Turner's walk-off blast caps imperfect 6-4 win, Nats' first home sweep

In a perfect world, Aníbal Sánchez's second strong start off the injured list wouldn't have been rendered an afterthought. In a perfect world, Juan Soto's homer-robbing grab at the left field wall would get significantly more attention. In a perfect world, the Nationals would prefer not to contemplate another bullpen meltdown - or the ramifications for asking too much of too many pitchers on yet another occasion.

But Nationals baseball in 2019 is far from perfect, even if the ending today produced a feel-good 6-4 walk-off victory, even if it stretched their winning streak to a season-high four games, even if it meant closing out a two-game interleague series by recording their first home sweep of the season and their fourth straight series victory.

Trea Turner's two-run homer off Alex Colomé in the bottom of the ninth provided the final margin of victory, erasing the fact that the Nationals shortstop had struck out in three of his previous four at-bats, and guaranteed a happy cross-country flight to San Diego, where a four-game series begins Thursday night.

But before manager Davey Martinez pulled on his brightly colored Hawaiian shirt - the team charter will be filled with garish colors and unique floral prints as a team-building exercise - he was left to ponder the fact that the Nationals may just have turned a corner by virtue of their sudden-death triumph.

"You know what? What I feel is the fact that, three weeks ago we probably lose that game, and we end up winning," Martinez said. "Guys battled back. We lost the lead, and they came back and we won the game."

But every game these Nationals play, even the inspiring victories that should be cause for celebration, gives pause for reflection. In this case, Martinez is aware that he's burned out his bullpen - a frequent occurrence when the relievers were squandering leads left and right a few weeks ago - and he'll have to patch together some workable alignment over the next couple of nights with right-handers Kyle Barraclough and Wander Suero and closer Sean Doolittle likely unavailable for the next day or two.

"We're not going to win with three guys in the bullpen," Martinez said. "I didn't want to use Suero today. Now he's probably going to be down for two days. But I credit the boys for coming back and Trea walking them off."

Turner's dramatic homer, his third career walk-off, doesn't happen if the bullpen holds a 4-1 lead for Sánchez. Given a week off game assignments (but warming a few times in the 'pen), Barraclough tried to extend to a second inning with disastrous results.

Barraclough followed up a 1-2-3 seventh by fanning José Rondón to open the eighth before Leury García singled to center. Yoán Moncada flew out to left field, with Soto backtracking to the wall and leaping to snag what could have been a home run on one of his better defensive efforts.

"That was amazing," Soto said. "I tried to run, I tried to catch it. I'm like: 'I don't want to give up that homer.' The ball doesn't go, but I try my best. I just caught it. I think I had it since I started going, and Robles helped me, too, saying, 'Keep going. Don't get scared with the wall, just keep going.' "

For a guy still learning to play left field who doesn't always get the best jump on balls, it was a promising development. But not one Soto could really prepare for.

"You can't work on that. You can't. That just comes through. Just come in the reaction in the game," he said.

Pitching coach Paul Menhart visited the mound to go over the game plan for Barraclough to face the dangerous José Abreu, but whatever he said didn't seem to register. Abreu tattooed an 80 mph curveball, plucking it out of the lower third of the strike zone and sending it far enough over the wall that Soto had no chance at it.

Suero replaced Barraclough and his first pitch to Welington Castillo, a 92 mph cutter that caught too much of the plate, wound up in the right-center stands, tying the score at 4-4 and making the crowd of 28,910 wonder if they were seeing some sort of self-fulfilling prophecy of bullpen doom come to pass.

Martinez said the game-tying blasts were nothing more than poor execution. But was the skipper asking too much of his relievers in that circumstance? Barraclough has now yielded six homers in just 23 innings, though he's shown in spurts that he can also get batters out.

"He was throwing the ball good," Martinez said. "He didn't get the slider where he wanted to get it. But we liked that matchup. He faced him before. I wanted Paul to go out there, settle him down, tell him how to attack (Abreu). (Barraclough) admitted he just didn't get the ball down where he wanted to get it and way."

Doolittle pitched the top of the ninth, using a fielder's choice to work around a pair of singles and striking out the final two hitters he faced. That took the Nats to walk-off territory, and Turner happily mashed a 3-2 down-and-in slider over the left field wall after Brian Dozier had drawn a leadoff walk off Colomé, the fifth White Sox pitcher.

"He throws so many sliders, when I originally went up to bat, it felt like I was looking for a slider kind of middle of the plate to hit," Turner said. "Then he threw a bunch of 'em as balls to Dozier and then threw me one and then started going to the fastball more and, the first time I faced him, it's just a matter of seeing more pitches, not anything more than that, I guess."

But Turner's decisive blast was hardly the only highlight for the Nationals.

Sánchez has prospered since returning from the injured list after nursing a strained left hamstring and looks a lot different than the pre-injury version. But the right-hander's resurgence is merely a matter of playing to his strength.

Following the 10-day injury hiatus, Sánchez has done a much better job of controlling the lower half of the strike zone. The results have been much more encouraging than the 0-6 record and 5.10 ERA he turned in during the nine starts before he was hurt.

Sánchez scattered four hits and allowed just one run in 5 1/3 innings and seems to have rediscovered his comfort zone at the bottom of the strike zone. He said it's all about location.

"Everything that I worked since I got back from the (injured list) has helped me put my ball in the spot that I want," said Sánchez, who walked one and struck out seven. In two starts since being activated off the IL, he's allowed one run on five hits in 11 2/3 innings with two walks and 14 strikeouts.

"So every time I'm able to do that. I be ahead in the count most of the time, get out of the inning quickly."

Martinez may be right: On a day when the Nationals tried to give away a game they were in control of, they persevered and found a way to win.

"Every day, it's been somebody different," he said. "That's what makes it really good right now. Everybody's stepping up. Until today, the bullpen was phenomenal. We really were. And we're getting better. Every day we're getting better and our focus is just to win one game.

Added Turner: "We've played good baseball all year, we've just been on the losing side because something stupid each game. Stupid mistakes are starting to go away and we're starting to play consistent and pitch when we need it, hit when we need it. We bailed our pitchers out today, but last week, they bailed us out. That's what good teams do. When you need to score one more run than the other team, no matter when it is, I think we've been able to do that lately. That's how you win."