I'm not sure anyone could have expected a game started by Ross Ohlendorf and Alex Wood to be scoreless through 4 1/3 innings.
I'm also not sure that anyone could have expected Ohlendorf and Tanner Roark to have combined to throw 12 straight scoreless innings against the Braves.
But that's where we are.
Ohlendorf has put up five scoreless frames tonight, allowing just one baserunner, striking out five and needing just 57 pitches to this point.
He set down the first 10 Braves he saw before Justin Upton singled to center with one out in the fourth, but Ohlendorf then got a line drive double play to get out of the inning and retired the side in order in the fifth.
He and Roark have now allowed just three hits and a walk with 11 strikeouts over the last 12 innings against Atlanta.
This isn't proven top-of-the-rotation guys we're talking about here. It's not Stephen Strasburg and Gio Gonzalez shutting down the Braves.
It's Ross Ohlendorf and Tanner Roark. And Davey Johnson must be loving it.
Update: Things sure got interesting in the bottom of the fifth, as the Braves had both their manager and their starter ejected (the latter of whom was tossed after he was pulled from the game), and the Nationals took a 2-0 lead under controversial circumstances.
Wood allowed a leadoff single to Anthony Rendon, and two batters later, Denard Span reached on a Freddie Freeman fielding error. After a Ryan Zimmerman walk, Jayson Werth stepped in with the bases loaded.
Werth worked the count full, and then took a pitch that home plate umpire CB Bucknor ruled was off the plate inside. Werth took his walk, Rendon came in with the game's first run, and Wood lost it.
The left-hander pounded his glove with his throwing hand and started yelling at Bucknor, clearly thinking he had gotten strike three. Bucknor whipped off his mask and started yelling back, and in an effort to defend his starter, Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez got in between the two. Gonzalez was eventually tossed.
Bryce Harper then added a sac fly to center, making it 2-0. Wood was then pulled from the game, and he gave Bucknor a piece of his mind on his way to the dugout, earning him an ejection of his own. A fine from the league office will probably follow. Wood said a few (and by a few, I mean about three dozen) words that cannot be repeated here.
Update II: As quickly as the Nats jumped on top, the Braves countered.
Dan Uggla crushed a solo homer on the first pitch from Ohlendorf leading off the sixth, and after Ohlendorf committed a two-base error to put Jordan Schafer on third with nobody out, Upton crushed a first-pitch, two-run homer to left-center to put Atlanta up 3-2.
For whatever reason, Ohlendorf continues to have issues once he gets to the 60-75 pitch mark. The lengthy delay while waiting for the bottom of the fifth to end probably didn't help matters, but he completely fell apart there in the sixth after a stellar first five innings, and now finds himself on the hook for the loss.
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