More on Nats' crazy comeback against Colorado

For eight innings of yesterday’s finale, it looked like the Nationals offense had run out of juice to mount another comeback.

But that’s why baseball plays nine innings.

After Lane Thomas’ one-out single in the third inning, the Nats sent the minimum to the plate over the next 5 ⅔ innings. The only baserunner over that stretch was Jeimer Candelario, who was hit by a pitch from Peter Lambert in the sixth and then out on a double play ball by Joey Meneses.

The Nats only had five baserunners after eight innings on three hits, a walk and the hit batter.

“The chasing,” manager Davey Martinez lamented after the game on the Nats’ lack of offense. “We gave away too many at-bats because we were chasing all day today. We play a game like we did last night, come back and play at 12 o'clock. I tell these guys that’s part of growing up right now is that you got to grind today. Today's a grind day for some of our young players and veteran guys. It's not gonna be easy. I know it's hot. But you gotta grind.”

Grind they did in the bottom of the ninth.

Facing right-hander Daniel Bard, who they knew had dealt with the yips in the past, worked good at-bats to get more runners on base in that frame than they had the previous eight combined.

Thomas and Jeimer Candelario drew back-to-back five-pitch walks, neither of them even swinging at an offering from Bard. Meneses then singled on a 95 mph fastball right down the middle to load the bases with no outs.

Keibert Ruiz took the most aggressive at-bat, swinging at a first-pitch sinker that stayed up in the zone and popping out to first baseman Michael Toglia.

“Keibert got up with bases loaded looking to get a pitch to hammer here,” said Martinez. “I mean, go ahead. But other than that, they were patient.”

On Bard’s very next pitch, he hit Dominic Smith with a 95 mph fastball that hit him square in the thigh and scored the inning’s first run.

Stone Garrett worked the count to 2-2 and then took an inside slider the other way to score the second run.

Then came decision time for Rockies manager Bud Black. With first base empty and Luis García, who was hitting .200 over his last 19 games coming into Wednesday, due up, Black decided to intentionally walk the slumping second baseman and bring up pinch-hitter Ildemaro Vargas with force outs at all bags and hopefully get a double play ball.

“Well, they were thinking about it,” Martinez said when asked if he was surprised Black intentionally walked García. “I wanted them to see Vargas up there, so I brought him up instead of waiting and let them make a choice of what to do. It's a tough call. I know that. But they chose to walk him and Vargas in turn walked himself.”

The other interesting call – or non-call – by Black was to stick with Bard while Matt Koch was warming up in the bullpen. Koch might not have been ready yet, but Bard clearly didn’t have it.

Vargas watched as four pitches completely missed the strike zone and took his base while the tying run scored.

“You have to get the ball in the zone,” Martinez said. “My biggest thing was, ‘Hey, get a ball that you know you can handle and get it in the zone and be ready.’ They all went up there, we started out with just going up there and trying to take a strike and getting him to get the ball in the zone. Once we got guys on base, we had a chance to tie the game, then it became more, ‘Hey, get a ball that you can hit hard and try to drive the ball.’ And like I said, they were patient. They were good. They tried to get the ball in the zone and they took their walks.”

Then the ball to drive finally came once Koch entered to face CJ Abrams, who got a quick rundown of what the righty throws from hitting coach Darnell Coles while the pitch took the mound.

“He just showed me what he throws,” Abrams said. “I had faced him the day before, too. So I knew he was gonna throw that little cutter and I got it.

The first pitch was a fastball that Abrams fouled off. The next one was a cutter in the dirt. Then the third pitch was another cutter right in the zone that Abrams was able to get enough to get past Toglia.

“Big moment for him. Big moment for our team,” Martinez said. “Like I said, he was kind of swinging a little uphill today. And I reiterated again that he needs to hit the ball down. Get the ball down, hit the ball down, hit a line drive. Just a simple ground ball in the hole scored a winning run for him. But he's doing really well. He's done really well. He's matured. He's maturing as we sit here. He loves playing the game and he loves leading up because, like I said before, part of that leadoff spot is getting on base for your teammates, and he loves that part of it.”

The end result, of course, was the fourth run of the inning and the one to send everyone home.

In the end, the Nats scored two unearned runs in the first through sixth innings over these three games against the Rockies. In innings seven through nine, they scored 15. The good, late-inning mojo even came from all the way back in the Nationals’ training room.

“Joe La Sorsa was actually trying to leave,” said starter Jake Irvin. “He was in there, too, and he was trying to leave. And spots are hot. Had to keep everybody until the job was done.”

According to STATS, the Nationals scored four-plus combined runs in the eighth and ninth inning in all three games against the Rockies this week, including two comeback wins of three runs or more in the eighth inning or later.

The last team to do that in a series (minimum of three games) was the Tigers against the Brewers in a four-game set on April 25-28, 1901. (The 1901 Brewers became the St. Louis Browns, who would eventually become the Orioles. So they are not the same Brewers team that exists today.)

So, on a day that seemed like everything was going against them, the Nationals were able to turn it into a positive and make a little bit of history while they were at it.

“We’re gonna take the positives every day and bring them to the next day,” Abrams said. “So bringing it to New York now.”