Nats drop doubleheader opener 6-3 to Braves (updated)

With the season series tied 3-3 and seven games scheduled between the two teams over a 10-day stretch in the season’s final two weeks, the Nationals entered this four-games-in-three-days series with a chance to close the gap between themselves and the Braves before the end of the year.

Last night’s 11-3 drubbing was a setback, but the Nats have not one, but two chances to get back in this long set with today’s split doubleheader. But by dropping the first game, which was rescheduled from a May 21 rainout, 6-3 on this Tuesday afternoon, the Nats now must win tonight to avoid the twinbill sweep and the possibility of a four-game sweep in tomorrow’s finale.

Much like Monday night’s starter Mitchell Parker, Jake Irvin entered this afternoon’s start looking to build any positive momentum before the offseason.

For a moment, it looked like Irvin had something going to start this one. With so much talk about his velocity being down this year (his four-seam fastball has averaged 92.3 mph this season), he struck out Matt Olson with a 95.1 mph heater and touched 94 mph during his strikeout of Drake Baldwin in the first inning, stranding Ronald Acuña Jr. after a two-out single.

Irvin then stranded runners on the corners with back-to-back strikeouts in the second, but his pitch count was already up to 41. And with a 2-0 lead in the third, he induced a double play ball and stranded Acuña again after the Braves slugger hit a comebacker off Irvin’s left foot and the 6-foot-6, 234-pound starter did a somersault while trying to field the ball and throw to first.

“I think just throughout the game staying in attack mode and getting ourselves in good counts," Irvin said after the game. "The end result is really unfortunate, but I thought altogether, we had a good game plan and executed really well.”

True, the end result was really unfortunate because any positive momentum built was gone with a disastrous fourth inning. Back-to-back one-out singles put runners on the corners. Then an RBI groundout put Atlanta on the board even with a nice play made by Brady House at third base. Then Vidal Bruján hit an RBI double that Jacob Young barely missed with a diving effort to tie the game. And that was followed by back-to-back home runs by Jurickson Profar (a two-run shot) and Matt Olson.

“I think every pitch in that inning, other than the Olson homer, I can live with," Irvin said. "You get two balls that are base hits under 90 miles an hour, and then on a homer on a front-foot breaking ball, it is what it is. And that's just part of the game.”

In fact, only one base hit had an exit velocity under 90 mph: Ha-Seong Kim's single to start the rally. The other two base hits (excluding the homers) were each hit over 91 mph. Regardless, the results were damaging.

That brought acting pitching coach Sean Doolittle out of the dugout to chat with Irvin, as rain fittingly came down over the announced crowd of 15,584 at Nationals Park. (Jim Hickey is away from the team today for a pre-planned, minor medical procedure, per a team spokesperson.)

“Bloop hit, bloop hit, then a couple of blasts, man," Irvin said. "It's just been kind of a microcosm of the season, trying to limit that damage and not being able to do it.”

Although Irvin finished his day with two shutdown innings on a combined 18 pitches, the damage was done. He completed six innings with eight hits, five runs, two walks, five strikeouts and two home runs on 102 pitches, 67 strikes. His ERA is now up to 5.76, which is still behind Parker's 5.85 for the two highest ERAs among qualified starters in the major leagues. With two longballs, however, Irvin has now surrendered 35 on the season, the most in the majors.

“Keep attacking. Keep attacking. Don't be discouraged by anything that's happened in the past," Irvin said of his goals in his remaining starts. "Give our boys a chance to win every time we go out there. At the end of the day, just make quality pitches and be a warrior.”

What may have been more discouraging, though, was the Nats’ offensive performance against a journeyman starter. The two-run second inning notwithstanding, the Nats’ bats had nothing going against José Suarez, who had his contract selected from Triple-A Gwinnett this morning to make this start for the Braves.

The Nats were able to get two baserunners in the first, but although they were unable to score, that set up the possibility for early runs against a 27-year-old who posted a 3.53 ERA in nine Triple-A appearances, eight starts.

Sure enough, after a Dylan Crews walk and a House single, Jacob Young was able to drive in the game’s first run. And then with a CJ Abrams sacrifice fly, the Nats had an early 2-0 lead against the left-hander.

But Suarez, who was making his first major league start of the year and first big league appearance since April 10, settled in from there. He ended his outing by retiring 17 of 20 Nationals through the seventh inning. Only Daylen Lile (single), Andrés Chaparro (walk) and Crews (single) reached base safely in that span.

“Like every lefty has been doing the whole year: Fastballs top of the zone, good changeup, mixing in sliders to lefties," said interim manager Miguel Cairo. "But it was his fastball-changeup and fastball-slider to our lefties.”

Among the few offensive bright spots, though, was Lile, who with two more hits raised his OPS to .823 to increase his lead among all National League rookies with at least 300 plate appearances this year. And with his eighth-inning triple, he passed Bryce Harper (2012) for the most triples in a season by a rookie in Nationals history (2005-present) with 10.

“He doesn't give at-bats away," Cairo said of Lile. "And you see it. The last inning against righty, against lefty, he goes over there and battles. He doesn't want to give no at-bats away. And he's being consistent. Hopefully, he'll stay like that and keep going until the season is over.”

But among the many offensive sore spots was James Wood, who with four strikeouts in the first game now has 209 on the season, which means he is 14 away from Mark Reynolds’ major league record of 223 from 2009 with the Diamondbacks.

“I keep saying to him, and I keep saying to everyone, he's got his stay with his approach," Cairo said of Wood. "When he's doing good, he's left-center. He's always from the middle to left-center. That's when he's doing good. When he's in that alley right there, he recognizes the breaking pitches better. And there's no fastball that can go by him. So the next two weeks, he needs to go back to that approach.”

The Nationals still have another chance to get back into this series with the nightcap at 6:45 p.m. They just hope the continuous rain isn’t an ominous omen of things to come.