Already possessing an impressive 9-6 record at home against high-quality opponents, the Nationals entered today’s finale against the Mets looking to put the cherry on top of an encouraging homestand.

With two dramatic, come-from-behind wins over the weekend, they had already secured at least a split of this four-game, wraparound series. But one more win, ideally without needing late-inning rallies, would give them three victories in four games against the team with the best record in baseball.

Unfortunately, the Nats fell behind again. And unlike Friday and Sunday, there were no theatrics in this 19-5 blowout loss to the Mets in front of an announced crowd of 14,011 on a sunny afternoon in the District.

“It was a good game til it wasn't,” manager Davey Martinez said after the loss. “The bullpen came in and had a rough day today. But we had our chances early offensively. Just once again, as I always say, when we chase, nothing good comes out of it. So we got to stop chasing, especially with guys on base. We gotta get good pitches to hit. When we do that, we're pretty good.”

The Nationals' offense, which combined to score 13 runs and collect 29 hits over the first three games, once again had no issues creating scoring chances. But the bats looked more like the ones that were shut out 2-0 on Saturday instead of the ones that put up hard-fought rallies Friday and Sunday.

The Nationals are looking to win three of four games against the Mets, the hottest team in baseball. To do so in Monday’s late afternoon finale of this four-game wraparound series, manager Davey Martinez is trotting all four of his outfielders into the starting lineup.

James Wood will serve as the designated hitter against Mets starter Griffin Canning. Alex Call takes over left field while Jacob Young and Dylan Crews remain in center and right, respectively.

Wood has now been in the Nats’ starting lineup for all 29 games to start the season. But this will only be the fourth time he’ll serve as the DH, which has been a part of the team’s plans to keep the big outfielder fresh and healthy after he dealt with left quad tendinitis during spring training.

“As we know in spring training, he had a little (quad) issue. So every now and then, I want to try to get him a DH day,” Martinez said of Wood during his pregame media session. “I think he's played in every game this year. But I talked to him, and he loves to play. But I think in order to keep him healthy and keep him going, DHing him one day and keeping him off his feet is good.”

Wood has slashed .257/.361/.543 with a .904 OPS, a team-leading eight home runs and 10 RBIs. And while he has -1 Defensive Runs Saved, per FanGraphs, in left field, that is already a major improvement from the -7 he posted last year.

When we look back on it days, weeks, months, even years from now, Friday night’s 5-4 win over the Mets may seem like just an ordinary divisional victory for the Nationals. But those who watched and lived it know it was so much more.

After a 3-0 lead vanished in the eighth inning, what had started as a positive night had suddenly turned a heartbreaking one with the Nats down by one run with only six outs to go.

But the Nationals prevailed with a ninth-inning rally, thanks in large part to the bottom of the order and the team’s young stars. It was all capped off by the first walk-off hit of James Wood’s young career.

So much happened last night, it couldn’t possibly be processed in one post. Let’s take some time to revisit some of the finer points of the Nats’ best win of the season to date …

Jake Irvin shows toughness in strong start
Although it is easy to forget, we should remember that the Nats almost lost their starting pitcher to injury two batters into the game.

The Nationals’ home schedule has been difficult on paper to date. All five opponents who have come to D.C., including the Mets for this weekend’s wraparound series, entered the year with high aspirations of playing in October. And all five, with the exception of the Orioles, started today above .500.

The combined record of the Phillies, Diamondbacks, Dodgers, Orioles and Mets entering today was 71-53, good for a .573 winning percentage. The Nats’ record against those first four daunting opponents: 7-5, good for a .583 winning percentage.

This young Nationals squad has done what they said they would do from the start of spring training: Show their stuff against the top dogs in the league.

And just when they thought their eighth victory against a tough opponent was snatched away from them, this young Nationals group put together a ninth-inning rally to walk off the Mets 5-4 in a truly wild game in the District.

