Rendon hits despite "nicks and bruises," but Nats fall 7-5

DETROIT - The Tigers outlasted the Nationals 7-5 as the bullpen faltered late Saturday from Comerica Park to even the series at 1-1.

Arriving with a 5-3 lead, Tanner Rainey took the loss (1-3) when he walked two batters to open the door to a three-run Tigers' seventh inning rally, adding to a troubling weekend for the right-hander.

Rainey has handed out four free passes in the first two games of the series which is a concern for Nationals manager Davey Martinez.

"What I'm seeing is, for me, it has to do with his mechanics," the skipper said. "He has no length in his legs, so Paul (Menhart) is going to talk to him tomorrow. When you come out of the bullpen and start walking guys, you can get into trouble. Even though he gave up a bouncing ball over (Anthony) Rendon's head, it was the walks. You walk two guys coming out of the bullpen, we got to do something else.

After Rainey's two walks, Miguel Cabrera bounced a ball over Rendon's glove for an RBI single and Christin Stewart added a line drive sac fly to center off Tony Sipp and suddenly the lead was gone, game tied 5-5.

"It's a battle. Any time you give them two free bases you're putting yourself in a terrible situation," Rainey said. "Obviously there (facing) Miggy next, try to get ahead and I did. He ended up hitting the ground ball off the plate and (it) gets over third and scores the one run. I put myself and the rest of the bullpen in a tough situation."

Niko Goodrum's single off Sipp scored Cabrera with the go-ahead run to finish the rally and make it 6-5 Tigers. JaCoby Jones put the game away in the eighth with an RBI double to deep center field off of Wander Suero, scoring Harold Castro.

Rendon went 3-for-4 with a homer, a run scored and two RBIs, but the Nats lost for the first time on this road trip. Even though Rendon has been hitting well, he has not been running as well. While not a full-on lower-body injury, Rendon did admit he might be feeling some soreness after 68 games.

"I'm all right," Rendon explained. "Nah, just your typical nicks and bruises here and there. The cost of playing every day, so nothing we can't handle. It's good, we have a great medical staff here. Just trying to stay on top of things and try not to hit the injured list. So, just continue daily treatment on nicks and bruises."

The Nats went ahead thanks to sloppy Tigers fielding in the top of the seventh, breaking a 3-3 deadlock. Yan Gomes singled when Ronny Rodríguez was unable to glove a grounder to his right at first base.

Adam Eaton followed with a single and went to second on a throwing error by third baseman Jeimer Candelario. That miscue allowed Gomes to score. Rendon's single scored Eaton. The Nats led 5-3.

Rendon crushed a 3-1 pitch for Tigers lefty starter Gregory Soto over the left field all to give the Nats a 1-0 lead in the fourth inning. It was his 18th homer of the season. The Nats have hit at least one homer in 14 straight games.

Brian Dozier had a run-scoring double and Victor Robles an RBI single in the three-run fourth. Rendon's homer was his 18th on the season.

Austin Voth allowed six hits in the final three innings he pitched in his second start. He walked two and struck out three on 78 pitches, 47 for strikes. He finished 4 1/3 innings.

"Did not have my best stuff," Voth said. "Fastball, glove side, wasn't there, it was just a tick off. Same with arm side. Felt like I was missing off by a little bit. Definitely felt like I battled with the stuff that I had.

"Off-speed wasn't there, wasn't able to command it in the zone for the most part," the right-hander explained. "Felt like I got some soft contact ground balls but they just weren't at people. Had some bad luck there."

Tigers spot starter Soto gave up three runs on four hits with one walk, one wild pitch and one strikeout. He threw 64 pitches, 41 for strikes.

Left-hander Jonny Venters made his Nationals debut by recording two outs in the fifth to get Voth and Javy Guerra out of a jam, then he struck out the side in the sixth. It was his first appearance since signing June 25 and the outing was a bright spot in a tough loss.

"Awesome to see," Martinez said. "That sinker was really good, he threw a couple sliders, he actually threw a changeup that, honestly, I didn't know he threw a changeup and it was really, really good. If we can get him and (Fernando) Rodney to pitch like the way they've been pitching, it helps our bullpen out tremendously."

The Tigers won for the first time since June 18, snapping an eight-game losing streak. For the Nats, it was their first loss in five games to fall back to 41-41. But no panic from Rendon.

"I think we've had a good run of baseball the past couple weeks," Rendon said. "It's going to happen. We're going to have many games where our offense doesn't show up. We are going to score no runs or we might score one. That's part of being a teammate."

"We're all professionals, we're all adults here," Rendon continued. "We're not in high school here or middle school, where we're jibber jabbering, pointing the finger, saying 'Oh, it's your fault or that fault.' Or whatever it might be. We are going to go about our business, put our work in each and every day and try to control the things that we can control."