In adding several veteran relievers with late-inning experience this winter and even into the spring, the Nationals hoped they were assembling a bullpen that would give Davey Martinez more viable options for tight ballgames and not force the manager to rely too much on his top arms.

So when the situation arose today in the team’s home opener – tie game in the eighth, Kyle Finnegan and Hunter Harvey having both pitched the previous two days – Martinez entrusted it to Matt Barnes, a 33-year-old former All-Star closer with the Red Sox trying to bounce back from an injury-plagued 2023 with the Marlins.

The ensuing results suggested there’s still some work to be done figuring out who else can be trusted to be part of the so-called "A" bullpen.

Allowing four of the first five batters he faced to reach base, Barnes turned a tie game into a three-run deficit and eventually an 8-4 loss to the Pirates, who are off to a surprising 5-0 start to their season and have left the Nats at 1-3 for the sixth consecutive year.

"It's a long season, and obviously a handful of things haven't started out the way we want to," Barnes said. "But we've got 158 games to go. Hiccups like this are going to happen. You clean them up and work on getting better."

In a perfect world, the Nationals would have come home from Cincinnati with a winning record to a sun-splashed ballpark for today’s home opener. Alas, this isn’t a perfect world. The Nats lost Sunday’s series finale to the Reds with a gut punch of a bottom of the ninth. And the sun will not be shining on South Capitol Street today, with lots of rain in the forecast.

The glimmer of hope? The percentage chance of rain goes down during the mid-to-late afternoon hours, so perhaps it will be dry enough to play as scheduled at 4:05 p.m. If the Nats knew Tuesday looked better, they absolutely would have postponed today’s game well in advance. Unfortunately, Tuesday’s forecast looks worse, so they really have no choice but to attempt to play today. It’s not ideal, but it’s the best they can do with what Mother Nature is throwing their way.

The Nationals come home to face a Pirates team that just swept a four-game series in Miami, two of those wins coming in extra innings. This is a team filled with young talent, making for an intriguing series here the next few days.

It’s MacKenzie Gore getting the ball for the home opener, an honor Davey Martinez wanted the young lefty to have. After less-than-dominant showings from Josiah Gray, Patrick Corbin and Jake Irvin in Cincy, it would be lovely to get some quality out of Gore today.

MASN has all the proceedings today, with a special hour-long pregame show beginning at 3 p.m. and concluding with all of the player intros, the anthem and flyover. If you can’t be here in person, be sure to tune in!

They would’ve come home flying high, having just won the season’s opening series on the road against a team with October aspirations, and having done it on the backs of some of their most important young players.

They would’ve taken the field at Nationals Park to a thunderous roar from a large crowd excited to welcome them home for the first time in 2024, enthusiasm soaring after such an uplifting start to the year.

They would’ve been the proud owners of a winning record for the first time since – get this – July 1, 2021, a night that saw a Nationals team loaded with star power fall to 40-39 after a loss to the Dodgers in which emergency second baseman Alex Avila strained not one but both of his calves. By month’s end, they would trade Max Scherzer, Trea Turner and a host of other veterans in the first act of a long and painful roster rebuild.

The Nats won’t take the field with a winning record today, though. They’re 1-2, not 2-1, after Kyle Finnegan’s swift and painful, bottom-of-the-ninth meltdown late Sunday afternoon in Cincinnati sapped all the goodwill out of the clubhouse and left a dejected ballclub to quietly shower, dress and head to the airport.

But does that loss, agonizing as it was, really change the overall state of the Nationals on this date? Does a blown save on March 31, ghastly as it was, erase everything else that preceded it?

CINCINNATI – The stage was set for another uplifting victory. Trey Lipscomb would be the hero. Other key young building blocks would have contributed. The Nationals just needed one more pitch from Kyle Finnegan.

And then, in what felt like a matter of seconds, it all collapsed.

