After a 2-4 road trip, the Nationals have lost five straight series, all coming against tough opponents. And depending on how you view the Marlins, another one is on deck this weekend.

The Fish are 38-31 and in second place in the National League East, but have the second-worst run differential in the division at -30. Their bread and butter is one-run games in which they are a stunning 17-5, including two out of the three games they won against the Nats in May.

Of course, the Nats have struggled against the Marlins for a while. They are 4-18 against their division rivals since the start of last year.

Trevor Williams gets the start in tonight’s opener. The right-hander is 3-4 with a 4.11 ERA and 1.355 WHIP in his first 13 starts. He has set season highs with six strikeouts in back-to-back outings and turned in a quality start against the Marlins the last time these two teams met.

Sandy Alcantara gets the call for the Fish. The reigning NL Cy Young Award winner has not put up the kind of numbers we’re used to seeing from the right-hander, going only 2-5 with a 4.75 ERA on the year. But he did hold the White Sox to one run over seven innings in his last start.

HOUSTON – It seems hard to believe given his offensive struggles the last three seasons, but Victor Robles’ pending return should be a real boon to the Nationals’ offensive fortunes.

Robles, out since May 7 with a back injury, appears to be in the final stages of a rehab assignment with Triple-A Rochester and could be activated this weekend, perhaps even in time for tonight’s series opener against the Marlins at Nationals Park.

Will the 26-year-old center fielder with a career .670 OPS really make much positive difference at the plate? If he performs anything like he did prior to suffering the injury while sliding into second base in Arizona, yes.

Robles was making some real strides through the season’s first month-plus. It’s not just his .292 batting average and .388 on-base percentage, impressive as those are. It’s his approach at the plate, a vast improvement from 2020-22.

Robles has always been one of the freest swingers in baseball, often to his detriment. His strikeout rate the last three seasons was a lofty 25.1 percent, his walk rate a scant 6.1 percent that plummeted to 4.2 percent in 2022.

HOUSTON – For 26 innings over three agonizing nights, the Nationals tried like might to hit a baseball high and far at the home run haven that is Minute Maid Park. For 26 innings, they could not get anything to clear the fence.

And then, at last, in the 27th inning of this series against the Astros, Keibert Ruiz finally broke through and delivered the big blast his team had so desired all week.

But because Hunter Harvey couldn't record the 27th out without surrendering the tying run, the series was extended to a 28th inning and the Nats found themselves in extras for the first time this season.

And thanks to some long-awaited offensive execution by several members of the lineup, they emerged at the end of the night with a well-deserved 4-1 victory over the defending World Series champions.

"It always feels good to win," Ruiz said. "I feel really good for the team. We've been playing really good, coming from behind. We lost yesterday, but we've come from behind and we've been playing better. Don't give up, keep the head up and keep playing hard."

HOUSTON – It was easily forgotten, because of what transpired moments later, but prior to the controversial ending of Wednesday night’s game, the Nationals put themselves in an especially disadvantageous position when they allowed Kyle Tucker to steal third off them without even attempting to throw him out.

Tucker, leading off second base with one out in the bottom of the ninth of what was at that point a tie game, took off for third as Hunter Harvey delivered his pitch to the plate and slid in safely as catcher Keibert Ruiz could do nothing but watch from his position.

It may not have mattered, because Harvey proceeded to walk Corey Julks and then surrendered the grounder by Jake Meyers that scored the winning run when Meyers wasn’t called for interfering with Ruiz’s throw to first. But it stuck with manager Davey Martinez, who has grown tired of seeing that type of play happen against his team over and over this season.

“It definitely matters,” Martinez said. “In a situation like that … we’ve got to keep the guy on first base or second base, wherever he may be.”

This has become a disturbing, regular pattern for the Nationals, who enter tonight’s game having surrendered 67 stolen bases (tied for third-most in the majors) while throwing out only 15 runners. The problem is more acute in late innings, with Harvey, Kyle Finnegan, Mason Thompson, Carl Edwards Jr. and Andrés Machado having combined to allow 20-of-22 opposing runners successfully steal of them.

HOUSTON – Tonight is the 15th scheduled game of a stretch that has seen the Nationals play nothing but contenders, including some of the best teams in baseball. It promised to be a difficult stretch, and it most certainly has proven to be that. They enter tonight’s finale at Minute Maid Park with a 3-10 record against the Dodgers, Phillies, Diamondbacks, Braves and Astros. (They of course didn't play one game vs. Arizona due to hazardous air quality in D.C.)

The schedule eases up now, but before that happens the Nats would love to emerge from this series with at least one win over the defending World Series champions. They’ll need to score some runs prior to the top of the ninth, you’d think, but the challenge again isn’t an easy one facing Christian Javier. The 26-year-old right-hander is 7-1 with a 3.13 ERA in 13 starts, though he did give up four runs on seven hits and three walks during a five-inning no-decision against the Guardians last week.

