Adon returns from Triple-A, dominates Reds in 7-3 win (updated)

CINCINNATI – Only once in his major league career had Joan Adon looked anything like this. It wasn’t in his two relief appearances earlier this season. It wasn’t in any of his 14 starts last season, 12 of which ended in a loss.

No, you have to go all the way back to Adon’s major league debut on the final day of the 2021 season to find any outing that resembled today’s performance by the young Nationals right-hander.

On that day, best remembered as the final day of Ryan Zimmerman’s storied career, Adon took the mound at Nationals Park, stared down a potent Red Sox club that needed to win to make the postseason and caught everyone by surprise with an eye-opening performance.

Nearly two years and a lot of disappointing starts later, Adon rediscovered his prime form today during a 7-3 victory over the Reds at Great American Ball Park. And then dialed it up a few more notches to put together the best outing of his brief career.

With both power and precision, the 24-year-old carried a perfect game into the sixth inning before the Reds finally got to him. No matter, because thanks to early run support from his teammates and lights-out work from his bullpen, Adon still emerged at the end of the day with only his second major league win.

"It felt great to be able to go out there and contribute and pitch the way I did for six innings," Adon told reporters, via interpreter Octavio Martinez. "On the field, I felt like I had good command of all my pitches."

Recalled from Triple-A Rochester for what in theory was supposed to be a spot start while Trevor Williams remains on bereavement leave, Adon made the absolute most of his opportunity and now may force the Nationals to reconsider their plan for a guy who entered the day with a 1-12 record and 6.72 ERA in 17 career big league appearances and a 4.62 ERA in 17 starts at Triple-A this year.

After the game, manager Davey Martinez announced Adon will stay on the big league roster for now, with reliever Amos Willingham optioned to Rochester instead.

"The last time he was out there - I know he was in the bullpen - but he threw the ball a lot better," Martinez said. "He went down (to Triple-A) and worked on some things, and now he came back up here and polished up a lot of things. ... He did everything we asked of him to do, and that was awesome." 

Bolstered by plenty of early support from his teammates, who opened up a 6-0 lead by the top of the fourth, Adon was all business from the very start. He struck out the side in the bottom of the first on 13 pitches, then retired the side in the bottom of the second on 10 pitches, then retired the side in the bottom of the third on 10 pitches.

He threw first-pitch fastballs for strikes at the knees. He bent curveballs on the corners for strike two. Then he either blew away Cincinnati’s hitters for strike three or induced weak contact. The first 13 batters he faced either struck out or grounded out. Nobody so much as hit the ball in the air.

"Gosh, he was just mixing everything," catcher Riley Adams said. "He had confidence in all his pitches, and throwing them in any count. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't thinking about the perfect game there."

When he retired the first two batters of the sixth, Adon merely needed to retire No. 9 hitter Luke Maile to carry the unlikeliest of perfect-game bids into a seventh inning. Alas, he fell behind in the count 2-1, and though his next pitch jammed Maile, the Reds catcher got just enough muscle on it for an opposite-field single.

Now needing to recompose himself as his pitch count rose and as he was forced to pitch out of the stretch for the first time all day, Adon deflected a line drive from Elly De La Cruz off his glove and watched the blazing quick rookie beat it out for an infield single. And then after falling behind 2-0 to TJ Friedl, Adon finally succumbed, serving up a three-run homer to right that left his final pitching line (three runs in six innings) looking far less impressive than his actual performance suggested.

He was pulled with his pitch count at 86, Martinez not needing to confront a tricky situation of leaving a young starter on a low pitch count on the mound in search of history.

"I don't know what would've happened, because in that sixth inning, I started cramping," Adon revealed. "That's when I started feeling it. But no one wants to come out of a perfect game."

He was still well in line for the win, thanks to the early run support from a Nationals lineup that picked up where it left off late Friday night, when it scored six runs from the sixth through the 10th inning to emerge victorious in the series opener.

The Nats took full advantage of uncharacteristic wildness from Reds rookie Andrew Abbott, who walked four of the first nine batters he faced. Stone Garrett’s two-out double in the first scored Lane Thomas, who delivered a sacrifice fly to score Alex Call in his next plate appearance.

Thomas would create more damage in the top of the fourth, doubling to left to score Michael Chavis, who had singled earlier and taken an extra base on an error in center field by Friedl that allowed Call to score. Thomas then stole third and scored when Maile’s throw from behind the plate wound up rolling down the left field line.

Back-to-back doubles by Joey Meneses and Keibert Ruiz added one final run off Abbott in the sixth and provided some cushion for the Nationals bullpen once it took over for Adon. That reconfigured bullpen, now missing Mason Thompson (who was placed on the 15-day injured list with a left knee contusion), continued its surprising run of success. Andrés Machado, Jordan Weems and Kyle Finnegan each tossing a scoreless inning to wrap up the team's 10th win in its last 15 games (its best stretch since June 2021).

All of that, of course, ensured Adon would be adequately rewarded for his phenomenal efforts today. In his 16th big league start, he finally earned his second win. And in the process, maybe gave the Nationals reason to reconsider his future role around here.

"It was awesome to see him go out there, understand what he was trying to do and attack hitters, and do it well," Martinez said. "Today, for me, was a perfect example of what he really can do. If he stays engaged, I can see him helping us win games here."