ANAHEIM, Calif. – The Nationals pitching staff did an excellent job containing Shohei Ohtani the hitter Monday night. Now we’ll find out how the Nationals lineup fares against Ohtani the pitcher.

It’s the biggest attraction in baseball right now, Ohtani pitching and serving as the Angels DH on the same night. And tonight, we’ll get our first look at that phenomenon when the Japanese right-handed pitcher/left-handed hitter takes the mound before what should be a raucous crowd.

Only one member of the Nats has ever faced Ohtani before: Jeimer Candelario, who went 2-for-9 against him as a member of Tigers. Everyone else will be going in blind but hoping to keep putting the bat on the ball like they’ve done the last four days, both here and in Colorado, and trying to manufacture their way to enough runs to win.

They’ll need another good start from Josiah Gray, who was excellent last time out but suffered a hard-luck 1-0 loss to the Rockies due to a fly ball lost in the sun. The right-hander pitched here last season and fared all right, allowing three runs in 5 1/3 innings and earning the win. He’ll have to keep the ball in the yard to be successful tonight against an Angels lineup that has Anthony Rendon back after the former Nats great was a late scratch Monday with a sore shoulder.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at LOS ANGELES ANGELS
Where: Angel Stadium
Gametime: 9:38 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Partly cloudy, 63 degrees, wind 6 mph out to center field

ANAHEIM, Calif. – Hunter Harvey trotted in from the left field bullpen, and suddenly the decade of injuries and missed opportunities he endured felt worth it.

This was the reason he kept coming back from injury after injury, for a chance to be summoned to pitch in a situation like this: 1-run game, a runner on base, two outs and Mike Trout – one of the best hitters of his generation – at the plate.

“That’s the fun part about being here,” Harvey said. “Trout’s going to be a first-ballot Hall of Famer. Coming into that situation and facing those guys, it’s what you dream of.”

Harvey was able to enjoy the moment even more when he struck out Trout on the sixth pitch of their head-to-head encounter, getting the Angels star with a high, 98 mph fastball. And then he was able to really enjoy the moment after he returned for the bottom of seventh and got through that inning with the Nationals’ lead intact, an inning that began with a three-pitch strikeout of Shohei Ohtani.

“I’ve always been told that good pitching beats good hitting,” Harvey said. “You’ve just got to go right at guys. Can’t give them a chance and can’t fall behind. You’ve just got to attack.”

ANAHEIM, Calif. – Eleven games into the season, we have a pretty good idea what the 2023 Nationals are and what they are not.

They are not going to beat you with home runs. They are not going to trot out a dominant starting pitcher on most nights.

They are, however, going to put the ball in play and probably rack up a good number of singles and the occasional double. They are going to try to manufacture runs in any way possible. And they are going to hope their bullpen can hang on to finish things off.

It may be a narrow path to victory, but it is possible. And when it comes together like it did tonight in a 6-4 victory over the Angels, it actually makes for quite entertaining baseball.

"It's so much fun," first baseman Dominic Smith said. "I feel like that's how we can build a winning culture. That's something that's going to be our team identity. We'll probably have a couple guys in this lineup who will hit 20 home runs, but for the most part, we're going to have to manufacture runs. And this is the way we're going to have to do it."

ANAHEIM, Calif. – Michael Chavis made the Nationals’ Opening Day roster because of his positional versatility, the club wanted to make sure it had another player on its bench who could handle multiple infield positions if needed.

Chavis’ presence is coming in handy tonight, because with both Luis García an Ildemaro Vargas banged up, the 27-year-old is getting the start at second base for the Nats’ series opener against the Angels.

García, who is dealing with tightness in his right hamstring, went through early running drills to test his leg out. He didn’t appear to have any problems, but he also didn’t appear to be running at 100 percent. He’s not in the lineup for the third straight day, though he did participate in batting practice.

Vargas, who jammed his left shoulder making a diving play at second base during the first inning Sunday in Colorado, was able to finish out the game but admitted he was sore and was having trouble reaching for throws. He was set to meet with doctors this afternoon before learning about his availability for the game.

“I got real nervous,” Vargas said, via interpreter Octavio Martinez. “I’ve never felt anything like that on my shoulder. In the moment, I grabbed it and kind of tugged on it. I don’t know if I adjusted it or not, but I gave it a good tug. Today, it’s just stiff.”

ANAHEIM, Calif. – Hello from “The Big A,” where the Nationals will see how they stack up the next three days with the star-studded Angels. With Mike Trout, Shohei Ohtani and Anthony Rendon batting 2-3-4 for the locals, it’s going to be a real challenge. But at least they don’t have to worry about Ohtani pitching until Tuesday.

