Nationals go for broke and take Game 1 of World Series (updated)

HOUSTON - It's been his mantra all season long, certainly since May 24 and most definitely throughout October. Davey Martinez gets mocked at times for insisting his Nationals simply try to "go 1-0 today," but there's a method to his madness. And you can't dispute the results.

And just because they were in the World Series for the first time in franchise history tonight, the Nationals and their manager weren't about to start changing philosophies now.

When the opportunity presented itself to win Game 1 of the Fall Classic, Martinez played every card in his hand to try to do just that. He squeezed everything he could get out of Max Scherzer for five innings. He asked Patrick Corbin to pitch the sixth. He asked Tanner Rainey to start the seventh. And then he asked Daniel Hudson and Sean Doolittle to do the rest.

"We've really embraced that mantra of going 1-0 today," Doolittle said. "Regardless of the score, the situation, I think we all expected to be in there in some capacity. And I think guys are willing to go multiple innings. We'll figure tomorrow out tomorrow."

They'll figure tomorrow out while up a game in the 115th World Series, because the Nationals walked out of Minute Maid Park tonight with a 5-4 victory over the stunned Astros, making an emphatic statement they intend to be far more than spectators in this best-of-seven event.

"Sweet," Scherzer said. "I hope there's more."

If they keep playing like this, there will be more.

Thanks to two gargantuan hits from Juan Soto, the 20-year-old who didn't look fazed one bit by the bright lights, the Nats scored five runs in five innings off Astros ace Gerrit Cole. But with Scherzer laboring just to complete five innings of his own, they had to find a way to piece together the final 12 outs from a bullpen severely lacking in depth.

No problem. Corbin, who hadn't yet been named the starter for Game 3 because he might be needed in relief tonight, provided a scoreless sixth.

"I knew I was available," the lefty said. "So you just try to prepare. If my name was called, I was ready to go."

Rainey did give up a leadoff homer to George Springer in the seventh and then issued back-to-back, one-out walks to create a major jam. But Hudson, summoned for a rare seventh-inning appearance, put out the fire with aplomb and then recorded two more outs in the eighth, though only after allowing another run to score on another Springer extra-base hit.

"I've said it a million times: That type of role, that type of situation can be kind of fluky," said Hudson, who allowed only six of 36 inherited runners to score against him this season. "You just try to battle and make one good pitch. And then get the ball back and do it again."

It was up to Doolittle, though, to close things out and notch the final four outs. The left-hander did it, retiring all four batters he faced on only 13 pitches, and so the navy blue-clad visitors were able to celebrate in the middle of the diamond as a sellout crowd of 43,339 shuffled silently out of Minute Maid Park.

The Nationals supposedly are heavy underdogs against the 107-win Astros. But guess which team has now won seven in a row over the last two weeks, not to mention 17 of 19 dating back to the final homestand of the regular season?

"I didn't feel it during my outing, but then it hit me like a ton of bricks after the final out of the game," Doolittle said. "You're so in the moment when it's happening that you're not thinking about what it might mean in context, and then it just hits you when you're done. We just took the first game and won the first World Series game in Nats franchise history and took a lead in the series. It was really cool to be out there for that."

Given the pregame hoopla, the oversized American flag covering the outfield during an extra-long national anthem and a rousing "Play Ball!" declaration from Houston Texans sack master J.J. Watt, it's understandable if everybody had a few jitters to work out in the first inning.

Sure enough, the Nationals looked out of sorts early on, squandering a golden opportunity in the top of the first when Adam Eaton (popped-up bunt), Anthony Rendon (four-pitch strikeout) and Soto (three-pitch strikeout) all stranded Trea Turner in scoring position. Against Cole, who hadn't been charged with a loss since May 22, this felt like a big swing and a miss.

"I don't even know if it was Cole; I think it was just the World Series," Eaton said. "The lights weren't brighter, but it felt like that from my standpoint."

Adding to the trouble, the Astros got to Scherzer in the bottom of the first, making the three-time Cy Young Award winner work to the extreme and scoring two runs in the process. Scherzer, who opened the game with a walk, a single, a wild pitch and a stolen base, nearly got out of the mess with strikeouts. But Yuli Gurriel went up and got his 1-2 fastball above the strike zone and hammered the ball off the left field wall for a two-run, two-out double to give Houston the early lead.

That 26-pitch first would set the tone for Scherzer, who faced an uphill climb all night. He didn't enjoy one clean inning in his first four frames, driving his pitch count to nearly triple digits. But he didn't break, consistently coming through with big pitches when he needed to get out of jams, including a pair of inning-ending strikeouts of Carlos Correa.

And when he did finally retire the side for the first time, he picked an awfully good time. Scherzer set the heart of the Astros lineup down in order in the fifth, and after walking back to the dugout having thrown 112 high-stress pitches, he was the worthy recipient of high-fives from teammates and coaches alike.

"The way I see it is: I didn't lose the ballgame," he said. "There were a lot of chances where they had runners on second and third base, runners in scoring position. Just trusting (catcher Kurt Suzuki) to continue to execute pitches. If I had to throw it in the dirt, I had to. I had to keep from making a mistake in the middle of the zone, and a lot of credit goes to him."

Yes, on a night when he wasn't all that sharp, Scherzer still gave his team a chance to win. And his teammates rewarded him for the effort with two early blasts and then a most impressive go-ahead rally against the sport's best pitcher of the last five months.

Though they didn't convert much against Cole the first time through the order, the Nationals did take some good swings off the ace right-hander. That included Ryan Zimmerman's second-inning blast to center field, not a bad way for the face of the franchise to celebrate the first World Series at-bat of his career.

"You're kind of almost floating around the bases," Zimmerman said.

"I'll be honest with you: My eyes got a little watery for him," Martinez said. "He waited a long time to be in this position. And for him to hit that first home run and put us on the board was awesome."

Then Soto took over as only he can. The young star may have looked bad in his first at-bat versus Cole, but he quickly solved that problem with a pair of gargantuan, opposite-field hits.

It began with a 1-0 fastball launched over the left field wall and onto the train tracks just below the Astros' 2017 World Series pennant, a jaw-dropping, 417-foot home run that left the vast majority of the sellout crowd silent, aside from the pockets of red-clad fans who began chanting "Let's Go Nats!"

"Have you ever seen an oppo tank up there?" Eaton said. "I mean, they all count, I guess. But we all looked at each other and I think all of us had to check our chins, cause it was jaw-dropping."

Soto was just warming up, because one inning later he pulled off an equally impressive feat. Before that, though, Eaton came through with an RBI single, scoring Suzuki (who had adeptly tagged up from second moments earlier on a lineout to right) to tie the game. Then, after Rendon hustled down the line to prevent an inning-ending double play, Soto stepped up, worked the count full and drilled a slider from Cole off the scoreboard in left field, the ball caroming far enough back toward the infield to allow two runs to score.

"He's shown the fastball everywhere," Soto said. "The first couple of innings, he started throwing it and throwing it and throwing it. I was just waiting for that. After the first at-bat, I was like: He's throwing really hard. But I just try to sit back and hit the ball the other way."

Yes, the Nationals had just scored five runs in five innings off Cole, who had surrendered just one run in his first 22 2/3 innings this postseason. And they now held a three-run lead in Game 1 of their World Series, a game that got off to a shaky start and surely left a few out there doubting their ability to come back.

At this point in 2019, though, why would you even think about doubting this team?

"We've done this the whole postseason," Scherzer said. "We might get down a little early, but we find a way to grind away and score runs late. I have the utmost belief in everybody in this clubhouse. When everybody gets their number called, they step up and they're going to do their job. And tonight, that happened."