One strike away from locking up the save, Finnegan instead surrendered a two-out double to Jonathan India, then back-to-back homers to Will Benson and Christian Encarnacion-Strand to deal the Nats a crushing 6-5 loss in the finale of their season-opening series.

"That's tough," manager Davey Martinez said. "Three-two, two outs. And then double, homer, homer. That's how the game ended. That's tough."

Handed a two-run lead for the bottom of the ninth, Finnegan seemed to be in complete control. He retired the first two batters he faced, then just needed to retire India to end it. But the Reds leadoff man kept battling, fouling off five straight fastballs before lining the 10th pitch of his at-bat into the left-field corner for a double.

CINCINNATI – The Nationals didn’t do a lot of things well in Thursday’s season-opening loss to the Reds, but high on the list was their lack of patience at the plate, leading to zero walks during the 8-2 loss.

They flipped the script Saturday, taking advantage of Hunter Greene’s wildness to draw four walks off the Cincinnati starter, then another two off closer Alexis Diaz during their ninth-inning rally to win 7-6.

Davey Martinez hopes the message sunk in for his players.

“If we accept our walks and not chase, we’ll hit the ball hard,” the manager said. “That’s what we’ve got to do always. We talked a lot about it this spring, we worked on it. These guys have to understand that taking your walks, good things happen. We saw that yesterday with CJ.”

Indeed, CJ Abrams was the biggest beneficiary of all of plate discipline. The 23-year-old shortstop drew three walks during the game, immediately stealing second base after each of them and ultimately scoring three runs.

CINCINNATI – It was quite pleasant here on Opening Day. It was unseasonably warm and windy Saturday. Now it’s cold and rainy for today’s series finale at Great American Ball Park. Gotta love Midwest weather.

No matter the conditions, the Nationals are feeling hot after their rousing, come-from-behind win less than 24 hours ago. They’ll try to keep the momentum going and leave town with a season-opening series win over the Reds in advance of Monday’s home opener against the Pirates, and they’ll do so with their most effective pitcher from spring training on the mound.

Jake Irvin didn’t get the attention others in the rotation did, but he was unquestionably the best of the group down in Florida. Over his final 15 innings of work, the right-hander did not allow a run, scattered four hits and two walks and struck out 13. He enters his second big league season brimming with confidence, and a solid outing today would only bolster that belief.

The Nationals wound up scoring seven runs on 11 hits and six walks Saturday, but five of the runs and eight of the baserunners came from the seventh inning on. They had chances earlier but could not convert with runners in scoring position (2-for-10 through the fifth). Let’s see if they can produce better in key situations early against Reds starter Nick Martinez today and actually play with a lead instead of forcing themselves to come from behind again. Davey Martinez is trotting out the same lineup, so that means three straight starts behind the plate for Keibert Ruiz and three straight starts in center field for Eddie Rosario.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at CINCINNATI REDS
Where: Great American Ball Park, Cincinnati
Gametime: 1:40 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Chance of rain, 58 degrees, wind 3 mph in from right field

CINCINNATI – The Nationals got major contributions from a number of young building blocks this afternoon, whether in the form of Trey Lipscomb’s solid all-around play in his major league debut, CJ Abrams’ three walks and three steals and triple or Keibert Ruiz’s latest clutch homer.

But when they needed one last contribution to pull off a rousing, come-from-behind win, they turned to one of the veterans they signed during spring training for moments just like this.

After Lipscomb, Abrams and Ruiz did their thing, Eddie Rosario did his, producing the sacrifice fly that capped a three-run rally in the top of the ninth and propelled the Nats to a stirring, 7-6 victory over the Reds that required all sorts of performances to make possible.

"Any game is fun to win," Abrams said. "But we all came and had each other's back, and we had fun getting the win today."

Having already rallied to tie the game the previous two innings, the Nationals were forced to do it again in the ninth after Hunter Harvey gave up a two-run double to new Cincinnati cult hero Nick Martini. They came through in impressive fashion against closer Alexis Diaz.

