The All-Star break offers a time for reflection, a chance to hit the pause button and consider everything that’s happened over the last 3 1/2 months. It’s a lot easier to think about the big picture when you don’t have a game to worry about from the night before or another coming the following day.

And when you take a step back and consider the big picture, you find a lot to be pleased about the Nationals’ first half of the season. There were breakthrough performances, the arrival of several rookies including one of the top prospects in the sport and ultimately a better record (44-53) than at this same point one year ago (39-58).

Which isn’t to say everything went swimmingly in NatsTown. There were disappointing performances from a number of players, disruptive injuries and sloppy play at times. This is a team that felt at times like it could be good enough to win more games than it lost, but the record suggests there’s still a way to go before that feels plausible.

So before we move on to what could be a very entertaining – and newsworthy – second half, let’s look back at the things that went right for the Nationals in the first half and the things that went wrong …

RIGHT: THE YOUNG STARTING PITCHERS
Even the most optimistic club official or fan couldn’t have predicted how well the quartet of Jake Irvin, MacKenzie Gore, Mitchell Parker and DJ Herz would pitch. (Many wouldn’t have even predicted Parker and Herz would be in the big leagues to begin with.) But this turned into the most important story of the first half. Combine their stats, and those four young starters delivered a 3.91 ERA and 1.238 WHIP while issuing only 2.5 walks per nine innings and surrendered slightly more than one homer per nine innings. And those numbers looked even better a couple weeks ago, before all four labored in their final outings leading up to the break. If they can return refreshed and get back to what they did throughout April, May and June, the Nats will have the makings of a strong rotation for years to come.

MILWAUKEE – If anyone was worried the grind of 17 games in 17 days to close out the season’s first half – not to mention 13 losses over the last 17 games – would leave the Nationals a dejected bunch this evening, Jesse Winker and Co. made sure to allay those fears right off the bat tonight.

And if anyone was worried Jackson Rutledge wouldn’t be up to the challenge of his first big league start of 2024 against the first-place Brewers, the big right-hander also made sure to allay those fears right from the get-go.

Rutledge allowed only two runs in a strong-if-abbreviated spot start, and Winker led a balanced offensive attack with an RBI double and a solo homer against his former team as the Nats topped the Brewers, 5-2, and snapped their five-game losing streak with an all-around impressive showing.

An exhausted roster arrived in Milwaukee late Thursday night following a series sweep in New York and had to muster up the energy to take on the Brewers in the final weekend of this daunting stretch before everyone can enjoy a well-deserved All-Star break.

"That's your job. That's what you sign up for, to come in and grind it out," Winker said. "It's hard. It's a hard game. It was a tough stretch of games, and we've been playing a lot of really good teams, but it's a good league. It's our job to keep coming in, put the work in and grind stuff out."

All morning, he waited, knowing he was likely to be summoned at some point before the end of the game. Davey Martinez was just waiting for the right moment to signal Jesse Winker to step to the plate.

“He was biting at the bit, I can tell you that,” Martinez said. “He said: ‘I’ll be ready.’ Oh, I know you’ll be ready.”

Winker has been one of the Nationals’ most consistently productive offensive players this season, and in recent weeks he has become their regular No. 3 hitter. But that’s mostly against right-handers. And with the Mets starting three lefties during this week’s four-game series, that meant a lot of time sitting on the bench and waiting for the call.

Thursday’s series finale featured left-hander Jose Quintana on the mound for New York, so it was the right-handed Harold Ramirez batting third and serving as designated hitter. But the moment Mets manager Carlos Mendoza pulled his starter and inserted righty Adrian Houser for the bottom of the eighth, Winker knew his name was about to be called.

“You’re kind of just watching the game, paying attention and seeing when a moment might arise,” he said. “And then you go and prepare and talk a gameplan. I talked to (assistant hitting coach) Chris Johnson about a quick gameplan, went up and just tried to barrel a ball.”

More than three months into this season, it has become clear the Nationals trust Jake Irvin. And with the stars perfectly aligned today, they trusted their young right-hander more than ever before.

And thanks to one – and only one – big hit from his teammates, Irvin and the Nats emerged victorious on Independence Day in the nation’s capital.

Irvin completed eight innings for the first time in his career, allowing one hit, one walk and nothing else on a day when the Nationals bullpen was severely depleted and needed everything it could get from the 27-year-old starter. And when Jesse Winker blasted a pinch-hit homer in the bottom of the eighth, they had the only run they needed to pull off an inspired, 1-0 victory over the Mets.