As was the case for Josiah Gray on Wednesday night, MacKenzie Gore faces his own challenge in the form of a potent Houston lineup that gets shortstop Jeremy Peña back tonight. Gore had a rough one in his last start in Atlanta, giving up five runs in five innings, including a pair of homers. He’ll have to keep an Astros team that has launched six homers so far in this series in the park tonight.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at HOUSTON ASTROS
Where: Minute Maid Park
Gametime: 8:10 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Indoors

NATIONALS
RF Lane Thomas
2B Luis García
3B Jeimer Candelario
DH Corey Dickerson
C Keibert Ruiz
1B Dominic Smith
LF Stone Garrett
SS CJ Abrams
CF Alex Call

HOUSTON – The ninth inning of Wednesday night’s game at Minute Maid Park featured enough drama and twists and turns to capture every ounce of attention afforded the Astros’ 5-4 victory over the Nationals.

It also rendered everything that happened prior to the final inning moot, even though there were a few significant developments throughout the bulk of this game. Most notably, Josiah Gray’s seven-inning start and another new pitch he unveiled along the way.

Gray didn’t enjoy anything close to his best results of the season, charged with four earned runs thanks to a two-run double in the first and back-to-back homers surrendered in the fourth. But the right-hander did do a lot of things well, better than he had for much of the season to date.

He didn’t issue a walk for the first time since Aug. 10, 2022 against the Cubs. He threw 66 of his 95 pitches for strikes. He completed seven innings for only the third time this year.

For those reasons, Gray still viewed this as a positive outing, despite the fact he was due to take the loss until his teammates rallied in the top of the ninth.

HOUSTON – That tonight's game, with the Nationals back at Minute Maid Park for the first time since the 2019 World Series, would end the way it did defied all common sense and logic. How could the baseball gods concoct such a scenario – a potential obstruction call on a bang-bang play at first base – with a game between these two teams in this ballpark, and have that call yet again go against Davey Martinez's club? Was this some kind of cruel cosmic joke?

It was not. It was all too real, and it cost the Nats in a way none of the previous similar plays that have befallen them did. This one ended the game. This one gave the Astros a 5-4 walk-off victory moments after the visitors had staged a dramatic, three-run rally to tie the game in the top of the ninth.

And this one left Martinez as steamed as he's ever been at the end of a loss.

"I'm over this play!" the sixth-year manager bellowed as he held up a just-printed piece of paper showing a still frame of Houston's Jake Meyers clearly running in fair territory toward first base as catcher Keibert Ruiz prepared to make a throw from the plate that would hit Meyers' helmet and Michael Chavis' glove right as he arrived at the bag. "Seriously, they need to fix the rule. If this is what the umpires see, as he's running down the line? I'm tired of it. I'm tired of it. Fix it! We lost the game, and (plate umpire Jeremy Riggs) had nothing to say about it, because he can't make the right call. Brutal! Brutal!"

In the exact location where Trea Turner infamously was called for obstruction in Game 6 of the World Series, leading to Martinez's ejection, Meyers was not called for it tonight. As the ball squirted away from Chavis, José Abreu waltzed home with the winning run as the crowd of 39,796 rejoiced, fireworks exploded overhead and Martinez stormed out of the dugout to accost Riggs.

HOUSTON – Upon learning the Nationals were skipping his turn in the rotation so he could take a physical and mental break, Jake Irvin almost didn’t know what to do with himself. The rookie right-hander had grown so accustomed to the regimented, five-day schedule for starters since arriving in the big leagues last month, the idea of a layoff for non-injury reasons was quite foreign to him.

Now that he’s had more than a week of rest, though, Irvin has come to understand how valuable it was in the wake of everything that came before.

“Making your debut and going through the whirlwind of the first month in the big leagues is something you can’t really explain,” he said. “It’s something you go through once and hopefully get your feet wet. I’ve taken this time to kind of reflect on what’s happened so far, and how you can move forward as best as possible. Not only does it give the body a chance to reset, but it really gives your mind a chance to reset and move forward and grow.”

The Nationals took advantage of Monday’s scheduled off-day to skip over Irvin’s spot in the rotation. Patrick Corbin went ahead and started Tuesday’s series opener against the Astros on normal rest, and Josiah Gray and MacKenzie Gore will follow to round out this series.

Irvin, who last pitched June 6 against the Diamondbacks, is likely to return to the mound either Friday or Saturday against the Marlins. Manager Davey Martinez said he planned to meet with pitching coach Jim Hickey today to settle on a plan.

HOUSTON – Josiah Gray enters tonight’s start with a 3.00 ERA, which is quite good. Good enough to rank sixth in the National League, in fact. His 1.403 WHIP, however, is worse than it was in either of the last two seasons. So, how do we reconcile those two facts?

