Williams' scoreless debut a bright spot in loss

The lasting image of Sunday's game for most will be of the two towering home runs surrendered by Jefry Rodriguez and Tim Collins during a seven-run fifth inning that turned the Nationals' series finale against the Brewers upside-down.

For Austen Williams, the lasting image will be of the sixth and seventh innings. Yes, the game already flipped to the opponent's favor, with Milwaukee holding a 9-4 lead it would not relinquish. But the score doesn't matter so much when a young pitcher makes his major league debut, and so Williams could do nothing but smile when thinking about the emotions he felt on this afternoon.

"Awesome," the right-hander said. "It's hard to describe other than that. Just a special moment in my life, and something I've worked really hard to achieve. I wish it could've come in a winning game, but still just an awesome day for me and my family and all the people who helped me back home."

Promoted from Triple-A Syracuse on Saturday, Williams had plenty of time to contemplate when and how he'd make his big league debut. He watched all of Saturday's 5-4 win from the Nationals' bullpen, then watched the first four innings of Sunday's game from the same perch.

But then as the disastrous top of the fifth played out, the 25-year-old found himself twice warming up, potentially to be thrust into a jam. Manager Davey Martinez wanted to avoid placing a rookie into that kind of situation for the first time, so Williams wound up getting to start the top of the sixth inning clean, if trailing by five runs.

"It was tough, and he did really well," Martinez said. "But I asked him after he came out, I said: 'How'd you feel? 'He looked at me and said: 'I couldn't feel the baseball.' So I'm like: 'OK ... but you did good."

Williams indeed impressed. He struck out the very first big league batter he faced, Mike Moustakas, on a curveball. After walking Manny Piña, he struck out Keon Broxton on a fastball.

By the time his two innings were complete, Williams had posted two zeroes without allowing a hit, only two walks.

"I think my biggest problem was I was just holding back a little bit at first," he said. "I think I was trying too hard to throw strikes, which isn't my game. I like to rear back and just throw it, and I usually pitch better that way. And I maybe was just a little timid at first, threw more balls with my fastball than I usually do. But for the most part, it still felt really good out there."