“A little tick for tack,” said manager Davey Martinez after one of the craziest wins in his career. “I'm proud of the boys. They fought. We talk about that all the time. We played hard for 27 outs and we fought. Man, I'll tell you right now, CJ (Abrams, who scored the winning run) was hauling ass. He really was. I don't know how else to explain it, but that was awesome to see.”

CJ Abrams was all smiles, bouncing around the Nationals clubhouse this afternoon as he prepared to play his first big league game in nearly two weeks.

“It feels good to be back,” the 24-year-old shortstop said. “The boys have been battling, and I’m ready to get in there with them and win some games.”

Officially activated off the 10-day injured list this afternoon, Abrams returns after missing time with a right hip flexor strain, confident that ailment (which he briefly tried to play through before going on the IL) will no longer be a factor.

“No pain. Nothing at all,” he said. “Running, swinging, anything. Everything is 100 percent.”

Abrams played in two rehab games with Double-A Harrisburg, going 0-for-4 with two walks and a sacrifice fly. He played six innings at shortstop Tuesday night, then all nine innings there Wednesday afternoon, emerging from the stint feeling healthy and ready to return.

James Wood’s reaction the first time he found out he’d be leading off for the Nationals?

“Uh, I don’t know,” he admitted. “But whatever the manager thinks gives us the best chance to win, I’m OK with.”

Wood has been more than OK batting first. He’s been downright unstoppable.

With another big night Wednesday in the Nats’ 4-3 win over the Orioles, the 22-year-old left fielder further established his credentials as a big bat who can provide instant offense for his team.

Wood opened the bottom of the first with a towering, 431-foot blast to the second deck in right-center field at Nationals Park. The exit velocity on that home run: 116.3 mph, making it the hardest-hit homer by a Nats player in this ballpark since such things began getting tracked in 2015.

If Tuesday night’s blowout over the Orioles was a rare cakewalk win for the Nationals, this one felt all along like a walk across a lengthy tightrope, with no net visible down below.

Even after scoring three quick runs in the bottom of the first, the Nats found themselves in a tight contest, their bullpen unable to protect a two-run lead, the game ultimately decided in the eighth and ninth innings.

It’s the kind of pressure situation that has haunted this team too often during its rebuild. But all that experience may be starting to pay off. Even after blowing their slim lead tonight, the Nationals still felt like they were going to emerge victorious.

“We’ve hung in there with some really good teams, some teams that are supposed to be postseason teams,” closer Kyle Finnegan said. “We’ve proven to ourselves and to other people we can play with anybody. I think it’s big for the young guys to recognize that if we focus on what we can control, when we look up at the end of the game, we’ll be in it.”

The Nats were more than just in it tonight. They were indeed victorious, securing a 4-3 win over Baltimore thanks to Luis García Jr.’s go-ahead sacrifice fly in the bottom of the eighth and another good-enough top of the ninth from Finnegan, who closed out his ninth save in as many opportunities.

Mitchell Parker’s Tuesday night actually got off to a rough start.

He walked Orioles leadoff man Cedric Mullins on four pitches, then elicited some Bronx cheers when he finally threw a strike to Adley Rutschman. Little did anyone realize what was still to come.

“It definitely wasn’t ideal,” the Nationals left-hander said with a sheepish grin. “But it basically ended up working out, so I can’t be too upset about it. But maybe we’re going to try to not do it next time.”

Maybe Parker should try to do it again, especially if it leads to the same end result he got this evening: eight scoreless innings of one-hit ball to lead his team to a dominant 7-0 win.

Building off the four quality starts he already had authored to begin the season, Parker took things to another level tonight with the best performance of his young career. The 25-year-old became the Nats’ first starter to complete eight innings since Jake Irvin last July 4. He surrendered one single and two walks. He retired the final 17 batters he faced.

DENVER – As demoralizing as the first two legs of this three-city road trip were, the Nationals at least could take some solace knowing the location of their final stop: Coors Field.

Nothing turns a slumping lineup productive like some thin mountain air. And though they had to wait 19 hours for a mid-April snowstorm to pass through before finally opening their weekend series against the Rockies, the Nats happily accepted the much-needed offense that came with it.