Patrick Corbin will be tasked with keeping that lineup in check tonight in the series opener. The left-hander still seeks his first quality start of the season. The Nationals obviously would love to get six innings and three or fewer runs out of him tonight.

A Nats lineup that totaled only 17 runs through its first seven games came to life the last three days in Colorado, totaling 23 runs. The question now: Will that carry over into this series, or was that merely a product of Coors Field? They’ll face yet another left-hander tonight in Jose Suarez, remarkably the seventh southpaw they’ve gone up against in their first 11 games.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at LOS ANGELES ANGELS
Where: Angel Stadium
Gametime: 9:38 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Clear, 67 degrees, wind 7 mph out to center field

NATIONALS
LF Alex Call
RF Lane Thomas
3B Jeimer Candelario
DH Joey Meneses
1B Dominic Smith
C Keibert Ruiz
2B Michael Chavis
CF Victor Robles
SS CJ Abrams

DENVER – When he did it in spring training, there were the obvious caveats attached. When he did it through the season’s first week, there was still reason to withhold judgment until the sample size was larger. And even though he continued to do it over the weekend, you still can’t talk about Victor Robles’ early season success without pointing out he just played four games at Coors Field, which can inflate any ballplayer’s offensive numbers.

So, yes, it’s still far too early to declare that Robles has been “fixed” or that his production through 10 games is definitely sustainable. But it’s not hard to look at what the Nationals center fielder is doing and believe that there is some legitimacy to it.

First, there are the cold, hard facts. Robles is batting .387 (12-for-31) with a .472 on-base percentage. He has drawn five walks. He has scored five runs.

Then there is the manner in which he has done this. He has dramatically cut down on his strikeouts, with only three of them to his name in 37 plate appearances. He is executing in near-flawless ways in fundamentals, whether placing a perfect safety squeeze to score the decisive run in Saturday’s win or singling through the vacated right side of the infield on a hit-and-run during Sunday’s loss. And we haven’t even discussed his work in center field yet, with several notable instances of restraint when in the past he would be tempted to throw the ball away.

All of these are encouraging signs, and reason to hope the 25-year-old is finally turning a corner after several disappointing seasons.

DENVER – It’s hard to call a six-run offensive performance unsatisfactory, especially for a lineup that hasn’t exactly been great at scoring runs so far this season. The usual standards of offensive success, though, don’t always apply 5,280 feet above sea level.

The Nationals, sorry to say, needed more than that this afternoon during a 7-6 loss to the Rockies at Coors Field. Maybe that’s more an indictment of their bullpen, which saw four runs cross the plate in the bottom of the sixth under its watch. But with several top relief arms unavailable after contributing to wins both Friday and Saturday nights, it was always going to be a challenge for the rest of that unit to pitch flawless baseball.

As such, the Nats failed to win this four-game series, settling instead for a long weekend split. Each loss came by only one run: a 1-0 heartbreaker Thursday afternoon, then today’s high-scoring, back-and-forth affair.

They leave town at 3-7, with a three-game series in Anaheim against the star-studded Angels next before they return to the East Coast.

"We talked about this all week here: You've just got to score as many runs as possible," manager Davey Martinez said. "Anything can happen. Look, we battled. It was just a tough day."

DENVER – As he mapped out his bullpen plan for Saturday night’s game, Nationals manager Davey Martinez knew he wanted to use Hunter Harvey to get out of a jam (which proved to come in the sixth inning). He knew he wanted Kyle Finnegan to face the top of the Rockies lineup (which happened to come in the eighth). And he knew he wanted Anthony Banda to face a string of lefties (which happened to be due up in the ninth).

Everything seemed to be going according to plan, until Banda took the mound for the bottom of the ninth with a 7-2 lead and couldn’t retire any of the three batters he faced, with Mike Moustakas blasting a two-run homer on the 10th pitch of his at-bat.

So now Martinez was left to summon the only remaining experienced late-inning arm in his bullpen: Carl Edwards Jr., who was thrust into an unexpected save situation.

“We mapped it out,” Martinez said afterward. “One, we wanted to get Finnegan back in there and get him some more work. He’s still searching a little bit with his mechanics. He threw the ball a lot better. He was able to throw the ball inside, get a ground ball, we turned a double play. And then we had the matchups with Banda, all lefties. It just didn’t work out. We had CJ as well. It was just one of those days here.”

It was one of those days that are all too common at Coors Field, but it did still have a happy ending for the Nationals. Despite giving up three hits and allowing two more runs to score while he was on the mound, Edwards gutted his way through the bottom of the ninth and struck out Kris Bryant to end the game with the tying runner in scoring position, the Nats surviving with a 7-6 victory.