CINCINNATI – Trey Lipscomb had just completed his first workout Thursday at Innovative Field in Rochester and was preparing to board a bus with his Triple-A teammates for Syracuse, the site of the following day’s season opener. First, though, Red Wings manager Matt LeCroy wanted to let his players know who they would be sharing hotel rooms with on the road, so he pulled names out of a hat and announced as he went along.

Lipscomb’s name, as it turned out, was the last one drawn. The 23-year-old figured that meant he would get his own room in Syracuse. Instead, LeCroy announced to everyone in the clubhouse he was heading to Cincinnati to join the Nationals.

“He drew my name and he said: ‘You get your own hotel room, and you’re going to The Show,’” Lipscomb recalled this afternoon from the dugout at Great American Ball Park, where tonight he’ll make his major league debut. “It was pretty cool. Pretty cool.”

Lipscomb nearly made the Nats’ Opening Day roster, surviving the entirety of spring training and traveling with the team to D.C. for Tuesday’s exhibition finale. In the end, the club decided to keep Luis Garcia Jr. at second base and Rule 5 draftee Nasim Nunez on the bench, so Lipscomb was to begin the year with Rochester and spend most of his time at second base.

Then Nick Senzel fractured his right thumb trying to field a bad-hop grounder during batting practice before Thursday’s game, and the Nationals were left to scramble and call Lipscomb up before he ever had a chance to play his first Triple-A game.

CINCINNATI – And now the grind begins.

With the hoopla of Opening Day – and the traditional just-in-case-of-rainout off-day – now behind them, the Nationals and Reds get down to business. There will be fewer fans and media in attendance. Things won’t be magnified as much. It’s just another ballgame today.

Except for Trey Lipscomb, who makes his major league debut after officially having his contract purchased from Triple-A Rochester, with Nick Senzel going on the 10-day injured list with a fractured right thumb. Lipscomb made all kinds of headlines this spring with his .400 batting average and solid defensive play at multiple positions, but this is still a big leap for the 23-year-old, who only two years ago was playing at Tennessee.

The Nats will try to make it easy on Lipscomb (who starts at third base and bats ninth) by doing more at the plate against Reds flamethrower Hunter Greene than they did against Opening Day starter Frankie Montas. And they’ll hope to get a better showing from Patrick Corbin than they got from Josiah Gray. Though it’s worth noting there’s a strong wind blowing out to left field here today. It’s already a small ballpark under normal conditions. Corbin is going to have to do his best to keep the ball out of the air.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at CINCINNATI REDS
Where: Great American Ball Park, Cincinnati
Gametime: 4:10 p.m. EDT
TV: MASN2, MLB.tv
Radio: 106.7 FM, MLB.com
Weather: Partly cloudy, 74 degrees, wind 17 mph out to left field

CINCINNATI – Despite their limited action in free agency over the winter, the Nationals’ payroll has gone up a bit this year, a product almost entirely of returning players whose salaries increased via arbitration.

The Nats’ Opening Day payroll (counting 26 active players, plus five more who began the season on the injured list) is $107,566,629, according to Spotrac, which ranks 21st among all major league clubs. One year ago, that figure was about $94.5 million, which ranked 22nd.

Those totals count all money owed to players during the upcoming year, not any money that will be paid at a later date via deferrals.

The Nationals did very little in free agency during the offseason, signing only three players to major league contracts: Joey Gallo ($5 million guaranteed), Dylan Floro ($2.25 million) and Nick Senzel ($2 million). They did sign four more veteran free agents to minor league deals during spring training who wound up making the roster: Eddie Rosario ($2 million guaranteed), Jesse Winker ($1.5 million), Matt Barnes ($1.5 million) and Derek Law ($1.5 million).

All told, the Nats spent only $15.75 million on free agents, down from $18.25 million the previous offseason.

