More notes from Nats' stunning 5-4 comeback win at Philly

PHILADELPHIA - With another dramatic win over the Phillies 5-4 Tuesday night, the Nationals are now six games back of the Milwaukee Brewers in the National League wild card race with 29 games remaining. They trail the Atlanta Braves by eight games in the NL East race.

The Nats take on the Brewers at Nats Park for three games beginning Friday night. But they still have one more game against the Phillies here tonight.

Anthony Rendon hit a two-run shot in the ninth and the Nats ended the game with a rare double play by catching a fly ball in center field and then appealing the runner left second base too early.

"(T)hese guys fight, man, they never quit and they keep pounding and they keep grinding and it was a big win for us," said Nationals manager Davey Martinez.

The bottom of the ninth inning got sticky when Justin Miller allowed back-to-back doubles. But Greg Holland came in and recorded the double play to end the contest.

Five relievers ended up saving the day for the Nats after the team found themselves down 3-0. Matt Grace set the tone by recording five outs without a run allowed. Jimmy Cordero notched a big strike out. Koda Glover (1-2) pitched a scoreless frame. Then Miller struggled a bit but Holland, who led the majors with the Dodgers' Kenley Jansen with 41 saves in 2017, sealed the deal by recording the final two outs for his first save with the Nats.

"(T)hey've been unbelievable, they've been wonderful," Martinez said of his bullpen. "We talk about it all the time, you're going to be put in roles you probably never been put in before. But I got all the confidence in the world in you. Just throw strikes. I tell them, if you come in don't walk anybody, just pound the strike zone."

* Ryan Zimmerman and Rendon combined for all six base hits for the Nats in the comeback. Rendon's two-run shot put the Nats up for good. Zimmerman's third double of the game continued the ninth-inning rally. He then stole third base and a throwing error by Phillies catcher Jorge Alfaro allowed Zimmerman to come home with the decisive fifth run.

Zimmerman was impressed with the Rendon at-bat against the Phillies Pat Neshek, especially fighting back to hit the homer after falling behind 0-2.

"Yeah, I mean, it's tough," Zimmerman said. "He's tough on righties. Anthony's been having good at-bats for the last couple weeks. He's a professional hitter and grinded it out. He left a slider over the plate and he put a good swing on it."

* When Odúbel Herrera hit a homer off of starter Max Scherzer in the fourth to give the Phillies the 1-0, it marked his second homer against the Nats ace in five days. What does Scherzer think about Herrera's ability to go yard against him with such frequency?

"(H)e can hit a lot of different pitches, up and down, in and out. You just have to continue to execute pitches against him, keep changing speeds, keep changing locations and there's ways I know I can pitch him and I know there's ways I can get him out, I just know that there's such a fine line of what I have to do in order to have success against him and the moment I make a mistake it seems like he always gets a hit.

"So, that's just one of the things in this league, you face guys that there's so many types of hitters and right now the type of hitter that I have to continue to figure out, to keep having sustained success against him, that's really tough. So, he's really putting me to the screws to try and figure out what i need to do to consistently get him out."

With the five strikeouts, Scherzer now has 249 on the season. He is one shy of 250 strikeouts for the fifth consecutive season. Only four pitchers in the history of MLB have accomplished that: Randy Johnson, Ferguson Jenkins and Pedro Martinez are the others. His ERA is 2.22.