Then again, nothing turns an already struggling bullpen into an absolute mess like Coors Field does, which meant not even a 10-run lead this afternoon was truly safe.

Despite getting four opposite-field homers, two of them by rookie Dylan Crews, and a 13-strikeout performance from starter MacKenzie Gore, the Nationals still had to hang on for dear life as their beleaguered bullpen gave up nine runs before closing out a way-too-tense, 12-11 victory.

"You know how many games like that I've seen here?" manager Davey Martinez sighed. "Whew, a lot."

PITTSBURGH – A sleepy game between the Nationals and Pirates, one that saw the two teams combine for one run through six innings before a quiet, four-figure crowd at PNC Park, turned loud in the bottom of the seventh tonight.

Loud because of Jorge López’s inability to throw strikes. Loud because of the unwarranted clearing of benches and bullpens his lack of command caused. Loud because of the surprise ejection of López by an umpiring crew that didn’t seem inclined to do anything until Pirates manager Derek Shelton came out of the dugout to argue.

And, ultimately, loud because of the grand slam Oneil Cruz crushed off Eduardo Salazar to turn a tight, low-scoring affair into a 6-1 rout by Pittsburgh in the latest example of a Washington bullpen implosion.

The particulars might have looked different, but the result was all too familiar for the Nationals, who had already seen their beleaguered relief corps turn two close contests into blowouts on this road trip alone. And it cost them another shot at a late-inning rally that could’ve flipped the game back in their direction. (Though it might have been too much to ask for a rally from a lineup that sent the minimum 24 batters to the plate through eight innings before a too-late rally in the ninth.)

"The key was we couldn't score any runs," manager Davey Martinez said. "We started swinging the bats late in the game, but our bats didn't show up today."

PITTSBURGH – The major league home run leaderboard may not matter much in mid-April, but there’s nothing wrong with taking a glance at the list even at this early stage of the season. Especially when a particularly notable name can be found there: James Wood.

With his monstrous, leadoff blast Tuesday night in the Nationals’ 3-0 win over the Pirates, Wood notched his sixth home run of the young season, his fifth in his last eight games.

That’s good enough for a nine-way tie for second-most in the majors right now. Athletics first baseman Tyler Soderstrom surprisingly leads the way with eight homers. Wood joins a star-studded list with six that includes Corbin Carroll, Jazz Chisholm Jr., Aaron Judge, Kyle Schwarber, Fernando Tatis Jr., Tommy Edman, Wilmer Flores and Mike Trout.

That’s some impressive company for a 22-year-old.

“It’s cool,” Wood said, showing off his usual go-with-the-flow mindset. “But it’s still early and it’s a long season, so you’ve just got to stay consistent. That’s what makes those guys so good.”

PITTSBURGH – Jake Irvin had done everything in his power to win this game for the Nationals and put an end to their three-game losing streak, precisely the kind of performance the situation called for.

Irvin authored seven scoreless innings on a frigid Tuesday night, and doing it on an economical 87 pitches. And now all he could do was watch from the visitors’ dugout at PNC Park like everyone else and hope his teammates could finish off the Pirates.

That’s been anything but a given for the Nats bullpen through the first 16 games of the season. But on this night, the two reliable back-end relievers did their job without breaking a sweat, Jose A. Ferrer and Kyle Finnegan teaming up to complete a 3-0 shutout and ensure Irvin's efforts were properly rewarded.

"We needed that today," manager Davey Martinez said. "He stepped up big-time."

Irvin was more than worthy of his first win of the year. Ferrer was more than worthy of his fourth hold of the year, throwing 14 of his 15 pitches for strikes. And Finnegan was more than worthy of his sixth save in as many attempts, finishing things off with a scoreless ninth to complete a 2-hour, 16-minute ballgame.

