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Nats snap 9-game losing streakApril 13th, 2008
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The Washington Nationals used the final game of their first extended homestand at their new field to snap an ugly nine-game losing streak, defeating the Atlanta Braves 5-4.
Nats starter Tim Redding picked up his second win of the season after giving up six hits and three runs in five innings. Jon Rauch notched his second save of the season by throwing one pitch that induced Braves catcher Brain McCann to fly out to right. Rauch relieved Chad Cordero, who began the ninth by quickly retiring two Braves hitters before loading the bases.
Braves starter Tom Glavine not only picked up the loss but also matched his career’s shortest outing, giving up three hits and one walk without retiring a batter before leaving in the first inning with a strained right hamstring. The lefthander was charged with two runs, both of them earned.
All of the Nats runs came in the first three innings, two in the first and second and one in the third. The Braves’ knocked three hits through five innings before coming alive in the sixth, when they scored three runs on the strength of Chipper Jones’ two-run homer and Jeff Francoeur’s sacrifice fly to right, scoring Mark Teixeira who had doubled to right center.
With the win, the Nats escaped being swept three straight series, two of which would have been at the hands of NL East division rivals; the Florida Marlins took three games last week before the Braves came to DC and won two.
Previous to the Marlins series, the Cardinals swept the Nats out of St. Louis. The win also spared the Nats of losing all six games of their first homestand. Rather, they lost five on top of four just before returning.
The victory marked the return for Nats leftfielder Wily Mo Peña, who was activated after beginning the season on the disabled list with a strained left oblique. But Peña was hitless at the plate, going 0-4 by grounding into a double play that scored a run in the first, followed by three strikeouts. He also committed the game’s only error, a costly one when a fly ball fell from his mitt while he was running it down in the eighth inning. The Braves’ run was unearned, cutting the Nats’ lead to one when Francoeur trotted home from second base.
The Nats’ first three hitters – Christian Guzman, Lastings Milledge and Ryan Zimmerman – went a combined 5-9 with three walks and two RBI. Milledge had two singles and a double.
Nats fans became loudest in the ninth,when Cordero registered two strikes on Yunel Escobar with two out. But Cordero walked him, then gave up a double to Jones that sent Escobar to third. Cordero then intentionally walked Teixeira before being relieved by Rauch.
After the soldout homeopener at Nationals Park, attendance has fallen at the new stadium. In the three-game set against the Marlins, attendance maxed Thursday night, with 60 percent of tickets sold. Saturday’s game was the best attended against the Braves with 79 percent of tickets sold.
This week, the Nats visit the Mets, then the Marlins, for three games apiece, followed by a two-game set in Atlanta beginning next Monday.
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