DENVER – Would you believe the Nationals have pitched much better at Coors Field than they did at Nationals Park? That’s certainly been the case for their starters, who have allowed a grand total of five runs in 17 1/3 innings through the first three games of this series, good for a 2.60 ERA. The only reason they’re 2-1 instead of 3-0 is a complete lack of offense in Thursday’s opener.

Can they expect Chad Kuhl to keep the trend going today in the finale? That may be a tough ask. Kuhl had a rough time in his season debut Tuesday against the Rays, giving up four runs in five innings (though all of the damage came in the first and second, and he didn’t allow a hit after that). This is a homecoming for Kuhl, who pitched for the Rockies last season. His numbers at Coors Field: 5.04 ERA, 1.399 WHIP in 12 starts. (Though it must be noted he also shut out the Dodgers here, so it’s not like he hasn’t had some success in the thin air.)

A Nationals lineup that has exploded for 17 runs the last two nights goes up against an unfamiliar foe today in Ryan Feltner. The 26-year-old right-hander owns a career 4-11 record, 6.31 ERA and 1.477 WHIP in 23 games with the Rockies over the last three years.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at COLORADO ROCKIES
Where: Coors Field
Gametime: 3:10 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Partly cloudy, 66 degrees, wind 7 mph in from center field

NATIONALS
LF Alex Call
3B Jeimer Candelario
1B Dominic Smith
C Keibert Ruiz
DH Stone Garrett
SS CJ Abrams
RF Lane Thomas
2B Ildemaro Vargas
CF Victor Robles

DENVER – Stone Garrett didn’t make the Nationals’ Opening Day roster, not so much because of his performance this spring but because Alex Call outplayed him to earn the fourth outfielder’s job.

Garrett didn’t get a chance to play his first several days after getting called up from Triple-A Rochester to start the week, not so much because of his chances of success, but because others were ahead of him on the depth chart.

Davey Martinez may have to rethink those plans after tonight’s game. How could the Nats manager sit Garrett after a 4-for-5, five-RBI explosion to lead his team to a too-close-for-comfort, 7-6 victory over the Rockies?

"I'm going to have to stay awake for a little while on this one," Martinez said with a laugh. "It's hard to sit the guy down, you know? We'll see. I'm going to look at everything again tonight."

In one of the unlikelier offensive performances in recent club history, Garrett seized his opportunity to start tonight, delivering a three-run homer, a pair of doubles and a single that gave him nine total bases. The 27-year-old slugger, cut loose by the Diamondbacks in November and quickly scooped up by the Nationals, was almost single-handedly responsible for his team’s offense en route to its second straight win at Coors Field.

DENVER – Luis García is out of the lineup for tonight’s game against the Rockies, but the Nationals continue to believe his right hamstring is only tight and not cause for any significant concern.

García pulled up and grabbed his right leg as he was running out a grounder in the sixth inning of Friday night’s 10-5 win at Coors Field. After a brief talk with director of athletic training Paul Lessard, he walked off the field, replaced at second base by Ildemaro Vargas.

Tests conducted after the game showed no serious issues, and García himself said he wasn’t worried about the hamstring.

“Everything seems to be fine,” manager Davey Martinez said. “This is going to be a day-to-day thing.”

García went through some agility drills today and did say his leg still felt sore. Martinez decided to play it safe and not include him in the lineup.

DENVER – After watching his team break through for 10 runs and 19 hits during Friday night’s win, Davey Martinez joked he might have to rethink his plans for today’s lineup. He already had intended to go with a right-handed-heavy lineup against Rockies lefty Austin Gomber. Now he wondered if he should just stick with what worked.

The answer: He stayed with his original plan. Tonight’s lineup doesn’t bear much resemblance to last night’s batting order. Stone Garrett is the designated hitter and batting second. Michael Chavis gets the start at second base over Luis García, who tweaked his right hamstring running out a grounder. And Riley Adams makes only his second start of the young season behind the plate, giving Keibert Ruiz the night off.

We’ll see if this still produces the desired results against Gomber, who allowed three runs on four hits in six innings in his season debut at the Padres but gave up a massive .304/.328/.534 slash line to right-handed batters last year.

