WASHINGTON – The Braves scored one or no runs in six of their past nine games before Tuesday, and averaged fewer than 2 ½ runs over their past 15 games.
So with the Nationals leading 4-0 after the first inning and Jordan Zimmermann on the mound, things looked bleak for the Bravos.
They made it interesting, Justin Upton’s two-run homer in the sixth inning pulling them to within 6-4, but the Nationals held on for a 6-4 win, handing the Braves their third consecutive loss and fourth in five games to start a nine-game trip.
“Not good,” said Braves starter Ervin Santana (14-8), who got ambushed in the first inning and gave up eight hits, six runs (five earned) and four walks in five innings, losing for only the second time in 11 starts since the All-Star break.
“It’s very important for our team to win the game, every single game that we’ve got left. So (losing)…it’s not fun at all.”
After winning seven of their first eight games against the Nationals this season, the Braves have lost five of the past seven matchups including four in a row at Nationals Park. Washington extended its lead to nine games in the National League East standings over the defending champion Braves with only 17 games left to play.
The Braves need to win Wednesday’s series finale to avoid being swept in the series. The teams play one more series next week at Turner Field, but the Braves’ previous idea of using this head-to-head series and that next one to reel in the Nationals have all but evaporated.
“I mean, we still have a chance,” Braves first baseman Freddie Freeman said. “Once we’re fully eliminated from the division race we’ll worry about the wild card, but we’ve got four games against the Nats in the next seven games. We can play some good baseball against them and get right back in this division race, and you never know what could happy in the last couple of weeks.”
Though not technically eliminated from the division race, the Braves’ realistic shot at making the postseason is through one of the two wild-card berths. They remained 1 ½ games behind Pittsburgh for the final wild-card spot. The Braves will be off Thursday before a three-game weekend series at Texas against a Rangers team with the majors’ worst record.
They’ll send the recently struggling Aaron Harang to the mound Wednesday in a series-finale matchup with Stephen Strasburg, whom the Braves have had frequent success against in the past. After two nights of watching Nationals hitters do damage early in counts, the Braves should know what to expect Wednesday.
“They came out swinging the bats and were really, really aggressive in the first pitches of every at-bat,” Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez said. “Usually when they do that against (Santana), he gets quick outs. But today they found the outfield grass and put a big number up, four runs (in the first inning).
“We weren’t able to recover after that, but we battled, and came back and scored some runs and made it a two-run game. Our bullpen did a terrific job holding them. We had some opportunities to get within one run or even try to tie the game there. Justin’s big blast gave us a little life there, to get us within two runs.”
Phil Gosselin reached on an error to start the sixth inning, and one batter later Upton hit his 27th home run.
But the Braves went 2-for-9 with runners in scoring position, including two strikeouts by Upton. He whiffed with two in scoring position in the fourth, before the Braves scored on Jason Heyward’s fielder’s choice and Chris Johnson’s RBI single.
The Braves trailed by two when Emilio Bonifacio doubled to start the eighth inning. After a Gosselin groundout, Freeman struck out against left-hander Ross Detwiler and and Upton struck out against righty Craig Stammen to end the inning.
“That’s the (missed opportunit) I was talking about,” Gonzalez said. “We scratch another run there and like we always talk about, one run down or one run up is different than two runs down or two up. But they came out of the bullpen and matched up well against us.”
Santana gave up five hits and a walk in the first inning, when the Nationals got a leadoff double from Denard Span and batted around in just 22 pitches. Included were consecutive singles by Bryce Harper and Wilson Ramos on first-pitch fastballs, followed by an Asdrubal Cabrera sacrifice fly on a first-pitch change-up.
“It was tough, but I made some good pitches,” Santana said. “Because everything’s going there way right now, every good pitch that I made they hit it for a base hit. We swung at first pitches, too, and it was ground balls and ground balls. It’s nothing we can do. We just have to keep playing hard and try to turn it around.”
The Nationals pushed the lead to 5-0 in the second with an unearned run that proved to be important. They got it after Jayson Werth drew a two-out walk and advanced to third on a throwing error by rookie catcher Christian Bethancourt, who attempted an ill-advised snap throw to first to try to pick off Werth with left-handed hitting Adam LaRoche batting.
Freeman wasn’t looking for the throw and it sailed wide and into right-field foul territory back to the corner.
“Free never saw him pop up (to throw),” Gonzalez said. “You’ve got a left-handed hitter and Betty’s got a pretty strong arm, and that ball went all the way to the wall. But ge never saw him. (Bethancourt) kind of disappeared behind (LaRoche).”
Bethancourt said, “More than anything I was trying to help Ervin because he was having a rough start. I thought there was a chance, so I threw the ball over there. It didn’t happen, so we’ve got to move forward.”
LaRoche followed with an RBI single through the right side, and the Nationals finished 5-for-10 with runners in scoring position, excelling in a deparatment where the Braves have floundered all season.
Santana has allowed more than three earned runs just three times in 11 starts since the All-Star break, but has done it each of is past two starts. He gave up seven seven hits and four runs in six innings of Wednesday’s 7-4 win against the Phillies, one of only three times the Braves scored more than three runs in their past 15 games before doing it again Tuesday.
Two of four runs charged to Zimmermann (11-5) were unearned, and the right-hander allowed six hits and no walks with seven strikeouts in seven innings to improve to 5-0 with a 2.40 ERA in his past nine starts. Zimmermann has limited the Braves to two earned runs or fewer in eight of his 10 career starts against them including all three this season.
“In our opinion, we think Zimmermann is their ace,” Freeman said. “We’re swinging the bats really well; we hit the ball hard, even lined out a few times, and we got some runs on the board. So if you can take a positive away from here, that’s the positive, and hopefully we can come out here tomorrow and put some more runs on the board.”