"That was unbelievable, it really was," manager Davey Martinez said. "We definitely needed that."

Held to four singles by New York starter Jose Quintana, the Nationals finally broke through in the bottom of the eighth against reliever Adrian Houser. With a right-hander finally on the mound, Martinez sent Winker up to pinch-hit for Harold Ramírez, then watched the veteran blast a 1-0 curveball to right-center for the day’s first and only run and some long-awaited support for his starting pitcher.

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – As scared as he was in the moment Friday when his right knee got tweaked and he fell to the ground in pain, Jesse Winker was confident by night’s end he wasn’t seriously injured and hoped he might even feel well enough to rejoin the Nationals lineup Saturday afternoon.

Sure enough, Winker is back in there today, starting in left field and batting third for the Nats against the Rays. His knee was taped up this afternoon as he went to the batting cage, but otherwise he looked no worse for wear.

“I’m thankful it’s not anything worse,” the 30-year-old said. “Because anytime you, as a professional athlete, go down without running into anything, it’s kind of a scary feeling.”

Winker was backtracking to try to catch Isaac Paredes’ first-inning fly ball Friday night when his cleat got caught in the artificial turf at Tropicana Field. He immediately felt his knee twist and was worried it was something bad. But with the ball still in the air, he kept tracking it back to the wall, where he made a circus catch as he fell to the ground.

Manager Davey Martinez and director of athletic training Paul Lessard jogged out from the dugout to check on Winker, who remained on the ground for some time. And even though he was able to get back on his feet and walk himself back to the dugout, he did so at an extremely slow pace and with a noticeable limp.

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – The sting of a 3-1 loss to the Rays was still fresh, not to mention the frustration of a losing streak that has now reached four games and dropped the Nationals from a temporary spot in the National Leauge’s final wild card slot to a spot well below that key standing.

But as Jesse Winker contemplated where this team stood upon reaching the official halfway point of the season – 38-43, four games out of a playoff berth with 81 games still to go – the veteran outfielder couldn’t help but think about the expectations way back in March compared to now.

“If we were to all sit in Palm Beach and you said we’d be right here, right now at this point, I think everyone would be pretty stoked about that,” Winker said. “Keeping that in perspective is obviously a big deal.”

Indeed, most anyone associated with a Nationals club that finished last in the division four years in a row and was happy to win 71 games in 2023 would have to be content with the current state of affairs.

This wasn’t a great first half, nor would anyone try to claim it was. But it was better than most probably expected, and it featured far more encouraging developments than discouraging ones.

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. – Help is on the way for the Nationals’ power-starved lineup. But it’s not scheduled to arrive until Monday, leaving the current group to have to try to get the job done this weekend against the Rays.

And if tonight’s series opener was any indication, it’s going to continue to be tough sledding until James Wood joins the bunch. Especially if Jesse Winker has now been lost to injury.

Hours after news broke they intend to promote one of baseball’s top prospects Monday for the start of an eight-game homestand, the Nats slogged their way through a 3-1 loss to Tampa Bay that was made worse by Winker’s right knee injury in the bottom of the first.

Already reeling from a three-game sweep in San Diego, the Nationals were held to one run on five hits by the Rays’ pitching staff, leaving them with a 38-43 record at the official halfway point of the season.

"We were one game under .500 before we got to San Diego," center fielder Jacob Young said. "So I think we're right there. We've played a lot of teams tough. We've had a pretty tough schedule. I think we've played well. We just need to keep going one game at a time and try to get some victories and get off this little four-game slide we're on."

SAN DIEGO – There was underlying tension ahead of this second game between the Nationals and Padres.

After Jurickson Profar took exception to two inside pitches that weren’t really close to hitting him then walked off the Nats and directed his celebration toward the visiting dugout last night, some members of the Nationals bench waited around to see if things would escalate.

They didn’t then. But it didn’t take long for it to carry over into tonight’s game.

The Nationals ended up losing 9-7 to the Padres, but not before both benches cleared in the first inning with Keibert Ruiz and Profar getting into it.

“It was nothing crazy," Ruiz said after the game. "We were just having a conversation about what he did yesterday. But it was nothing really crazy.”

