A Blown Opportunity

On a night when they had the chance to take sole possession of first place in the National League wild card race, the Nationals failed to take advantage of the opportunity. The Houston Astros lost 4-2, meaning that a win would give the Nationals a one-half game lead in the wild card race. But poor starting pitching and poor hitting, especially in key situations, doomed the Nationals in a game they could have won. Playoff teams can't afford to lose games like this, and the Nationals may regret this loss come the end of September in a race that may be very close. They may also regret it tomorrow, because had they won tonight all they had to win the series was split a double header tomorrow. Now, they have to sweep the double header to accomplish the same feat, which will be difficult given that they'll be starting their two weakest starting pitchers.

Tonight's pitching matchup on paper favored the Nationals, but they don't play the game on paper, they play it on a field. Esteban Loaiza was in trouble from the beginning and clearly didn't have his best stuff. Jimmy Rollins and Kenny Lofton singled to lead off the game, and Chase Utley hit a sacrifice fly that scored Rollins from third. Brad Wilkerson threw wildly to home, and Lofton advanced to second. That would prove to be a costly mistake, because Lofton scored from second on Pat Burrell's double. Would Lofton have scored from first? Maybe, but that's not a question we should be having to answer in a game of this magnitude.

The Nationals tied the game in the top of third on a Vinny Castilla homer and a Jose Vidro single, which drove in Cristian Guzman, who had doubled and moved to third on Loaiza's bunt.

Unfortunately, the Phillies came right back to score two runs. Rollins singled and Loften doubled him to third. After Utley grounded out, Bobby Abreu doubled in both Rollins and Loften. You can argue that the Nationals should have walked Abreu to load the bases to set up an inning ending double play with the right-handed hitting Burrell coming up, and we wouldn't say you were wrong. Of course, Burrell had already doubled off of Loaiza, so you need to be careful with this argument. In any event, Frank Robinson chose to pitch to Abreu and Loaiza chose to challenge Abreu and at least one of those decisions was a mistake.

It looked like the Phillies might blow the game open in the sixth when they loaded the bases with two outs. Luis Ayala replaced Loaiza and, thankfully, struck out Jason Michaels.

The Nationals then had the chance to tie the game in the top of the seventh. Preston Wilson singled off Ryan Madsen and moved to third on Brian Schneider's ground rule double. Castilla then hit a sacrifice fly that scored Wilson and advanced Schneider to third. The Nationals now had Schneider at third with one out, and all they had to do was hit a fly ball to score him. The problem in these situations is that the Nationals don't have much of a bench. Of course, the Nationals could have acquired some bench help with some trades before the trade deadline, but that's another story. In any event, Carlos Baerga, batting for Guzman, popped out to third, and Ryan Church, batting for Ayala, grounded out to second.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, was the game, because the Nationals went out one, two, three in the eighth and when down in order after Jose Guillen singled to open the ninth.

Philadelphia, not Washington, is now in first place in the wild card race, which looks like this:

Team	Record	Pct.	GB
Astros	64-56	.533	--
Phillies	64-56	.533	--
Nationals	63-56	.529	.5
Marlins	62-57	.521	1.5