Max Scherzer can’t keep it together, and the Nationals fall to the Braves

By Jesse Dougherty,

Max Scherzer looked in need of rest, a shower, maybe a time machine, if that were possible, to rewind 10 minutes and take two pitches back. The first, his 116th of the game, went for a game-tying, two-run home run by Adam Duvall in the sixth inning Sunday. The second, his 119th, went for a go-ahead, two-run shot by Ozzie Albies that ended his afternoon in a blink.

And so Scherzer ambled off the field, his shoulders a bit slumped, his hand bobbling a baseball he would soon lob into the tunnel. There was no glove slam. There wasn’t much of a scene. There was just bound leather rolling down a shaded hallway, a fitting illustration of the Washington Nationals’ 8-4 loss to the Atlanta Braves.

The Nationals are now 17-28 and regularly frustrated. With two weeks left in the season, they are headed straight toward missing the playoffs. Their ace was the latest promise to fall short, as Scherzer continued to struggle in the back half of otherwise dominant starts. His last four batters went single, homer, single, homer to turn a two-run lead into a permanent hole. Just add it to the list.

[Last time out: Nationals can’t take advantage of Patrick Corbin’s gem]

The Nationals expect to take a dual approach from here. On one hand, the hand of practicality, they are looking beyond this year, assessing Carter Kieboom and Luis García in the infield; Austin Voth and Erick Fedde in the rotation; and Kyle Finnegan, Wander Suero and Kyle McGowin, among others, in the bullpen. But on the other hand — call it the hand of knowing-no-other-way — they remain keen on competing right now.

“You’re going to see a steady diet of our young players and players that we’re committed to for the long term,” General Manager Mike Rizzo explained Sunday morning. “But with that said, we’re still trying to win baseball games, and each and every time out we’re expecting to win and disappointed when we lose.”

Scherzer only exists on the second hand. He only knows grunting, growling, demanding the ball in the later innings. To ease up in September, to do anything below 150 percent, would be a sort of sacrilegious. Scherzer calls this “posting,” his word for emerging every turn to give the Nationals a shot to win. And on Sunday, for the second straight start, he posted into the twilight of a lost year.

But the outing was entirely uneven. Atlanta scored in the first when Freddie Freeman doubled and Travis d’Arnaud singled him in. The pitch to d’Arnaud was a slider on the outside edge of the plate, though Scherzer may have wanted it a few more inches away from the catcher’s bat. Scherzer leaned on his slider early, using it for each of his first three strikeouts.

The deficit was erased once Asdrúbal Cabrera punched a homer into the second deck in right field. Kyle Wright, the Braves’ starter, entered with an 8.05 ERA in five appearances. His WHIP — walks plus hits per inning pitched — was an abysmal 2.211. After Cabrera tagged him with that homer, the Braves went back ahead in the fourth before the Nationals again knotted the score on Kurt Suzuki’s RBI fielder’s choice in the bottom of the inning. Then they got to Wright in the fifth, then got a little help.

García led off with a single before Victor Robles poked another single into center. Adam Eaton followed with his second bunt hit to load the bases. Next, Trea Turner chopped a grounder up the middle — a sure double play — but Eaton slid in hard at second and Albies’s throw sailed wide. It trickled into the dugout while García and Robles came home to make it 4-2. Turner jogged to second uncontested. But the progress was soon erased by four swings.

Heading into the sixth, Scherzer had dominated everyone but Freeman and d’Arnaud. They were 4 for 5 with two doubles, two singles, a walk, an RBI and two runs scored. The rest of the Braves’ lineup was 1 for 15 with a walk, RBI single and all 10 of Scherzer’s strikeouts. Yet it was the bottom of the order that ultimately burned him.

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Suero had warmed while Scherzer labored through the fifth. He quickly sat down, though, and didn’t toss again until Duvall had tied it with his two-run shot to center. Scherzer’s last frame was shaky from the beginning. He needed Juan Soto to make a leaping catch against the wall for the first out. His fastball velocity had slipped below the mid-90s. Nick Markakis’s rally-starting single was on a well-placed cutter, inside and a bit off the plate. The homers came on a pair of mistakes.

Duvall launched a middle-low fastball. Albies blasted a heater that was in but not in enough. Scherzer’s final line was 5⅓ innings, nine hits, six earned runs and two walks. Once he exited, Suero, Kyle Finnegan and Ryner Harper retired eight straight before Harper was charged with two insurance runs in the ninth. The Nationals had chances to push back, to pick up Scherzer, but couldn’t scratch Atlanta’s bullpen.

The Braves improved to 21-0 when ahead after six innings. Their relievers stranded two runners in the sixth and seventh, another in the eighth and, in the ninth, Chris Martin went 1-2-3 against the top of Washington’s order. And that’s how a checkered homestand, the Nationals’ second-to-last of 2020, met its sleepy end.