CINCINNATI – The Nationals had a plan all mapped out for Trey Lipscomb.

Lipscomb, the last player demoted from the spring training roster, would report to Triple-A Rochester, where he would get the bulk of his playing time at second base. There would be occasional starts at both shortstop and third base, but manager Davey Martinez wanted the versatile infielder to start getting comfortable at the position he has played the least coming up through the minors.

“It was a new position for him coming into the spring,” Martinez said around 1:45 p.m. Thursday, shortly before his team took the field at Great American Ball Park for batting practice. “So that was a big reason why we sent him over there, to get him accustomed to turning two all the time. And to be ready when he’s called upon.”

Maybe 30 minutes after making that statement, Martinez saw Nick Senzel leave the field with his right hand in a cup of ice. A short while late, the Nationals got the official word: Senzel had fractured his thumb trying to field an errant grounder during pregame warmups.

And just like that, the plan for Lipscomb was thrown out the window.

CINCINNATI – A season of renewed optimism ran headfirst into a brick wall this afternoon. Opening Day saw Josiah Gray get lit up by a 33-year-old journeyman, the Nationals lineup get shut down by a 31-year-old making his first start in two seasons and their starting third baseman get taken out by a pregame ground ball.

An 8-2 loss to the Reds – a game that essentially was over after three innings – was demoralizing enough. The injury to Nick Senzel might as well have been a kick to the groin, one that came 90 minutes before the season’s first pitch was even thrown.

Senzel, the former Cincinnati first-round pick who signed for a modest $2 million over the winter in hopes of resurrecting his career, was fielding grounders during batting practice when a ball struck him on the thumb. Instead of trotting out of the dugout with his new teammates in his old ballpark for player introductions, he was getting an X-ray, which revealed a broken right thumb, according to manager Davey Martinez.

"It's awful," Martinez said. "He was in a good spot, and we were in a good spot with him. He was excited for today. And then just a freak accident."

"I was warming up in the training room, and I see him roll in," Gray said. "I'm not really paying attention, but I hear him saying something happened. I feel terrible for him, because obviously the significance of coming back here - he had a long career here - and for it to happen in pregame as well, that's a tough blow for him. I feel for him."

CINCINNATI – Victor Robles is on the Nationals’ Opening Day roster for the sixth straight year. He is not, however, in the starting lineup for the first time.

Opting for what he hopes will be a better offensive matchup, manager Davey Martinez decided to start veteran Eddie Rosario in center field, with Jesse Winker in left field, for today’s season opener against the Reds.

“They’re both really good against right-handed pitching,” said Martinez, whose team is facing Cincinnati righty Frankie Montas. “I looked at the matchups, and I like the matchups. … This is the matchup I wanted to go with today.”

It’s an alignment the Nationals tinkered with during spring training, after Rosario signed a minor league deal in early March. The 32-year-old has played almost exclusively in left field throughout his long career with the Twins, Guardians and Braves, but he does have 58 games of big league experience in center field (albeit none since 2019).

Martinez, though, didn’t want to sit Winker, another mid-spring acquisition who struggled last season in Milwaukee but produced a .942 OPS in Florida over the last month to earn a spot on the team. And with Joey Gallo (a two-time Gold Glove Award outfielder) starting at first base, Joey Meneses is forced to be the designated hitter.

CINCINNATI – And away we go!

Forget about anything that happened last season. Forget about anything that happened over the winter. Forget about anything that happened during spring training. It all made for great conversation and debate, but it doesn’t matter anymore. Starting today, we have actual baseball to watch and evaluate.

The 20th season of Washington Nationals baseball begins on the road. It’s actually the first time the Nats have opened on the road since 2018, when rookie manager Davey Martinez debuted with a win in … Cincinnati! This is the eighth road opener in club history, and it’s strange to think the only repeat towns during that time are New York and Cincinnati of all places.

