MacKenzie Gore and Victor Robles drew most of the attention Tuesday night, but there were plenty of other factors that contributed to the Nationals’ 9-3 loss to the Cardinals, their fifth straight in this homestand and 13th in their last 15 games overall. …
* Another weak offensive performance was mitigated only somewhat by two late runs scored to put a small dent into an already lopsided margin.
The Nats managed all of one run on four hits against Jordan Montgomery, who had won only one of his previous 12 starts but managed to dominate for seven innings this time. The other two runs came late against Drew VerHagen and Jake Woodford with the game already out of reach.
The Nationals’ average exit velocity off Montgomery was only 80.7 mph. They didn’t have one batted ball hit over 100 mph against the St. Louis left-hander. (For comparison’s sake, the average exit velocity off Gore was 95.4 mph, with eight balls hit at 100 mph or harder against him.)
Equally troubling was the continued lack of patience from the Nats. They drew only one walk in the game (by Stone Garrett). That’s the seventh straight game they’ve drawn two or fewer walks. They’ve drawn a grand total of 20 free passes over their last 15 games (13 of which they’ve lost).
* Thaddeus Ward continues to struggle. The Rule 5 draft pick came out of the bullpen to replace Gore and gave up a run in both the seventh and eighth inning.
Ward has now been scored upon in four of his five appearances this month, surrendering multiple runs in each instance. Overall, his ERA is 5.86 and his WHIP is 1.482 in 19 total appearances.
Because of his Rule 5 status, Ward was always going to have a longer leash than anyone else in the Nationals bullpen. He can’t be demoted to the minors without first offering him back to the Red Sox and 28 other clubs who would be allowed to put in a waiver claim on him.
But the Nats are going to need to see some signs of improvement from Ward along the way if they’re going to be convinced he’s worth keeping on the major league roster the entire season.
* Hunter Harvey finally pitched for the first time in five days and wound up struggling.
The hard-throwing reliever hadn’t appeared in a game since Thursday night’s extra-inning win in Houston. Such is the life of a late-inning specialist on a team that has lost five straight games since.
Because Harvey sat for so many days, manager Davey Martinez felt compelled to use him Tuesday night, even with his team trailing by five runs at the time. It did not go well.
Harvey plunked Willson Contreras on his very first pitch. He served up a towering homer to Paul DeJong on a fastball over the plate. He wound up needing 31 pitches to complete one inning of relief, a heavy workload that could actually leave him needing to take Wednesday off, regardless of the score or situation.
* Riley Adams tripled. Which would be news anytime it happened, but was especially notable in this instance because it was the second time he’s done it in his last seven games played.
Adams, the Nationals’ 260-pound backup catcher, generally isn’t known for his speed on the bases. But remarkably he’s now tied for the team lead in triples this season, and he’s already tied the club record for triples in a season by a catcher.
Jesus Flores is the only other catcher in team history (2005-present) to hit two triples in a season. Adams has more than three months to try to add a third and establish a new record by himself.