The Nationals’ aggressiveness at the plate has been on display all season. They want to swing at strikes, get on base and steal bases to score runs.

The approach of swinging at strikes is all well and good on paper. But you have to do some damage with those hitter’s pitches to make it meaningful.

They’ve had some trouble with it this week against the Diamondbacks. It didn’t work at all on Tuesday while seeing a grand total of 96 pitches during a 5-0 shutout. It barely worked Wednesday when they needed Jesse Winker’s two-run home run to rescue them in a 3-1 win after seeing only 104 pitches.

And it didn’t work again Thursday in a 5-2 loss to the Snakes as the Nats dropped their first series in their last four attempts in front of an announced crowd of 21,158.

The Nationals offense was once again doomed by not doing too much in the strike zone.

For 14 innings across nearly 23 hours, they swung and swung and kept swinging and kept making outs. And then with one mighty swing, Jesse Winker changed the agonizing narrative that had defined the first half of the Nationals’ series against the Diamondbacks and got his team back on track.

Winker’s two-run homer in the bottom of the sixth snapped the Nats out of their scoreless funk. And thanks to a tack-on run provided by Ildemaro Vargas, another effective start by Patrick Corbin and another strong showing by the back end of the bullpen, they emerged with a cathartic 3-1 victory.

"Good teams, that's what they do," manager Davey Martinez said. "They're not going to hit every day. I talk about it all the time: Hitting is hard. And you're going to go through those lapses where it's like that, where you score two or three runs but you've got a chance to win. That's what I love about this team: They don't give up."

It wasn't a perfect day at the yard for the Nationals, who had to scratch shortstop CJ Abrams from the lineup shortly before first pitch with a left wrist issue. Martinez said Abrams, who isn't sure how he hurt himself, is getting an MRI to determine the extent of the injury.

Shut out on four hits and no walks Tuesday night even with a healthy leadoff man, the Nationals totaled just two hits and one walk through five innings this afternoon against Arizona starter Brandon Pfaadt, whose pitch count remained ridiculously low thanks to another string of first-pitch outs made by an overly aggressive lineup.

On a night when hardly anyone in the Nationals lineup did anything of consequence, Jesse Winker did more than anyone else. Not bad for a guy who wasn’t able to play the team’s last game after hurting his knee.

Winker went 2-for-3 in the Nats’ 5-0 loss to the Diamondbacks, recording the team’s lone extra-base hit (a fourth-inning double) as well as a single in his final at-bat. The veteran left fielder did so with no apparent lingering issues in his right knee.

Winker hurt himself rounding second base and slamming on the brakes to dive back into the bag Saturday against the Marlins. He went to get an MRI that night, hoping it wasn’t anything serious but a bit worried it could have been something bad.

When the MRI came back clean, Winker and the Nationals were relieved. He sat out Sunday’s game, then enjoyed the team’s day off Monday before returning to work Tuesday, back in the lineup batting third and playing left field.

Winker ran the bases fine and had no problems in the field. Afterward, he was asked if he thinks he can jump right back into playing every day, or if he might need to manage his knee a little and take some days off.

It’s still too early in the season to call a series truly meaningful, not with the calendar still showing June and with more games left on the schedule than have been played to date.

But the Nationals haven’t been in this position in a while, so why not get a little excited about a mid-June three-game set against the defending National League champs, both teams smack dab in the middle of a wild card race that features a host of teams sitting just below the .500 mark, waiting for someone to make a move.

The result of tonight’s game doesn’t necessarily portend anything about what’s still to come over the next 3 1/2 months, but it wasn’t exactly a positive showing by the home team. A 5-0 loss to the Diamondbacks was about as unexciting as it gets, with Jake Irvin laboring early and a punchless lineup completely rendered ineffective by three Arizona pitchers.

The Nats (35-37) didn’t much look the part of a surprise contender, not on this night. The Diamondbacks (36-37) looked much more like the team that squeaked into the 2023 postseason with 84 regular season wins and then rode the wave all the way to a World Series loss to the Rangers.

Davey Martinez can only hope for a better showing the next two afternoons.

The MRI on Jesse Winker’s right knee showed no structural damage, and the Nationals left fielder believes he can rejoin the lineup within a few days.

“It’s definitely nothing major, nothing that’s going to prevent me from playing,” he said. “I think I just need a couple days of rest.”

