WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 18 , 2019. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ M2 D7
tuated it with what sounded like a
laugh.
The Nationals’ bullpen hasn’t
had much to joke about this
season. But here, in a tired meta-
phor, were off-key reminders that
Washington still has the benefit
of the next game, and the one
after that, and then 10 more
before the regular season closes.
The relievers were a reason, along
with Corbin and the timely of-
fense, that the Nationals still held
a slight advantage in the wild-
card hunt. They were a reason to
put off worrying about the dot dot
dot — at least for another day.
[email protected]CARDINALS SIXTH
Yadier Molina called out on strikes. Tommy Edman
walks. Harrison Bader singles. Tommy Edman to third.
Jose Martinez pinch-hitting for Miles Mikolas. Jose
Martinez strikes out swinging. Harrison Bader steals
second, advances to third, Tommy Edman scores,
Throwing error by Yan Gomes. Dexter Fowler grounds
out.
Nationals 3, Cardinals 2
NATIONALS EIGHTH
Juan Soto strikes out swinging. Howie Kendrick sin-
gles. Asdrubal Cabrera walks. Howie Kendrick to sec-
ond. Victor Robles singles, Asdrubal Cabrera scores.
Yan Gomes doubles, Victor Robles scores. Gerardo Par-
ra pinch-hitting for Fernando Rodney. Gerardo Parra
grounds out.
Nationals 5, Cardinals 2
NATIONALS NINTH
Trea Turner walks. Adam Eaton singles. Trea Turner to
second. Anthony Rendon pops out. Juan Soto out on a
sacrifice fly, Adam Eaton to third, Trea Turner scores.
Howie Kendrick walks. Asdrubal Cabrera grounds out.
Nationals 6, Cardinals 2HOW THEY SCORED
NATIONALS SECOND
Howie Kendrick triples. Asdrubal Cabrera out on a sac-
rifice fly, Howie Kendrick scores. Victor Robles hit by
pitch. Yan Gomes lines out. Patrick Corbin grounds out.
Nationals 1, Cardinals 0
CARDINALS THIRD
Miles Mikolas singles. Dexter Fowler singles. Miles
Mikolas to second. Kolten Wong out on a sacrifice bunt.
Dexter Fowler to second. Miles Mikolas to third. Paul
Goldschmidt walks. Marcell Ozuna strikes out swing-
ing. Paul DeJong reaches on error, Paul Goldschmidt to
second, Dexter Fowler to third, Miles Mikolas scores.
Fielding error by Trea Turner. Yadier Molina strikes out
swinging.
Nationals 1, Cardinals 1
NATIONALS FOURTH
Juan Soto strikes out swinging. Howie Kendrick hom-
ers. Asdrubal Cabrera grounds out. Victor Robles flies
out.
Nationals 2, Cardinals 1
NATIONALS SIXTH
Juan Soto doubles. Howie Kendrick flies out. Asdrubal
Cabrera grounds out. Victor Robles singles, advances to
second, Juan Soto scores. Yan Gomes is intentionally
walked. Patrick Corbin strikes out swinging.
Nationals 3, Cardinals 1Nationals 6, Cardinals 2
WASHINGTON AB RHBI BB SO AVG
Turner ss........................411 011.291
Eaton rf ..........................501 003.279
Rendon 3b ......................501 000.332
Soto lf ............................411 102.294
Kendrick 1b ....................423 110.341
A.Cabrera 2b ..................310 110.309
Robles cf ........................312 200.257
Gomes c.........................302 110.217
Corbin p..........................301 001.082
Rodney p........................000 000---
Parra ph .........................100 000.224
Dan.Hudson p................000 000---
TOTALS 35 6126 47 —
ST. LOUIS AB RHBI BB SO AVG
Fowler rf ........................501 000.248
Wong 2b.........................400 001.282
Goldschmidt 1b..............201 021.259
Ozuna lf..........................300 012.251
DeJong ss.......................400 002.238
Molina c.........................402 002.266
Edman 3b .......................310 012.282
Bader cf..........................401 003.211
Mikolas p.......................211 000.140
J.Martinez ph.................100 001.266
Gallegos p......................000 000.000
Gant p............................000 000.000
Helsley p........................000 000.333
G.Cabrera p....................000 000.000
Carpenter ph ..................100 000.224
TOTALS 33 26 04 14 —
WASHINGTON.............. 010 101 021 —612 2
ST. LOUIS...................... 001 001 000 —2 60
E: Turner (13), Gomes (4). LOB: Washington 9, St. Lou-
is 9. 2B: Gomes 2 (13), Soto (30), Goldschmidt (22),
Molina (23). 3B: Kendrick (1). HR: Kendrick (16), off
Mikolas. RBI: A.Cabrera (30), Kendrick (61), Robles 2
(62), Gomes (38), Soto (106). SB: Gomes (2), Robles
(26), Eaton (14), Turner (33). SF: A.Cabrera, Soto. S:
Wong. GIDP: Rendon. DP: St. Louis 1 (DeJong, Wong,
Goldschmidt).
