A Very Frustrating Loss

Up 2-0 in the top of the 7th, everyone at RFK was assuming that the Nationals would cruise through the last three innings for another victory. Everyone assumed that some combination of middle relievers and Chad Cordero would close it out, but Frank Robinson had other ideas. Apparently convinced that the bullpen needed rest, he brought back John Patterson for the top of the 7th. Patterson had already thrown 108 pitches. Although he had allowed only two hits over six innings, he had been unable to get a handle on his control at times. He had been behind to a number of hitters and walked Carlos Beltran and Cliff Floyd with no one out before finding some way to get out of the inning.

By the 7th, Patterson was done and Robinson would have pulled him in almost any other game. But Robinson thought his bullpen needed a rest, so he let Patterson pitch the 7th. Gary Majewski had only pitched once since June 30th, but he apparently needed rest. Consecutive hits by Marlon Anderson (single) and David Wright (double) put men at second and third with no outs, and Robinson finally had to pull Patterson. Luis Ayala was unable to strand either runner, and the score was 2-2.

At this point, most fans still assumed the Nats would find some way to pull out a win. But after pitching a scoreless 8th inning, Sunny Kim gave up three runs in the 9th. Kim was in trouble early in the 9th, and we assumed that Robinson would pull Kim after the first run and certainly after the second, but Robinson didn't even warm up a pitcher in the bullpen. It was Kim's job to take a bullet for the team and give the rest of the bullpen the rest it needs, and Kim did just that.

That may have been the right call (and who among us is ready to doubt Robinson at this stage of the season), but it cost the Nats any chance of pulling this one out. The sad fact is that with Carlos Baerga, Marlon Byrd, Junior Spivey, and Gary Bennett in the lineup, with Brad Wilkerson in a slump, and with Vinny Castilla suffering from a power outage, the Nats' batting order is so anemic that we can't count on the team scoring two runs in a single inning, let alone three. So, down three in the 9th, the Nats had virtually no chance of coming back. Until the Nats can get by some of these injuries, runs will be hard to come by. That means the Nats must do all they can to contest every run scoring opportunity their opponents have. That's the only way you win a lot of one-run games. Robinson has followed that strategy for the most part, but not today. No, today he was willing to let this one go. He knows more about his team than we do, so let's hope that our frustration at losing this winnable game is all for the greater good.