This is also only the fourth Opening Day against someone from outside the National League East. The others: at the Cubs in 2012, home against the Yankees in the bizarre 2020 season. Among division foes, the Nationals have faced the Mets and Braves five times apiece, the Marlins four times and the Phillies twice.

The last 12 season openers have seen only three starting pitchers take the mound: Max Scherzer (six times), Stephen Strasburg (four) and Patrick Corbin (two). But today, the Nats pass the ceremonial baton to someone new: Josiah Gray, who makes his first career Opening Day start, against the franchise that drafted him in 2018 (and then traded him to the Dodgers six months later).

CINCINNATI – The day has come. The 2024 baseball season begins later today, here in Cincinnati where the Nationals face the Reds in the opener of a three-game series. And for the first time in a while, there’s some genuine optimism surrounding the team.

Not enough optimism for anyone to predict this season will extend into October, mind you. But consider this: A year ago, four of us predicted the Nats would lose at least 100 games. This year, nobody is that pessimistic about their chances. Progress!

This is, hard to believe, the 20th season of Nationals baseball. And it’s the 15th season of Opening Day predictions by the beat crew. Most of the names have changed. Some left for a few years and then returned. All are convinced they’re smarter than anyone else in the group. Time will tell.

As always, I’m grateful to every one of them for participating in this exercise. And as always, we’ll revisit every one of these predictions at season’s end and cringe at how little we actually knew …

WHICH NATIONALS WILL BE SELECTED FOR THE ALL-STAR GAME?
Bobby Blanco (MASNsports.com) – CJ Abrams
Jessica Camerato (MLB.com) – CJ Abrams
Craig Heist (106.7 The Fan) – Josiah Gray, Keibert Ruiz
Chelsea Janes (Washington Post) – CJ Abrams
Andrew Golden (Washington Post) – MacKenzie Gore
Bill Ladson (MLB.com honorary) – Josiah Gray, Jake Irvin
Spencer Nusbaum (Washington Post) – MacKenzie Gore
Mark Zuckerman (MASNsports.com) – Kyle Finnegan

From the moment they traded Max Scherzer, Trea Turner and six others in July 2021, the Nationals stopped paying attention to their won-loss record.

Managers, general managers and players can say all they want about competing every single day and believing they’re going to win far more than they lose, but deep down everyone associated with the Nats knew at that moment the organizational priority no longer involved winning percentage at the major league level.

That continued through the 2022 season, which also saw the club deal Juan Soto in the biggest trade of them all, and then through the 2023 season, even though the Nationals’ win total ultimately did improve by a healthy amount from 55 to 71.

Now, as the rebuild enters its third full season, with several core players already on the roster and several more coming soon, it’s fair to ask for the first time in a long time: Should the Nats be judged primarily by their record?

“I think we’re at a point right now where it’s wins and losses,” right-hander Josiah Gray said. “We want to improve on last year.”

Spring training is officially over. The Nationals boarded their charter flight in West Palm Beach after Sunday’s game and departed for Washington, ready to get the 2024 season going.

There’s still one more exhibition to play (Tuesday’s “Futures Game” against the organization’s prospects) before Thursday’s season opener in Cincinnati, but it’s OK to take a moment today to look back at what transpired over the last six weeks and share some thoughts.

As is always the case, we spend a lot of time at spring training obsessing over certain roster spots or job competitions. And by the end of camp, you can’t help but wonder if that time and energy was well spent.

