Nats overcome another short start, rally late to beat Reds (updated)

That the Nationals had to ask for at least seven innings from their bullpen for the second time in four games was aggravating. That they somehow were still in position to win another one of these games was absolutely remarkable.

And yet here the Nats were once again, forced to turn to the bullpen early after an extra-abbreviated outing from their starter. And here they were once again finding a way to emerge victorious at the end of the night, storming back from an early deficit created by MacKenzie Gore to beat the Reds, 5-4.

"Well, that was a grind," manager Davey Martinez sighed. "The boys played hard. They played with their heart."

They pulled it off by chipping away at Cincinnati’s early lead, scoring two runs in the first, one in the fourth, one in the seventh and one more in the eighth on Jacob Young’s clutch two-out RBI single.

And they pulled it off thanks to another brilliant performance by a relief corps asked to work overtime after Gore lasted only two laborious innings.

Jordan Weems, Robert Garcia, Dylan Floro and Derek Law combined to toss six innings of one-run ball, keeping the game close to give their teammates a chance to rally. And once they took the lead at last, Kyle Finnegan finished it off in the ninth for his 27th save in 31 attempts.

"I don't think as a reliever you're ever ready for that, because we expect the best out of our starters, honestly," said Law, who pitched a scoreless seventh and eighth and was credited with the win. "We're never thinking our guy is going to go under five or six innings. We're expecting six or seven. So I don't think anything really preps you for it. And then when you see it happening, the adrenaline starts kicking in without the phone even ringing. I think that's where everybody kind of turns the switch on real quick."

The winning rally was made possible by Ildemaro Vargas, who led off the eighth with a double off the left-field wall. James Wood and Trey Lipscomb weren’t able to drive Vargas in, but Wood’s grounder to the right side at least moved him 90 feet away from the plate.

To the plate stepped Young, who with the infield playing back had to be tempted to square around to bunt. Instead, he went right after Justin Wilson and ripped the lefty’s first pitch past a diving Santiago Espinal at third base for the go-ahead RBI single that left the Saturday night crowd of 32,734 roaring with approval.

"If I found a pitch up in the zone I liked, I wanted to get to it as best I could," Young said. "I knew it was going to be fastball up or cutter in, something like that. I know how they work me usually. So I just wanted to make sure if I got something like, I was on time. And I was able to find a hole there."

Rarely does a manager find himself having to think about pulling his starter in the first inning due to an excessive pitch count. But to have this happen twice in the span of four games, albeit with the All-Star break sandwiched in between? This felt unprecedented.

But it was all too real, Martinez in the home dugout, hands on hips, contemplating whether he needed to pull Gore in the first inning as his pitch count surpassed the 40-mark, just as he did with Mitchell Parker one week ago in Milwaukee. Unlike Parker, Gore somehow managed to complete the inning. But he legitimately was down to his final batter, with Jordan Weems ready to go in the bullpen if the frame continued any longer.

"I can tell you right now: He don't get that hitter out, he was out," Martinez said.

The tone was set right from the get-go, with Gore issuing seven consecutive balls before finally throwing a strike. Unable to locate his fastball, and unable to get the Reds to put anything near the plate in play in fair territory, the left-hander kept racking up pitch after pitch after pitch. The top of the first went as follows: four-pitch walk, six-pitch walk, nine-pitch strikeout, four-pitch RBI single, seven-pitch walk, 10-pitch sacrifice fly, eight-pitch strikeout.

The grand totals at the end of all that: A staggering 48 pitches thrown to seven batters, with two runs scoring via one hit and three walks. The Reds fouled off a whopping 16 of those pitches, including 11 of the 14 fastballs they swung at.

"Forty pitches is a crazy amount of pitches in one inning," he said. "So you're obviously a little more tired than you were when you started. But you try to stay with that one-pitch-at-a-time thing that you start with. At that point, it's just kind of where we're at. Nothing I can do about it. Just try to get out of it and limit the damage as much as possible."

Martinez gave Gore the opportunity to return for the top of the second, and he was poised to finish off the inning in short order until he issued another two-out walk, then an RBI double to Elly De La Cruz. By the time he retired ex-teammate Jeimer Candelario to end the inning, his total pitch was up to 67, and that’s as far as his manager would let him go.

"I have to be better," said Gore, who has seen his ERA skyrocket from 3.24 to 4.20 over the last month. "I understand what I'm doing wrong. I think we all do. But I just have to figure out a solution, because this is enough. I can't keep doing this."

When Martinez made the move last week with Parker, his team trailed 5-0. This time, the deficit was only 3-2, thanks to some early offense from another new source. Harold Ramírez, in his 35th plate appearance since joining the Nationals from the Rays, connected for his first homer, a two-run blast into the red seats in left-center in the bottom of the first to keep the crowd engaged.

The Nats would push across another run off Cincinnati starter Nick Lodolo in the fourth, loading the bases with two outs and then watching as CJ Abrams beat a late Lodolo to the bag on a chopper to first. The crowd roared the home team’s third run of the night, but more was still needed.

"I could go back to CJ hustling out a single there to get a run," Martinez said. "That was awesome. If we can play with that intensity every day, good things are going to happen."

They got more, scoring the tying run in the bottom of the seventh on Lane Thomas’ RBI double down the right field line. But with a chance to take the lead there, Keibert Ruiz (pinch-hitting for Riley Adams) grounded out, leaving the outcome of the game undecided into the late innings.

And then one inning later, Young delivered the last big hit they needed and Finnegan delivered the last scoreless frame they needed and everyone was able to enjoy another unexpected victory at the end of a night that started off in such aggravating fashion.

"I call those a 'locker room win.' It brings the team a little closer together," Law said. "Everybody's in here celebrating a little extra. And everybody's pulling for everybody in that situation, what's going on and how it all evolves. I think it just ends up meshing a little bit together closer and closer and closer. I hate to say it, but you kind of need games like that throughout the season, to bring everybody together closer."