Winker hurt himself in the bottom of the first Saturday afternoon when he took a big turn around second base on Ildemaro Vargas’ single to left-center, then had to slam on the brakes and dive back into the bag, getting tagged out in the process. He remained in the game for two more innings but felt knee pain while in the field in the top of the third and decided to depart at the end of the inning.

“I slammed on the brakes and dove back, and I kind of lost my footing,” he said. “So it happened somewhere in there. But there was no pop, or anything I could point to. I just had some pain walking out to the outfield, but then I really felt it the first fly ball.”

The Nationals had Winker get an MRI on Saturday, so they’d have results in time to know if they needed to make a roster move in time for Sunday’s game. When that test came back clean, they felt comfortable proceeding with Winker remaining on the active roster, even if he can’t play for another few days. (The team has Monday off, then returns Tuesday to open a three-game series against the Diamondbacks.)

The first time he struck out Tim Anderson, it was merely a nice way to start the afternoon. The second time he did it, it was the continuation of an already impressive outing. The third time he did it, DJ Herz hopped off the mound, slapped his hand to his glove and floated all the way back to the Nationals dugout, where teammates and coaches alike couldn’t wait to greet the rookie left-hander with high-fives and hugs.

The third start of Herz’s major league career had just come to an end, and it included a standing ovation from the crowd of 25,637 at Nationals Park who just watched this previously unknown 23-year-old put together one of the most dominant and most efficient starts in club history.

With six innings of one-hit, zero-walk, 13-strikeout ball on 84 pitches in a 4-0 victory over the Marlins, Herz etched his name alongside some of the best pitching performances the Nats have ever witnessed.

"I think this outing, I wanted to control my body language a little more, be a little better with that," Herz said. "And the first five innings, it was perfect. And then I got the last strikeout, and I kind of had a little feeling that I was done and just let my emotions fly a little bit. It was awesome."

He’s only the fourth person to wear the curly W cap and strikeout out 13 or more batters without issuing a walk. Max Scherzer did it four times during his Hall-of-Fame career. Stephen Strasburg did it twice, including in his historic major league debut. And John Patterson did it during the inaugural 2005 season at RFK Stadium.

DETROIT – There are many ways to measure progress in a franchise’s efforts to rebuild itself back into the kind of consistent contender it was years ago. But ultimately, it does come down to wins and losses, right? And, ideally, the ability to string together a bunch of wins over a sustained period of time.

The Nationals haven’t done much of that in the last three years. They’ve had their moments, sure, but rarely have those moments come in succession.

So consider the events of the last week, capped off by tonight’s 7-5 victory over the Tigers, significant in both the little picture and the big picture. In the little picture, the Nats have won five in a row, inching themselves ever closer to the .500 mark. In the big picture, they’ve won five in a row for the first time since June 19-24, 2021, the last time they were truly competitive and prioritizing short-term success over long-term plans.

"Good things will happen when you keep good vibes and play together and have fun," said shortstop CJ Abrams, who arrived in August 2022. "It's starting to show."

Win No. 5 should have come easier than it did. The Nationals put 15 runners on base through their first eight offensive innings, yet only five of them crossed the plate. There were countless opportunities to add more, but they were done in by poor situational hitting (2-for-11 with runners in scoring position) and poor baserunning (three outs made).

DETROIT – Hello from Comerica Park, a place the Nationals have not visited often in their history. This is only their fourth trip to Detroit, the previous ones coming in 2010, 2013 and 2019. They’ve gone 2-6 in the previous series here, so it’s not exactly a history of success.

The Nats, though, are feeling good about themselves again after winning three of four from the Braves over the weekend, then finally getting to enjoy their first day off in 2 1/2 weeks. So they’ll be refreshed and ready to go tonight when they open this three-game series.

This would’ve been Patrick Corbin’s turn in the rotation, but the Nationals decided to skip over the struggling left-hander and put him on the mound Saturday against the Marlins instead. So it’s Mitchell Parker, pitching on full rest anyway, taking the ball for the opener. It’s another opportunity for the rookie to show what he can do against a lineup that’s never seen him before.