Gray’s peripheral numbers aren’t great because he’s walking a lot of batters (4.6 per nine innings). But he’s not giving up runs because he’s managing to get outs when he needs to (opponents are batting and slugging .145 against him with runners in scoring position) and he’s avoided the home run (1.0 per nine innings, down from 2.3 last season). Can he keep that up? We shall see, but the test tonight against the Astros is a good one for the young right-hander.

A little run support wouldn’t hurt, either. After an uptick in production that included 5.4 runs per game from May 15-June 2, the Nationals are averaging only 3.1 over their last eight games. Is it any wonder they’ve lost seven of those games?

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at HOUSTON ASTROS
Where: Minute Maid Park
Gametime: 8:10 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Indoors

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

HOUSTON – There was what appeared to be a bounceback performance 2 1/2 weeks ago in Kansas City, prompting the question: Was Mason Thompson back?

The answer, at that time: No, he wasn’t. The Nationals reliever followed up an encouraging, two-scoreless-inning appearance May 27 against the Royals with a three-run meltdown three days later at Dodger Stadium.

So take this with a grain of salt. But after another dominant performance Tuesday night during the Nats’ 6-1 loss to the Astros, Thompson continued a more recent trend that suggests he may actually be coming out of his long funk at last.

“Absolutely, he’s getting back,” manager Davey Martinez insisted.

What did Thompson do in this game to stand out? He faced three batters in the bottom of the sixth and proceeded to retire the side, inducing a grounder to short and then back-to-back strikeouts of Chas McCormick and Jake Meyers.

HOUSTON – Minute Maid Park has always been kind to Patrick Corbin, and we’re not just talking about Game 7 of the 2019 World Series here.

While that epic, three-inning relief appearance may have represented the pinnacle of the left-hander’s career and proved essential to the Nationals’ championship victory that night, Corbin has enjoyed pitching in this supposedly hitter-friendly park for years.

When he took the mound for the bottom of the fifth tonight, Corbin was the proud owner of a 16 2/3-inning scoreless streak at the home of the Astros. He hadn’t surrendered a run here since Aug. 18, 2012 as a rookie with the Diamondbacks.

This place, for whatever reason, just brings out the best in him.

Then Corbin began pitching the bottom of the fifth, at which point the streak ended, the Astros reminded him just how powerful they still are and the Nationals reminded everyone how much has changed since the night of Oct. 30, 2019.

HOUSTON – Davey Martinez walked into Minute Maid Park this afternoon and couldn’t help but think about the last time he was here.

“Pretty cool,” the Nationals manager said. “It was four years ago, but it brings out good memories. I was sitting around with some of the guys who were here in ’19. There’s not many of us left. But we were reminiscing a little bit. It was fun.”

Indeed, there aren’t too many members of the Nats’ current roster or staff that were part of the 2019 World Series. Martinez is one of the last remaining, uniformed links to the franchise’s lone World Series title, so he found himself today sharing stories of that glorious late October week with young players who weren’t even in the major leagues at that point, let alone a part of this organization.

The next three nights, with the Nationals facing the Astros here for the first time in four seasons, offer everyone a chance both to reminisce about better days and to think about what it will take for this franchise to return to that kind of prominence.

There’s only one player on the active, 26-man roster who appeared in the 2019 World Series. And by sheer coincidence he takes the mound for tonight’s series opener.

HOUSTON – Hello from Minute Maid Park, where tonight the Nationals will take the field for the first time since Oct. 30, 2019. You probably remember some details about that night.

The guy who won that game is the only player on the Nats’ current active roster, and would you believe he starts tonight’s series opener against the Astros? Patrick Corbin gets the nod on normal rest, with the team using Monday’s day off to skip over Jake Irvin’s turn in the rotation and give the rookie a chance to work on some things. Corbin won’t be pitching in relief tonight, of course. He’ll be trying to hold in check a tough Houston lineup, albeit one that doesn’t bear much resemblance to the one from 2019, either.

The Nationals lineup, which broke out for six runs Sunday in Atlanta, has a familiar look against Astros right-hander Hunter Brown. Davey Martinez can only hope Joey Meneses, Jeimer Candelario and Dominic Smith pick up where they left off at Truist Park.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at HOUSTON ASTROS
Where: Minute Maid Park
Gametime: 8:10 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Indoors

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

Let’s take a walk down memory lane, shall we?

It’s hard not to as the Nationals make their first visit to Houston since winning the 2019 World Series in Game 7 at Minute Maid Park. And I don’t really like reminiscing too much about something that happened four years ago.

There have been three different World Series champions since the Nats won it all. And in that time, the Nats have had three straight last-place finishes in the National League East.