PITTSBURGH – The temperature has dropped about 30 degrees since Monday, with a strong wind now blowing in from the west, making the conditions at PNC Park far different than they were for the series opener. Maybe that can be a good thing for the Nationals, because they sure didn’t play well under Monday’s conditions en route to their third straight loss.

They’ll try to get back on track tonight behind Jake Irvin, who makes his fourth start of the season. The right-hander doesn’t have a decision yet, but the Nats have lost all three of his previous outings. He can do his part to put his guys in a better position to win by limiting the damage and going more than five innings this time around. That might also take some pressure off the much beleaguered bullpen, perhaps allowing Davey Martinez to use only his top three guys (Jorge López, Jose A. Ferrer, Kyle Finnegan) at the end.

At the plate, the Nationals will happily face anybody other than Paul Skenes. Not that Mitch Keller is a slouch. The 29-year-old right-hander has been a reliable starter for the Pirates for more than four years now, and he was outstanding last time out against the Cardinals, tossing 7 1/3 scoreless innings on only 96 pitches.

Today, of course, is Jackie Robinson Day across the major leagues. Everybody will be wearing nameless No. 42 jerseys in honor of the 78th anniversary of his debut with the Brooklyn Dodgers, always a special occasion for all involved.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at PITTSBURGH PIRATES
Where: PNC Park, Pittsburgh
Gametime: 6:40 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, 87.7 FM (Spanish), MLB.com
Weather: Chance of showers, 46 degrees, wind 17 mph out to left field

MIAMI – After a very successful homestand during which they went 4-2 against two contenders in the Diamondbacks and Dodgers, the Nationals have embarked on their first extended road trip of the season against teams with lower expectations.

The 10-day trip started tonight against the Marlins, who the Nats beat 11 times in 13 games last season. And while this opener started ominously, it resulted in a 7-4 comeback win in front of an announced crowd of 9,094 at an open-roofed loanDepot park.

Before the first pitch was ever thrown, the Nationals scratched Nathaniel Lowe, one of their most productive hitters and key defenders at first base, from the starting lineup because he was feeling under the weather.

“He's sick,” manager Davey Martinez said after the win. “But I talked to him before the game. I said, 'Look, if we have an opportunity to use you to pinch-hit, can you do it?' And he looked at me and said, 'Yeah, I think I can.' And I said, 'Alright, I'll check back with you.'”

In Lowe’s place, Josh Bell moved to first base, James Wood served as the designated hitter and Alex Call was inserted into the lineup in left field.

After the Nationals started 1-6, they have won four of their last five games. Winning cures all. Spirits are high.

But the Nats do find themselves with one problem. Don’t worry, it’s a good one to have.

There is a bit of an outfield conundrum forming in the Nats dugout, thanks to a scorching-hot start from Alex Call.

Call made the Opening Day roster as the fourth outfielder coming off the bench. Manager Davey Martinez announced early in spring training he was going to run out James Wood in left field, Jacob Young in center and rookie Dylan Crews in right on a daily basis to start the season.

But Crews struggled out of the gate, going hitless in his first 19 at-bats. Then Young was given a reset over the weekend after frustrations started to mount following his 1-for-15 start over his first eight games.

He had already hit 11 home runs in the big leagues, more than a few of them jaw-dropping in nature whether because of exit velocity or distance traveled. D.C. already knows what James Wood is, and what he can be.

Perhaps tonight, thanks to a jaw-dropping performance against the most-watched ballclub in the world, any portion of the baseball community that didn’t already know learned what everyone here had long since come to accept: This kid is special.

With two titanic home runs, not to mention an infield single and a bases-loaded walk for good measure, the 22-year-old outfielder drove in five runs to carry the Nationals to a convincing 8-2 victory over the Dodgers to clinch a series win over the defending World Series champions.

A Nats team that lost six of seven to begin the season has now won four in a row against top competition and remarkably will have a chance to sweep L.A. on Wednesday afternoon before embarking on a 10-game road trip to Miami, Pittsburgh and Colorado.