The Nats lineup will try to keep hitting the way it did over the weekend against Atlanta, this time against veteran right-hander Kenta Maeda. The 36-year-old is struggling himself in his first season in Detroit, entering tonight’s game with a 6.25 ERA in 10 starts.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at DETROIT TIGERS
Where: Comerica Park
Gametime: 6:40 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, 88.7 FM (Spanish), MLB.com
Weather: Partly cloudy, 71 degrees, wind 8 mph in from center field

CLEVELAND – Over the course of this afternoon’s game at Progressive Field, the Nationals allowed two runs to score on a popup, allowed another to score all the way from second base on a wild pitch, had one of their own runners tagged out after rounding third base too far, had another picked off first base even when he wasn’t being held on, saw their manager get ejected, saw their shortstop get scratched shortly before first pitch due to injury and saw their center fielder depart later due to injury.

It was, by any measure, an ugly performance from the visitors, the kind of performance they couldn’t afford against one of the majors’ hottest teams.

And yet, somehow the Nats still found themselves with a chance to beat the Guardians, if only they could come through with one modest rally before game’s end. Alas, they could not. And so this went down as a 3-2 loss, and certainly one of the weirder and more frustrating losses of the season.

"You feel like we lost that game more than they won it," catcher Riley Adams said.

Already playing without shortstop CJ Abrams, who was scratched less than an hour before first pitch due to a jammed left shoulder suffered Friday night, the Nationals also lost center fielder Jacob Young to a swollen right hand he first noticed after making a long throw to third base in the seventh inning.

Jesse Winker is out of the Nationals lineup today. Lane Thomas could be back in the Nationals lineup Monday.

Winker is sitting for the team’s series finale against the Mariners with a cramp in his left quad, an injury that forced his departure in the seventh inning of Saturday’s 3-1 victory.

“It basically was a cramp, but he’s still a little sore,” manager Davey Martinez said. “I talked to him this morning. He’s going to be available to pinch-hit today. I’d rather do that than have him go out there and something else happens. Let him get through the day, and then he can come off the bench and help us.”

Winker had an active day at the ballpark. He beat out a well-placed drag bunt for a single in the second inning. He singled to center and stole second in the seventh, then advanced to third on Keibert Ruiz’s bloop single to center.

Those final 90 feet, though, may have been too much for Winker, who didn’t look comfortable once he got to third base. The Nationals sent Victor Robles in to pinch-run for him in what at the time was still a 1-1 game. Robles would score the go-ahead run on Ildemaro Vargas’ grounder to short.

PHILADELPHIA – What’s the mood in the clubhouse at the end of a 2-7 road trip? It’s not upbeat, that’s for sure. But in the Nationals’ case, neither was it downtrodden.

Sunday’s 11-5 loss to the Phillies may have been one of the Nats’ worst games of the season, but it wasn’t necessarily reflective of the way they played through the rest of their long trip to Boston, Chicago and Philadelphia.

They lost seven games, yes. But five of those losses were by one or two runs. In each of those cases, one more timely hit or one more well-executed pitch would’ve flipped the script and produced a win for the visitors.

Recognizing that, the Nationals emerged from the carnage feeling more optimistic about the state of things than they probably should have felt.

“It was nine really good baseball games,” outfielder Jesse Winker said. “You hang your hat on that, then you get back home tomorrow and get some home cooking and give it hell.”

PHILADELPHIA – For the first time in a week, the Nationals hit a ball out of the park. Two of them, as a matter of fact. It was a welcome sight for a power-starved, run-starved lineup.

Then again, it doesn’t matter much when those two long-awaited home runs proved to be your only hits of the day until the eighth inning. Even more so when your pitching staff falls apart during the critical two-inning stretch that loomed large in what wound up a lopsided 11-5 loss to the Phillies.

Eddie Rosario and Jesse Winker’s blasts off Aaron Nola weren’t nearly enough for the Nats, who saw the game come undone in the fifth and sixth innings and wound up dropping their fifth straight game in the process.

Runs have been in short supply during the losing streak, the Nationals scoring a grand total of 10 in these five games. Even so, they were still in prime to position to win each of the previous four games, not to mention every other game on this 2-7 trip, thanks to stellar pitching that kept every game close.

"I feel like we've played a ton of games on the road, and they've all been really close," said Winker, whose team indeed has played far more games on the road (28) than at home (17). "We ran into Boston, who I think has one of the best ERAs in baseball right now. Then we ran into Chicago, who is playing really well and pitched lights out. And then you come to Philly, and they have the best record in baseball. It was nine really good baseball games. You hang your hat on that, then you get back home tomorrow and get some home cooking and give it hell."