So, here we are.  Half a season down with little hope in sight for tolerable baseball anytime soon.  Nobody’s watching on tv, the park is filled with casual fans and tourists, progress with draft picks has been slow, the Lerners are waging a financial battle with the city and there’s just not a lot to feel good about.  But, if you visit wevegotheart.com, you should get a little more heart and a little less doom and gloom.  I suppose.  Perhaps it all started when fans shot down the idea of playing the song regularly at the new park at the beginning of the season. 

We were joined by a special guest on Wednesday, a beloved professor who taught each of us as much about Aristotle and James Madison as he did about living a full life and having an impact on those around you.  A lifelong Red Sox fan, on Wednesday, he again taught us something new.  After prying with questions about the team, players, prospects and front office, he made the observation that we needed to change our attitude a bit.  He was a new source of enthusiasm, a light in the otherwise dark fanbase in despair.  Throughout the game, he was optimistic while we tried to pull him back to reality.

The oddest part of this pleasant learning experience came later.  This professor is by no means a fountain of optimism when it comes to trusting in political systems and citizens.  Pretty words, nice speeches and promises for a better tomorrow don’t inspire this sober mind. 

So, to see him inspired and enthusiastic that this last place team could turn a double play and properly execute a hit and run baffled me.  When I pointed out the discrepency in his life philosophy, he said, “that’s baseball,” the one thing that allows him to live outside of reality, if only for a few hours.  There’s some magic in setting aside the numbers for a night and believing it could be better.

And it was.  Wednesday brought about a desperately needed shut-out win for the Nationals.  And for the first time, in a long time, I was able to put it all in perspective.  You blog, you watch, you rush from work to get there in time, maybe you get soaked in a downpour or sit through a three hour rain delay, or maybe its 100 degrees and you spend more than you should on 5 bottles of water.  It takes a toll on your sanity.  You’re bound to get angry from time to time.  You care too much.

With that out there, here’s what happened last night.  The Nats battled.  They lost the end game but they battled back twice, which is more than we’ve seen all season.  The Diamondbacks battled too.  We saw a beautiful game from Bergmann, seven quality innings in his pitching duel with Dan Haren. 

When the bats came alive to rally in the 9th, fans stood up and hoped for the best.  A Lopez walk followed by consecutive singles for Casto and Guzman loaded the bases for Austin Kearns.  We think Manny unwisely wasted Willie Harris as a pinch runner for Casto.  Both Lopez and Casto scored easily when Austin Kearns’ hard grounder was bobbled by Mark Reynolds.  With Guzman, the winning run, on second - Young and Flores couldn’t get it done.  Wily Mo reached first on another error by Reynolds to load the bases.  With the winning run now just 90 feet away, Acta allowed the struggling Bernandina to hit for himself.  He battled through nine pitches but eventually grounded out to end the inning.  

With a tie to protect, big Jon Rauch took the mound.  He got the first two outs quickly, but things fell apart just as quickly.  Two singles and two doubles later, the Diamondbacks were up by 3 and Mark Reynolds had made up for his 2 errors.  Normally, I would have been dejected, impressed with the 9th inning rally and ready to call it a night, but I tried to believe, for a change, that we might come out fighting.  Sure enough, Pete Orr led off with a double.  After Lopez grounded out, Willie Harris singled to score Orr.  The gap was closing.  Guzman singled then Kearns doubled and advanced to third on the throw.  The game was again tied, but the winning run was on third base with only one out.  Fans again went crazy.  Tony Pena was pulled for Chad Qualls.  After Dmitri was intentionally walked, he was replaced by Wil Nieves, probably to prevent the double play ball.  Flores made contact but right to third base where a quick toss home to Montero caught Kearns out at the plate.  WMP ended the inning with a grounder, stranding two men on.  The rally fell short yet again.

Ayala came in and hit Ojeda on his second pitch, an omen almost worst than walking the lead off batter.  Ayala fielded Young’s sacrifice bunt well for the first out, but gave up a double to Stephen Drew which scored Ojeda.  He intentionally walked Hudson to face Conor Jackson.  Though Jackson singled, Harris’ throw to Flores beat Drew home for the second out.  Ayala still had one RBI base hit left in him and he gave it to Chad Tracy.  Worst of all, the two runners who scored off Ayala reached base by getting hit by pitch and intentionally walked.   While he’s struggled mightily this season, this loss is certainly not all his fault.  There’s enough blame to go around.  For one, Bernadina and Flores both left 5 runners on base and Young left 3.

As a sidenote, fans really gave Angel Hernandez a tough time throughout the final innings, booing and yelling Balk at every Diamondback’s pick-off attempt.  It was fun.

And the game was fun.  There are tough losses and there are times when you leave knowing everybody gave their all.  Last night, we lost a hard fought battle, which is worlds better than being shut out.

Tonight, we begin a series with the Houston Astros against Roy Oswalt, who missed his last start (7-8, 4.60 ERA).  Tim Redding takes the mound for the Nats.

This entry was posted on Friday, July 11th, 2008 at 10:44 am and is filed under Game Recaps. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.