"I just think it kind of proves we're really not far," Wood said. "Even when we were losing games, we weren't off by much. Being able to put these games together, I think it just proves that."

CJ Abrams is out of the Nationals lineup a second straight day with an upper right leg ailment, but the shortstop expressed confidence he’ll be back “very soon.”

Abrams didn’t play Monday night’s series opener against the Dodgers, with manager Davey Martinez revealing his shortstop had complained of thigh tightness stemming from the final play of Sunday’s win over the Diamondbacks, in which he charged in to field a grounder and then threw off-balance to first base.

Abrams today referred to his ailment as “kind of a hip flexor thing,” saying it’s not a problem with his thigh. He didn’t seem concerned about it forcing him to miss anything more than a few days.

“It wasn’t anything specific. I just kind of felt it after (the last play Sunday),” he said. “Just took a couple days off, and I should be back out there soon.”

Abrams did take ground balls this afternoon and was planning to take batting practice in the cage prior to this evening’s game. There’s a chance he could come off the bench if needed, but it sounds more likely he returns to the lineup for Wednesday’s series finale or Friday’s series opener in Miami.

James Wood hasn’t been a big leaguer long, but he’s been a big leaguer long enough to have some experience with big situations at the plate.

And what has the Nationals’ 22-year-old budding star learned from those experiences?

“I feel like if I go up there trying to create a big moment, I’ll get myself into trouble,” he said. “I just try and keep the same approach.”

Wood’s general laid-back persona certainly helps, but it’s another thing to actually put it into practice during a critical moment in a ballgame. What he did Monday night was further evidence he can handle the pressure just fine.

The situation: Bottom of the seventh, Nats already leading the Dodgers 3-2, one out and a runner on second. On the mound: Veteran left-hander Anthony Banda, himself briefly a member of the Nationals bullpen in April 2023, having since reestablished himself as a member of Los Angeles’ championship bullpen.

What did the Nationals need to do to defeat the defending World Series champs tonight and extend their own winning streak to three games?

They needed six strong innings from MacKenzie Gore. They needed early offense to take a lead. They needed late offense to provide some cushion for a thin bullpen. They needed that thin bullpen to get the job done on a night when most of the big names weren’t available.

Oh, and they also needed to hold down the Dodgers’ vaunted lineup enough to make sure Shohei Ohtani’s otherworldly exploits wouldn’t cost them.

And wouldn’t you know, they pulled it off, combining all of those elements during a 6-4 victory that stands as their best of the young season.

"That felt like a playoff game," said closer Kyle Finnegan, who was right in the middle of it all at the end. "To play against a team like the Dodgers, their resume speaks for itself. To play with them and compete all the way to the last out, it says a lot of things about our team and our grit. We can play with anybody in the league."

The Nationals beat the Diamondbacks on Saturday. Then they beat them again on Sunday. You know what that’s called? A winning streak! Now, can they keep it going against the defending World Series champions and their star-studded roster?

Yes, the Dodgers are in town the next three nights, so get ready for a whole lot of blue and a whole lot of Japanese media following Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Roki Sasaki. Word is, there won’t be an empty seat in the press box during this series. Giddy-up.

It’s a great test tonight for MacKenzie Gore, who gets the ball for the series opener. The Nats ace was brilliant on Opening Day against the Phillies, then labored but minimized the damage against the Blue Jays. He last faced the Dodgers nearly a year ago, right here in D.C., and he was very good in that one: six innings of one-run ball. The key tonight: Efficiency. With all of their top relievers pitching much of the weekend, the bullpen could be thin for this game. Gore needs to get deep in the game.

The Nationals lineup finally did a good job jumping out to early leads against Arizona, and they’ll try to keep that up tonight against Dustin May. The oft-injured right-hander missed all of 2024 but is healthy again and tossed five innings of one-hit ball in his season debut against the Braves.

CJ Abrams sits tonight with tightness in his right thigh, while Paul DeJong moves to shortstop and José Tena starts at third base. James Wood slides up to the leadoff spot in Abrams' place.