Rangers Lose At Washington
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WASHINGTON — It had become a sad state of affairs on the base paths for the Washington Nationals. Ian Desmond changed that with one mighty swing.
Washington’s shortstop crushed his team-leading 10th home run of the season to wake up a slumbering offense and propel the Nationals to a 9-2 victory Friday over the Texas Rangers.
Over the past seven games, in which Washington posted a 1-6 record, the Nationals were hitting just .127 with runners in scoring position, culminating with them stranding 15 men during Wednesday’s 10-inning loss to Miami.
Trailing 2-0 in the bottom of the fourth on Friday, and struggling to put anything together against middling Texas starter Colby Lewis, outfielder Jayson Werth and first baseman Adam LaRoche hit back-to-back singles to set the stage for Desmond, who hammered a Lewis (4-4) fastball over the wall in right-center to give Washington a 3-2 lead and a sense of relief.
“We’re not having enough fun,” said Desmond, who delivered some emphatic high-fives upon entering the dugout. “People have made that known to us. So every time we hit one from now on, it’s a party in
there. Sometimes we lose sight of the fact that it’s a game.”
That seemed to open the floodgates for the Nationals, who added at least one run in each of the next four innings.
“When you’ve been struggling to score runs and you come up with guys on base, you want to be that guy to get it done and sometimes it’s just best to relax,” said outfielder Nate McLouth, who was 2-for-4 with a run scored. “If only it was that easy to do, but it happened tonight.”
Texas manager Ron Washington knew the Nationals were a sleeping giant, and his team happened to catch them at the wrong time.
“Just because the offense wasn’t going for a while doesn’t mean they don’t have offense,” he said. “On any given night, anything can happen, and tonight they swung the bats and made things happen.”
The beneficiary of the offensive outburst was Stephen Strasburg (4-4), who went six innings while striking out seven and allowing no earned runs.
Strasburg retired the first three hitters in the top of the first inning on just 10 pitches but ran into trouble in the second.
Rangers third baseman Adrian Beltre led off the second with a stinging double off the wall in center that missed being a home run by about six inches. Strasburg struck out the next two batters and appeared to get out of the inning when center fielder Leonys Martin hit a tapper back to the mound. But Strasburg misplayed the ball for an error and Rougned Odor followed with an RBI single to make it 1-0.
Strasburg gave the Nationals a brief scare when he grimaced after Odor’s hit, sending the training staff and manager Matt Williams out of the dugout to check on him. But Strasburg quickly assured everyone that he could continue.
“I went out there and I asked him,” if he was injured, Williams said. “And he got mad at me. So I left.”
Lewis followed with a single to left to give the Rangers a 2-0 advantage. It was the first hit by a Texas pitcher since June 20, 2012, ending an 0-for-23 skid. But that would be it for the Rangers, who never really threatened again.
“You have to give credit to Strasburg — he shut us down,” Washington said.
Pinch-hitter Tyler Moore drove in two runs with a double, and Washington scored two more runs on an error by right fielder Alex Rios to improve to 22-2 when scoring four or more runs.
Desmond’s homer was the 77th of his career, moving him into sole possession of second place on the Nationals’ career home run list, breaking a tie with Adam Dunn. Ryan Zimmerman is Washington’s leader with 181 homers.