Trevor Williams, meanwhile, makes his second start for the Nationals, looking to bounce back from a loss to the Rays in his debut. The right-hander gave up two homers in five innings. Certainly, he’ll need to be careful to keep the ball in the yard here at Coors Field tonight.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at COLORADO ROCKIES
Where: Coors Field
Gametime: 8:10 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Mostly cloudy, 61 degrees, wind 11 mph in from left field

DENVER – Far be it for anyone to anoint this kind of title upon anyone this early in the season, let alone a 24-year-old who has made only two starts for the organization since his acquisition last summer. But if we want to consider this literally, there’s really no question about it: MacKenzie Gore has been the Nationals’ stopper.

The team has won only two of its first eight games. And the winning pitcher in both of those games has been Gore, who followed up his impressive debut against the Braves with an equally strong performance Friday night in the Nats’ 10-5 victory over the Rockies.

Gore stopped a two-game losing streak to begin the season. And now he’s stopped a four-game losing streak that went all the way back to his last start. That seems to make him worthy of the title, right?

“I think everybody here is capable of doing that,” he insisted. “We can win. We played really good today, we played really good the other day when I pitched. Now we need to figure out how to do that consistently and build off each other. We won yesterday, so let’s try to win again today. That’s what we’re going to try to get to. Everybody’s capable of being a stopper. It’s just kind of worked out this way so far.”

It’s worked out this way because Gore has been head-and-shoulders better than the other four members of the Nationals rotation. In two starts, he has allowed a total of three runs on eight hits, striking out 12 over 11 1/3 innings. And because of that – plus some well-timed run support from his teammates – he has emerged with two wins in two starts, confirming what the club believed all along in acquiring him as part of last summer’s Juan Soto blockbuster deal with the Padres.

DENVER – The runs would come, the Nationals insisted. As would the power, so long as they continued to have good at-bats. They just needed to start hitting the ball in the air and hitting the ball with authority in the right moments.

And then Alex Call and Jeimer Candelario backed up the sentiment with back-to-back homers to open tonight’s game at Coors Field, setting the tone for the Nats’ best offensive game of the young season, a 10-5 victory over the Rockies.

Call and Candelario set the tone with their early blasts. CJ Abrams provided the real punch later on with a three-hit, two-triple, three-RBI night. Everyone in the Nationals lineup recorded at least one hit by the sixth inning, with the team totaling 19 by night’s end.

"I think it's only a matter of time before we can open up like that," Call said. "I don't know if we're going to get 19 hits every night, but we have a great team in here and we're confident in all our guys. It was great to see everybody swing the bat really well."

Oh, and MacKenzie Gore pitched well again, allowing just two runs over six innings to improve to 2-0 with a 2.38 ERA in the first two starts of his Nats career. The left-hander is the only pitcher on the staff with a win to date.

DENVER – In this, their eighth game of the season, the Nationals will use their third different leadoff hitter.

Alex Call gets the call tonight against the Rockies, batting first after Lane Thomas (five games) and Luis García (two games) previously handled the responsibility.

Why Call, particularly against José Ureña, a right-handed starter? His .400 on-base percentage so far this season makes a good case for him. So does this particular matchup with Ureña, who struggled with command in his season debut last week.

“The matchup with this guy, I like Alex up there,” manager Davey Martinez said. “He walks some guys. Alex does a great job of being that pesky hitter. We’ll see if we can get him on base.”

Call has performed well since being thrust into a semi-regular job as the starting left fielder while Corey Dickerson is on the injured list with a calf strain. The 28-year-old is batting just .214 (3-for-14) but he’s drawn a team-high five walks, elevating his on-base percentage. He’s also tied with Thomas for the team lead with four RBIs.

DENVER – The Nationals have won one game so far through the first week of the 2023 season. That one win came with MacKenzie Gore on the mound. So even though there hasn’t been a lot to get excited about since Opening Day, the presence of the young lefty on the mound should be enough to get excited about tonight’s game at Coors Field.

Gore was outstanding in his Nats debut, holding the Braves to one run and three hits over 5 1/3 innings. Tonight he faces a Rockies lineup that only managed one run yesterday off Josiah Gray and Mason Thompson, and that run was possible only because of a fly ball lost in the sun. You hate to ask a 24-year-old making his second-ever start for his team to serve as the stopper, but that’s kind of what the Nationals need Gore to be tonight.