WASHINGTON IPHRER BB SO NP ERA
Corbin .......................... 65204111 10 3.10
Rodney ......................... 100001 18 3.49
Dan.Hudson ................ 210002 26 2.00
ST. LOUIS IPHRER BB SO NP ERA
Mikolas ....................... 683314 91 4.29
Gallegos .................... 1.1 00003 17 2.10
Gant ............................. 011110 10 3.64
Helsley ........................ .2 2110082 .27
G.Cabrera ..................... 111120 25 5.09
WP: Corbin, (13-7); LP: Mikolas, (9-14); S: Dan.Hudson,
(2). Gant pitched to 2 batters in the 8th. Inherited run-
ners-scored: Helsley 2-1. IBB: off Mikolas (Gomes).
HBP: Mikolas (Robles). T: 3:21. A: 44,061 (45,538).11 / 2 back, and the Brewers are tied
with Chicago after beating the
San Diego Padres. So if there was
ever a time to be urgent, to admit
that some contests may really
matter more than others, it is
right now.
“The best thing to do is just
worry about today,” said Hale,
who was both filling in for and
sounding very much like Marti-
nez. “Worry about the next pitch
and just try to win each pitch and
win each game. If you start going,
‘Whoa, if we lose this game and
they win then dot dot dot.”
The audible dot dot dot came
with Hale shaking his head and
waving his hands in the air. The
dot dot dot is what Washington
wants to avoid. The dot dot dot is
everything that could happen:
losing the wild-card lead, run-
ning away with it, playing in a
tiebreaker Sept. 30, missing the
playoffs entirely, winning every
remaining game, losing every re-
maining game — you name it. It’s
easy to get caught nose-deep in
scenarios at this time of year. It’s
easy, then, for doubt to set in. But
the Nationals’ simple cure, maybe
the only cure, is to win and let the
rest shake out.
Their latest attempt at that
began with Corbin fooling St.
Louis with his slider. That helped
him finish with 11 strikeouts,
tying a season high, and limit
damage despite four walks. He
only gave up those two unearned
runs in six innings, because of
errors by shortstop Trea Turner
and catcher Yan Gomes, but the
offense was up to erasing them
throughout the evening.
Kendrick was the first to get it
going against Cardinals starter
Miles Mikolas. He hit a triple in
the second, missing a home run
by a few feet, and scored on
Asdrúbal Cabrera’s sacrifice fly.
Then he got all of a Mikolas
curveball in the fourth for his
16th home run. Robles ripped
two RBI singles, in the sixth and
eighth, to stretch the lead. Juan
Soto added a sacrifice fly to score
Turner in the ninth. And, all the
while, Rodney and Hudson were
up for recording the final nine
outs.
“Pretty much every inning we
were thinking about the next
one,” Hale said of deciding to
push Hudson for two frames,
made possible because he needed
just 11 pitches in the eighth. “The
word of the night was reconvene.
[Pitching coach] Paul [Menhart]
kept saying, ‘We’ ll reconvene
when the inning ends.’ ”
Hours before the game, in the
dead of a lazy afternoon, the
Nationals’ clubhouse was filled
with Bob Marley’s greatest hits.
The last song to play was “Three
Little Birds” — among Marley’s
most famous, mostly for the re-
minder to “Don’t worry about a
thing... ’cause every little thing
is gonna be all right.” After it
ended, and the speakers stopped
offering music, Rodney and fel-
low reliever Wander Suero stood
by the showers and offered their
own version. Rodney sang those
famous two lines in his deep
voice. Suero did the same, his
range an octave higher, and punc-
NATIONALS FROM D1
BY JESSE DOUGHERTY
st. louis — Mike Rizzo received
good news during his phone call
with Manager Dave Martinez on
Tuesday. Rizzo, the Washington
Nationals’ general manager,
learned that Martinez will not
need any additional cardiac pro-
cedures in the near future. He
learned that Martinez is home
from the hospital and resting in
Washington, even if his mind was
filled with thoughts about his
team’s previous loss and its next
matchup with the St. Louis Cardi-
nals. And he learned, with all of
that, Martinez can rejoin the Na-
tionals as soon as he is cleared to
travel.
Martinez, 54, underwent a car-
diac catheterization Monday in
Washington after first feeling
chest pains during the Nationals’
game Sunday afternoon. Doctors
mandated that he avoid air travel
for an amount of time that Rizzo
did not specify. A person with
knowledge of the situation said
it’s likely two to three days if
Martinez is capable of getting on a
plane. That c ould put Martinez on
schedule to manage the Nationals
for their series opener against the
Marlins on Friday in Miami.
Rizzo confirmed that bench
coach Chip Hale would manage
the club’s final two games against
the Cardinals, starting with Tues-
day’s 6-2 win. The general manag-
er would not put a timetable on
Martinez’s return, knowing that
plans are subject to change.
Washington has a day off Thurs-
day in Miami before playing 11
games in 10 days to finish the
regular season.
“Nothing major,” Rizzo said of
Martinez’s test results. “The [car-
diac catheterization] is the only
thing that he had. He’s going totake some further testing down
the road, but there is nothing vital
that he has to take now. [The later
testing is] to monitor him for the
long term.”
