had blasted his second homer in as many games to get his season off to a rousing start. Game 2 of 162 was knotted up, and now the Nationals had to place their faith in a relief corps that entered the season as a major question mark and only reinforced those concerns on Opening Day.

As he did Thursday, Davey Martinez entrusted key moments in the game to Colin Poche and Lucas Sims, two experienced big leaguers who nonetheless were still available in February at bargain prices. And as was the case in the opener, the result was tough to watch for the locals.

Poche and Sims combined to give up five runs while recording only one out during a torturous top of the sixth that turned another tight ballgame against the Phillies into another lopsided loss, this one by the count of 11-6.

It made for an agonizing afternoon for many in the bipartisan crowd of 38,446 (the largest second-home-game crowd in club history). Not just because it ruined this game. But because it felt way too much like Thursday’s game, a 7-3 loss in 10 innings.

"You can't walk eight, nine guys in a game and expect to win," Martinez said. "We've got to throw strikes, pound the zone like we normally do. You walk guys, give free passes with a team like that? You're going to get beat. They're going to score a lot of runs."

Luis García Jr. was the Nationals’ surprise No. 3 hitter on Opening Day. Perhaps more surprising is the fact he’s not even in the lineup for Game No. 2.

With left-hander Jesús Luzardo on the mound for the Phillies, García is on the bench this afternoon, with Amed Rosario instead starting at second base and batting fifth.

“It’s early,” manager Davey Martinez explained. “I want to try to get everybody in there, try to get some at-bats to some of these guys. And the reason why we signed Rosario is because he hits lefties really well. So we’ll give him some at-bats today.

García often sat last season against lefties, though he started to get more opportunities later during his breakthrough season. Even so, the 24-year-old was far more effective against right-handers (.796 OPS) than lefties (.641).

Rosario, on the other hand, owns a career .798 OPS vs. left-handers, not to mention a .298 batting average. The Nationals signed the 29-year-old utilityman to a major league deal over the winter, envisioning him as a part-time second baseman who can also play third base, shortstop and the outfield if needed.

After the hullabaloo of Opening Day, after the much-needed rest of an off-day, the actual grind of the 162-game season begins today. The Nationals and Phillies meet in game two of the opening series, and it’s the debut of the Nats’ new City Connect uniforms.

MacKenzie Gore dominated the Phillies’ potent lineup Thursday. You probably can’t as for the same from Jake Irvin in his season debut, but the Nationals do need the right-hander to be on point. He had an excellent spring, until his final start, in which his fastball lost several ticks. Irvin insisted he felt fine physically that day, but we haven’t had a chance to see him since. (He was supposed to pitch Monday’s exhibition finale against the Orioles before that game was rained out.) So keep an eye on him in the first couple innings today, especially the velocity readings. Is he in the low-90s or the mid-90s?

The Nationals lineup sees a familiar left-hander today in the form of Jesús Luzardo, the long-ago organizational prospect who has since faced his original team many times as a member of the Marlins. Now he’s in Philly, going up against some hitters he’s got a book on. One of those hitters, Luis García Jr., is just 2-for-16 in his career against Luzardo. Amed Rosario, meanwhile, is 3-for-8 with a double and a triple. Hence, the different look at second base today. Don’t be surprised, though, if García comes off the bench to pinch-hit against a righty at some point.  

UPDATE: Trea Turner was scratched from the Phillies' lineup with back spasms. Edmundo Sosa will now start at shortstop.

PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES at WASHINGTON NATIONALS
Where: Nationals Park
Gametime: 4:05 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, 87.7 FM (Spanish), MLB.com
Weather: Mostly cloudy, 83 degrees, wind 11 mph out to center field

If the Nationals had to pick only one player off the roster who most needs to get his season off to a positive start, Keibert Ruiz would reside at the top of almost every list.

After a miserable 2024 season, the young catcher knows he must be better in 2025. And the road to better starts with a good opening month, giving him a chance to set the bar from the outset and not feel like he’s facing an uphill climb right away like he did a year ago.

So consider what Ruiz did Thursday during the Nats’ Opening Day loss to the Phillies a critical first step in the right direction.

“It’s awesome,” manager Davey Martinez said. “He works so hard, over the winter, during spring. He really wants to get off to a good start. My big thing with him is not to put that much pressure on him. Just go out there and play. He did the work. Now just go out there and have fun and play the game. He did that today.”

Ruiz opened his Opening Day by throwing out his first baserunner of the season. Maybe Kyle Schwarber isn’t the biggest threat to steal a base, but when the big Philadelphia designated hitter decided to try to swipe second in the top of the second, Ruiz was ready and fired a strike to nab him.

Whether anyone outside – or even inside – Washington believes it, the Nationals themselves believe they’re ready to take the next critical step in their long rebuild and compete head-to-head with the top three teams in perhaps baseball’s toughest division.

Consider today’s Opening Day extra-inning thriller a first message sent by this talented, young squad, which saw its new ace overwhelm a star-studded Phillies lineup and several key members of their own lineup deliver in key spots late in the game.

Now, they just need to learn how to finish the job and walk away victorious.

Alas, that wasn’t to be on this otherwise glorious late afternoon. Alec Bohm’s two-out, two-run double off Colin Poche and J.T. Realmuto’s two-run triple off Eduardo Salazar in the top of the 10th gave the Phillies the lead for good in a seesaw game, the Nationals ultimately falling 7-3 before a sellout crowd of 41,231 that desperately wanted reason to celebrate at day’s end but was forced to trudge home disappointed.

"It's not the result we wanted, obviously," said second baseman Luis García Jr., via interpreter Kenny Diaz. "But we battled. We continued to battle throughout, and we battled to the end. That's all we can ever ask for."