Of course, it doesn’t matter how well Gore pitches if his teammates can’t provide some run support. The Nats did not provide any for Gray yesterday, shut out by Kyle Freeland and Co. Tonight, they face perhaps a more favorable matchup in José Ureña. The veteran right-hander and former regular member of the Marlins rotation struggled mightily in his Colorado debut, giving up four runs on five hits and four walks in only 2 1/3 innings against the Padres. The Nationals will have to be careful not to chase if Ureña is regularly out of the strike zone again tonight.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at COLORADO ROCKIES
Where: Coors Field
Gametime: 8:40 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Partly cloudy, 61 degrees, wind 7 mph in from center field

NATIONALS
LF Alex Call
3B Jeimer Candelario
DH Joey Meneses
1B Dominic Smith
C Keibert Ruiz
2B Luis García
RF Lane Thomas
SS CJ Abrams
CF Victor Robles

DENVER – Well aware of their offensive deficiencies entering the season, the Nationals insisted they were going to find other ways to assist in the production of scoring runs. They were going to need to do a better job of moving runners once they got on base. They were going to need to be able to bring them home from third base with fewer than two outs. And they were going to need to take advantage of their team speed, plus baseball’s new rules, and more aggressively run the bases.

It all sounded good, but seven games into the season, the Nats’ run game has proven not only to be rare but also ineffective.

At a time when the rest of the majors have been swiping bases at a record pace, the Nationals have successfully stolen only one. Worse, they’ve been caught stealing three times.

Each of those stats ranks last in the majors. The Nats are one of seven teams with only one stolen base to their name so far. And they join the Dodgers as the only teams in the sport to have been caught stealing three separate times.

That’s not what Davey Martinez had in mind entering the season. And it’s really not what the manager was looking for at the same time his lineup was struggling to score runs in any manner.

DENVER – Coors Field can play tricks with the minds of pitchers and hitters alike. Pitchers enter this gorgeous ballpark at mile-high elevation and panic about anything left up and over the plate being launched into the stratosphere. Hitters come here and assume all they have to do is get the ball in the air and then watch it fly.

It doesn’t always work that way. It certainly didn’t this afternoon in the 30th home opener in Rockies history, in which the home team scored one run thanks to a fly ball lost in the sun and the visitors never came close to crossing the plate themselves.

Yep, that’s a 1-0 final, only the 11th in ballpark history, the Nationals losing for the sixth time in seven games to begin the season despite getting six highly effective innings from Josiah Gray and two more from reliever Mason Thompson. Quality pitching at altitude matters not if your lineup can’t even score a run.

"It's tough," manager Davey Martinez said. "He threw the ball well. Mason came in, threw the ball well. We couldn't score any runs today."

It's the first time the Nats have been shut out this year, but it's hardly the first time they've been rendered helpless. They've scored a total of 17 runs in seven games. They're batting .227 as a team, while slugging just .289.

DENVER – Though he made it only two days into the season before landing on the injured list, Corey Dickerson is traveling with the Nationals and hoping his stint off the active roster is a short one.

Dickerson, who suffered a left calf strain Saturday against the Braves and was placed on the 10-day IL the following morning, flew with the Nats to Colorado and will spend this road trip rehabbing. The veteran left fielder is already taking light swings in the cage.

“I wanted him here,” manager Davey Martinez said. “He’s feeling better each and every day, which is a good sign.”

Though he’s able to swing a bat, Dickerson has not tested his leg yet. Martinez said that will probably happen first on an AlterG treadmill, after which a decision will be made if he can progress to the field.

Dickerson technically is eligible to return one week from today. Given how few at-bats he was able to take before suffering the injury, he may need to go on a minor league rehab assignment before coming off the IL.

DENVER – Hello from Coors Field, where the Rockies celebrate their home opener this afternoon, the Nationals serving as the visitors for the festivities. It’s not exactly warm here: There were slow flurries last night, and the temperature was below freezing this morning. But it’s supposed to approach 50 degrees later this afternoon, and the bright sunshine does actually make it feel warmer than the temperature.

The Nats come to town for a four-game series, hoping the thin Colorado air helps them hit the ball with a bit more authority. They hit only two homers in six games during the opening homestand, and each of those was a solo shot in the bottom of the ninth with the team trailing by multiple runs. Perhaps the combination of Coors Field and the Rockies pitching staff will help flip that troubling trend.

Unfortunately, the Nationals aren’t going to want the ball to fly too much today with Josiah Gray on the mound. As you surely know by now, the right-hander gave up the most homers in the majors last season, and despite an outstanding spring in Florida served up three of them to the Braves in his 2023 debut. This will be a real challenge for him today, especially considering how much he relies on his breaking balls, which don’t break as much at altitude.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at COLORADO ROCKIES
Where: Coors Field
Gametime: 4:10 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN, MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Sunny, 49 degrees, wind 7 mph out to left field

NATIONALS
RF Lane Thomas
LF Alex Call
3B Jeimer Candelario
DH Joey Meneses
1B Dominic Smith
C Keibert Ruiz
2B Luis García
CF Victor Robles
SS CJ Abrams