A cardiac catheterization, ac-cording to the Mayo Clinic, is a
procedure used to diagnose and
treat certain cardiovascular con-
ditions. It requires doctors to in-
sert a catheter in an artery or vein
in a person’s groin, neck or arm,and that catheter is threaded
through the patient’s blood ves-
sels to the heart. That allows
doctors to run diagnostic tests
and see if a person’s heart is in a
state that requires further testingor procedures. Martinez’s overall
results were encouraging.
In the meantime, the second-
year manager continues to be
involved from afar. He texted
Hale the lineup for Monday’s 4-2
loss. He d id so again for Tuesday’s
game and broke down the results
with Rizzo when they chatted on
the phone. Rizzo noted that it was
more baseball talk than health
talk, a signal to him that Martinez
is feeling like himself, and he was
optimistic about Martinez’s abili-
ty to slide back into the playoff
race.
The race is tight. The Nationals
finished Tuesday 1^1 / 2 games ahead
of both the Chicago Cubs and the
Milwaukee Brewers in the quest
for the National League’s two
wild-card spots. That’s a stark
difference from where they were
at t he start of September, coasting
into the postseason, capping a
three-month stretch of being one
of the majors’ best teams. Now
their short-term future is much
more fragile.
And they want their manager
back as soon as possible.
“He’s feeling much better, and
the doctor said that as soon as he
is good to travel he can rejoin us,”
Rizzo noted. “A nd once he does
rejoin us, he will be full-go, no
limitations, 100 percent, hopeful-
ly for a long time.
“For the rest of this season, for
a long time.”
[email protected]News is positive regarding Martinez, who won’t need any further treatment
BY PETER SCHMUCK
baltimore — T he Baltimore Ori-
oles opened their final h omestand
of the season with one of those
games that would tear a team’s
heart out if it really meant any-
thing.
They entered the eighth inning
with a lead a nd ended the evening
with their 102nd loss, falling, 8-5,
to the Toronto Blue Jays before an
announced crowd of 9,280 at
Camden Yards.
Blue Jays slugger Justin Smoak
led off the ninth with a mammoth
home run off reliever Mychal Giv-
ens to put the Jays ahead in a
back-and-forth game that had
Trey Mancini’s fingerprints all
over i t.
Mancini gave the Orioles the
early lead in his first at-bat, tied
the score in his third at-bat and
put the Orioles back ahead in his
fourth at-bat, but his four-RBI per-
formance was rendered moot by a
four-run To ronto ninth that fea-
tured a highlight-film moment
that was both electrifying and ter-
rifying.
Rookie Cavan Biggio became
the third player in Blue Jays his-
tory to hit for the cycle when he
lined a ball off the center field
fence, but Mason Williams
crashed into the fence so hard
trying to catch the ball that he lay
on the warning track for several
minutes before leaving the field
under h is own p ower.
Manager Brandon Hyde said
Williams did not exhibit concus-
sion symptoms but would remain
under o bservation o vernight.
It was Biggio’s first career four-
hit game and the first Blue Jays
cycle since Jeff Frye turned the
trick in 2001. It was also the first
cycle by any opposing player at
Oriole Park.
Mancini didn’t waste any time
resuming his late-season power
surge. He came up in the first
inning with Dwight Smith Jr. on
first base and launched a long
home run to center field to stake
Orioles first-time starter Chandler
Shepherd to a quick l ead.
It was Mancini’s fourth home
run in his past five games, and he
was far from through. He also
delivered a game-tying sacrifice
fly in the fifth that scored Chance
Sisco on a close play at the plate
and a go-ahead single in the sev-
enth that scored Steve Wilkerson.
The home run was Mancini’s
34th of the season, and the four
RBI gave him 11 over the past five
games.
“I think a nybody w ants to finish
the year strong,’ ’ Mancini said.
“A gain, it sounds cliche, but it’s
honestly what I think about when
I go up to the plate is just trying to
do what I can to help t he t eam win
and t ry t o have a good a t-bat.”
— Baltimore SunMancini’s
big night
not enough
to carry O’s
BLUE JAYS 8,
ORIOLES 5NATIONALS ON DECK
at St. Louis CardinalsToday1:15 MASNat Miami MarlinsFr iday7:10 MASN2Saturday6:10 MASN2
Sunday1:10 MASN2vs. Philadelphia PhilliesMonday7:05 MASN
Tuesday1:05
7:05MASN
Sept. 25 7:05 MASNSept. 26 4:05 MASNRadio: WJFK (106.7 FM)Corbin and bullpen click as Nats beat Cardinals
PHOTOS BY JEFF ROBERSON/ASSOCIATED PRESSbaseball
JONATHAN NEWTON/THE WASHINGTON POST
“As soon as he is good to travel he can rejoin us,” GM Mike Rizzo said of Manager Dave Martinez, above.After heart procedure,
Nationals manager
is expected back soonAbove, Juan Soto scores on one
of two RBI singles by Victor
Robles to give Washington a 3-1
lead in the sixth inning. At left,
Howie Kendrick, who earlier
had tripled and belted a home
run for the Nationals, strokes a
single in the eighth inning.