MILWAUKEE – The Nationals entered Saturday’s matchup with the Brewers needing to put Friday night’s loss behind them. They struggled mightily against opener DL Hall and regular starter Quinn Priester, who combined to hold them to just three runs over the course of the series opener.
But today, the Nats would only need to face one Milwaukee starting pitcher before manager Pat Murphy turned it over to his traditional relievers. The problem was that one starter was Brandon Woodruff.
That mattered little to two Nationals rookies, who hit two home runs off the two-time All-Star and then one more late in the game. But that was not enough to power their team to a win, as the Brewers walked off the Nats in the ninth for a 6-5 win.
Handed a two-run lead following CJ Abrams’ sacrifice fly in the top of the inning, Kyle Finnegan immediately ran into trouble in the bottom of the ninth.
The Nats closer issued a first-pitch single to leadoff the frame, then walked Christian Yelich and gave up a two-run double to Andrew Vaugn. After a groundout and intentional walk, Caleb Durbin hit a single down the right field line to give the home team the win.
The loss was especially crushing since one of the Nats’ young stars had his coming-out party earlier in the afternoon.
Brady House, who has impressed more with his glove than his bat in his short amount of time in the majors, knocked the first two homers of his career, the second one being a two-run shot that gave the Nats an eighth-inning lead.
“I'm not really focused on it that much, honestly, because you'll hear a lot of people say that home runs are accidents,” House said before the game about his lack of power thus far in the majors. “So I'm just trying to put a good barrel on it, and it'll eventually go over.”
He put a good barrel on a 2-0 slider from Abner Uribe in the eighth inning. House launched the go-ahead longball 102.5 mph off his bat and 401 feet to left field. That is no accident. And it was not his first.
Following multiple injury setbacks over the last few years, Woodruff made just his second start of the season and his first in Milwaukee since Sept. 17, 2023, which coincidentally also came against the Nats.
The announced crowd of 35,015 at American Family Field gave their oft-injured right-hander plenty of ovations leading up to and during the game. But he gave them a mixed bag of results.
Yes, he struck out 10 Nationals. But he also let two rookies take him deep to give the visitors an early lead.
Daylen Lile struck first, hitting the second homer of his young career with two outs in the second. The lefty bat got a hold of a 3-2 fastball on the inside part of the plate and turned it 469 feet into the right field bleachers for a 1-0 lead.
Then House knocked the first homer of his career two innings later. The righty power bat crushed a first-pitch sweeper that was a no-doubt home run over the left field wall.
Again, hitting a ball 108.7 mph off the bat and 427 feet is no accident.
On the mound, Shinnosuke Ogasawara had much better results than his major league debut, when he was charged with four runs and seven hits in 2 ⅔ innings against the Red Sox. The 27-year-old Japanese left-hander faced the minimum the first time through the Brewers order, thanks to a lot of weak contact. He was able to take some advantage against an overly-aggressive lineup with his unusually low velocity.
But the Brewers found more success against him the second time around. After he was just given a 2-0 lead, Ogasawara started the bottom of the fourth with a hit-batter, a single, a run-scoring double (that was misplayed by James Wood in left field), a strikeout and a two-run double to give the Brewers a 3-2 lead.
Brad Lord entered out of the ‘pen to start the fifth and pitched 2 ⅓ perfect innings, proving that he can provide some length.
Although Ogasawara’s final results aren’t typically considered a good outing by a starting pitcher – four hits, three runs, one walk, two strikeouts and a hit-batter on 56 pitches over four innings – they are an improvement from his first outing.
The question for the Nationals over the break is will that be enough for Ogasawara to keep his spot in the rotation to start the second half? Or will they make some adjustments, like moving Lord back to a starter’s role, when they start a six-game homestand on Friday against the Padres?
But that’s a problem for next week. For now, the Nats have to suffer through this loss despite the pop from two young bats and a more encouraging outing from their starter.