It’s in that spirit that we present an annual feature on the morning after the spring training finale: What did we maybe make too big a deal about, and what did we potentially gloss over during our time in Florida …

TOO BIG A DEAL: WHETHER THE KIDS WOULD MAKE THE TEAM
It was impossible not to devote a ton of attention to the row of top prospects whose lockers were all together right by the front door of the Nationals’ clubhouse. And there was plenty to get excited about from that group. But talk about their chances of making the Opening Day roster was probably premature. Yes, James Wood looked great, batting .364 with an MLB-best 1.214 OPS. But he’s also a 21-year-old with half a season of experience at Double-A. Yes, Dylan Crews had his moments. But he was still playing at LSU this time last year and struggled in his brief time in Harrisburg last September. Brady House? He’s still got a ways to go. Only Trey Lipscomb (the least-talked-about prospect at the start of spring) played his way into the conversation at the end of camp. He turns 24 this summer, he looks very comfortable at three infield positions, and he consistently hit all spring. But even if he doesn’t make the roster, it’s not the end of the world. All of these guys will eventually be playing in D.C. The real test comes now that spring training is over.

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. – The Nationals’ goal for today’s Grapefruit League finale was pretty simple: Get guys in, get them out, get them on a plane to D.C.

Though most of the regulars made the 45-minute trip to Mets camp, all were out of the game by the bottom of the fourth and hitting the showers so they could catch the early bus back to West Palm Beach. After that was the scheduled charter flight home, setting the stage for Tuesday’s final exhibition at Nationals Park and then Thursday’s season opener in Cincinnati.

So there wasn’t a whole lot to evaluate from what wound up a 10-1 loss. As long as everybody emerged healthy, everybody would be happy.

Patrick Corbin didn’t mind that he allowed three runs and seven hits in only four innings. The veteran left-hander knew he was scheduled for only four frames today. He would’ve preferred a slightly lower pitch count than his final total of 86, but the extra work wasn’t the worst thing, either.

“We were thinking four and 60,” he said. “So, some more pitches than I thought. But it was definitely good to at least get one more game, a real spring game, in. I’m ready to go, ready for Saturday.”

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. – The Nationals officially purchased the contracts of outfielders Eddie Rosario and Jesse Winker, plus reliever Matt Barnes, this morning, moving a step closer to finalizing their Opening Day roster.

Rosario, Winker and Barnes all made the club after coming to camp on minor league deals. They could be joined by reliever Derek Law, who appears to have made the team but hasn’t officially had his contract purchased yet.

Rosario, Winker and Barnes’ fates were determined Friday night when the Nationals optioned outfielders Alex Call and Jacob Young to Triple-A Rochester and reassigned reliever Jacob Barnes to minor league camp, settling those spring competitions for jobs.

Rosario and Winker join Lane Thomas and Victor Robles as the Nats’ four-man outfield to open the season. Manager Davey Martinez expects all to receive playing time, with Rosario playing both left and center fields, and Winker playing left field and serving as designated hitter at times.

“As I always say, things always play themselves out,” Martinez said. “I hope they both do really well. … They’re both going to help us, big time.”

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla. – The day has come at last. It’s the final day of spring training. Later this evening, the Nationals will board their charter flight and head north to D.C. But first, there’s one last game to play down here.

The Nats, who at 15-11-1 already are assured of finishing with a winning Grapefruit League record, head up the road to face the Mets in this afternoon’s finale. They’ll have Patrick Corbin on the mound making his final tune-up start before he takes the mound Saturday in Cincinnati for Game 2 of the regular season.

The lineup isn’t quite what we’ll see Thursday in Cincinnati, but it’s probably close. Riley (“Grey Pants”) Adams is behind the plate for one more spring road game. And Joey Meneses has the day off, leaving Eddie Rosario as the designated hitter. Trey Lipscomb (still in contention for the final spot on the roster) is on the trip but will come off the bench.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS vs. NEW YORK METS
Where: Clover Park, Port St. Lucie
Gametime: 1:10 p.m. EDT
TV: MLB.tv (Mets feed)
Radio: MLB.com (Mets feed)
Weather: Partly cloudy, 76 degrees, wind 18 mph in from center field

NATIONALS
SS CJ Abrams
RF Lane Thomas
LF Jesse Winker
DH Eddie Rosario
1B Joey Gallo
3B Nick Senzel
2B Luis García Jr.
C Riley Adams
CF Victor Robles