The team looks completely different now, too. There is only one player from that 2019 roster currently on the Nats’ active 26-man roster: Patrick Corbin, who coincidentally was credited as the winning pitcher in Game 7 after three shutout innings of relief and will start tonight’s series opener. There are only three other players from that team on this 40-man roster: Stephen Strasburg, Tanner Rainey and Victor Robles, all recovering from injuries.

There are a couple of guys still with the organization. Sean Doolittle and Matt Adams are on minor league deals, trying to work their way back to the majors. But a lot of the big-name players are now gone.

It was only a matter of time before James Wood made a big splash at Double-A Harrisburg.

After getting the promotion for High-A Wilmington on May 28, he only collected one hit over his first three Double-A games.

He’s been on a tear ever since.

Since the start of June, the Nats’ top prospect is 11-for-37 with four doubles, three home runs, eight RBIs and a walk with the Senators.

This past weekend proved to be Wood’s biggest yet.

ATLANTA – It was raining heavily here this morning. There was a point when the forecast didn’t look conducive to playing baseball.

But the rain cleared out, the tarp was removed from the infield and this afternoon’s finale between the Nationals and Braves went off without a hitch.

And as the clouds cleared out for sunny skies, so did the clouds that have been hovering over this Nationals team this last week.

The Nats snapped their six-game losing streak, and in the process also snapped the Braves’ seven-game winning streak, with a 6-2 victory in front of 36,744 fans at Truist Park.

Just as I wrote this morning that the Nats were in search of more power, they found it.

ATLANTA – The Nationals are going to use these couple of off-days over this week to give one of their young starters some extra rest.

Jake Irvin will have his next start skipped in the rotation, with the Nats listing Patrick Corbin, Josiah Gray and MacKenzie Gore as the probable starters for the upcoming three-game series against the Astros.

Thursday’s postponement due to poor air quality in D.C. and tomorrow’s scheduled off-day as the team travels to Houston mean the Nats have two off-days over a five-day span.

“We have an opportunity to do some different things, and to give him a break was nice,” manager Davey Martinez said of the decision to skip Irvin before today’s series finale against the Braves. “We're gonna eventually have to do that with all of our young guys here soon. We had these days off coming up, so we thought we'd give Jake a breather. But you know, he can be available out of the bullpen as well. We just want to not have him start and then he'll get back in the rotation next time around.”

Irvin, the Nats’ No. 19 prospect per MLB Pipeline, impressed over his first two major league starts. He allowed just one run in 4 ⅓ innings in his debut against the Cubs and then shut out the Giants over 6 ⅓ innings in his second outing.

ATLANTA – The Nationals need a stopper and they need one badly. Or do they need more offense and need that badly?

They could use both as they try to snap this six-game losing streak and escape Atlanta with at least one win today.

Trevor Williams will attempt to be the stopper. The right-hander is 2-4 with a 4.15 ERA and 1.335 WHIP in his first 12 starts. He has completed five innings in all but two of his outings, with one being cut short due the rain-prompted suspension of the Nats' May 13 game against the Mets.

This is his first time facing the Braves in 2023, but he is 1-1 with a 3.28 ERA and 1.150 WHIP in eight career appearances (four starts) against Atlanta.

The offense has a tough task in trying to get going against Bryce Elder. The 24-year-old right-hander leads the National League with a 2.26 ERA, while posting a 4-0 record and 1.144 WHIP over his first 12 starts.

ATLANTA – However close the first two games between the Nationals and Braves this weekend were, one thing has been abundantly clear: One team has power in full supply and one is seriously lacking.

You can probably guess which team is which.

The Nationals were doomed by this stark difference yesterday. The Braves hit two home runs, both two-run shots. The Nationals hit one, a leadoff homer by Stone Garrett in the top of the ninth in what ended up being a 6-4 loss.

Digging a little deeper shows the power difference is more than just home runs.

The Braves barreled four balls from Nationals pitching: Two doubles and the two homers. The Nationals barreled just one: Luis García’s deep fly ball in the first inning that was a sacrifice fly instead of a two-run homer.

ATLANTA – A major difference between the Nationals and Braves is power at the plate. The Braves have it. The Nationals do not.

The Nats have hit the second-fewest homers in the majors and fewest in the National League. Meanwhile, the Braves have hit the third-most in the majors and second-most in the NL.

That difference was pretty glaring in today’s 6-4 loss in front of 40,799 at Truist Park.

When the offense doesn’t have a lot of pop, you need pitching that also keeps the ball in the field of play and doesn’t give up a lot of free baserunners so that those one-run shots don’t turn into multiple runs.

MacKenzie Gore has done a much better job of limiting walks recently. After giving up multiple in nine of his first 10 starts, he had given up just one over his last two starts coming into today’s rematch with the Braves.