FRIDAY, AUGUST 23 , 2019. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ M2 D3
tion with Martinez, nodded a few
times and proceeded to give
swinging high-fives to his team-
mates.
If Scherzer feels good in the
morning, he will begin further
strengthening his shoulder in the
weight room, preparing for a
start Wednesday and working
toward 100 pitches and “empty-
ing the tank” in his final inning.
Getting back on the mound in a
live game checked one box. Now
the Nationals will see whether
Scherzer can check another.
“This is a good start,” Scherzer
said. “But I’m not out of the
woods.”
[email protected]on a throwing error. Eaton
reached with a bunt single and
was plated once Kendrick
chopped a grounder to third.
Then Scherzer entered, had his
sixth pitch lifted to the warning
track by Adam Frazier, and spent
the outing sidestepping damage.
The Pirates left two runners
on in the second. In the third,
Scherzer’s worst frame, he gave
up a towering homer to Frazier
before yielding a single and walk.
He got out of that jam with a
strikeout on a 95-mph fastball
and then ended his night by
getting Elias Diaz to whiff at a
change-up to finish the fourth.
Scherzer had a short conversa-wait stretched 10 extra minutes
for showers to pass over Pitts-
burgh on Thursday evening, and
Scherzer soon emerged from the
visitors’ dugout as a traveling
crowd cheered. It came in part to
see a resurrection of sorts. And
the entire organization could
exhale.
“It was awesome,” Martinez
said. “Just seeing him run out
there and take the ball was
great.”
Scherzer had a two-run lead
before he stepped on the mound
after Trea Turner and Adam
Eaton scored in the first. Turner
reached on a double, his first of
two in the game, and came homerotation.
So sitting out was, in a word,
difficult. For both Scherzer and
those around him. Scherzer often
hung by Manager Dave Martinez
in the dugout, making sugges-
tions and hinting, not so subtly,
that he was ready to pitch. He
trash-talked the Nationals’ hit-
ters. He started having pre-work-
out energy drinks before games
— games he wasn’t playing in —
for an added boost.
That’s how he coped. That’s
Scherzer, always competing, al-
ways seeking an edge in whatev-
er he does. Before he first felt
upper-back pain in late June
following a start in Detroit, he
had a 0.95 ERA in his past nine
appearances. That included 86
strikeouts against eight walks.
He was at the forefront of the Cy
Young conversation in the first
days of summer, and there was
only one way to slow him down.
The injuries did what oppo-
nents couldn’t. Washington
worked him along slowly, not
skipping any steps, getting even
more cautious once Scherzer re-
turned in late July, pitched five
innings and felt something the
next morning. He went back to
the IL. The wait continued. Thefive innings for the bullpen, and
a combination of Wander Suero,
Hunter Strickland, Fernando
Rodney and Javy Guerra got
through them. The offense
scratched across two runs early
and another five after Scherzer
exited. Howie Kendrick provided
insurance with a two-run homer
in the eighth and finished with
three RBI. Anthony Rendon add-
ed a solo homer in the ninth to
give him a career-high 101 RBI.
That all helped the Nationals
to a series win and, at 70-57, left
them a season-best 13 games over
.500. They also left Pittsburgh
with their rotation back intact.
But how Scherzer felt Thursday
night — or how he pitched
against a lowly offense — isn’t
the critical part of this. It’s how
his body responds, how it feels in
the morning, how well he and the
medical staff have decoded what-
ever led to three different diag-
noses since late June. Then this
start against the Pirates can be
adequately assessed.
“Fortunately I’ve never been in
this situation, but here I am,”
said Scherzer, who added a single
in two at-bats. “I got to deal with
it. I have to understand what’s
going on here, communicate
with the trainers, doctors, under-
stand what I can and can’t do.
“Try to communicate as much
as I can and just make sure I can
recover every single start.”
The Nationals have been anx-
ious for Scherzer’s return and not
just because he is one of the best
pitchers on the planet. The past
six weeks were uncharted terri-
tory as he dealt with a mid-back
strain, then bursitis in the scapu-
la below his right shoulder blade,
then a mild rhomboid muscle
strain in the same area. He had
made at least 30 starts in the
previous 10 seasons before this
one. He broke his nose in June on
a batting practice bunt and was
back on the mound the next day.
He prides himself on being dura-
ble, first and foremost, and fill-
ing each of his turns in the
NATIONALS FROM D1
Scherzer’s return to the mound gives the surging Nationals a shot in the arm
BY AVA WALLACEWashington Mystics Coach
Mike Thibault walked into Enter-
tainment and Sports Arena on
Thursday morning knowing he
was going implement three
changes to practices.
First, he vowed to stop practice
every time the Mystics made a
mistake — halting for flaws rang-
ing from a poor defensive read to
a shoddy pass — as opposed to
earlier in the season, when he
might let action continue for the
sake of teaching a play. Second,
he was going to have the men on
the Mystics’ practice squad play
harder and more physically than
they had all season. Then he was
going to swallow his whistle.
“Don’t expect to get calls; don’t
expect to get anything from any-
body,” Thibault said. “You’ve got
to earn everything you get. You
might get fouled; you’ve got to
play through it. You might get a
bad call; you’ve got to play
through it. And that’s the mental-
ity: We have to make ourselves
better in practice with little hab-
its.”
With seven games remaining
in the regular season, Thibault’s
aim is to usher in playoff-caliber
basketball early by mimicking
the pressurized environment of
the postseason.
The first-place Mystics (20-7)
play at the Chicago Sky (16-11) on
Friday night with their dominant
offense clicking and the chance at
a top seed and double-bye in the
playoffs well within reach. So the
focus for Thibault, from now
until the team’s final regular
season game Sept. 8, is getting his
team to think as if it is already in
the playoffs.
That means simulating the
physicality of the postseason and
getting accustomed to officials
letting teams play, though Thiba-
ult still will call fouls on his own
players to get them acclimated to
calls not going their way in heat-
ed situations. It also means add-
ing a little stress to practice: No
one wants to be the person whose
small error got the five-on-five
drill stopped.
“It ends up putting more pres-
sure on the team, and that makes
you feel like you’re in a playoff
atmosphere,” Elena Delle Donne
said of Thibault’s tactics. “You
know the stakes are high. Some
people are a little nervous. You
know you’ve got to play with that
pressure and play through it. So
it’s good he’s prepping us early for
it.”
On court, Washington spends
60 to 75 percent of every practice
focused on defense. The team
leads the league in five major
offensive categories: points
(88.6 per game), assists (21.7),
field goal shooting (46.9 per-
cent), three-pointers made (246)
and free throw shooting
(86.9 percent), but on the other
end of the court, it could im-
prove.
Washington’s defense is mid-
dling. Its defensive rating is sev-
enth best in the league, with
room to improve on rebounding
and finishing out plays, Delle
Donne said.
As the Mystics prepare to face
Los Angeles once and Chicago
twice down the stretch — Friday
and again in the season finale—
they know defense could make
the difference in their race for the
top seed in the playoffs.
Chicago has the second-high-
est-scoring offense in the WNBA,
averaging 82.6 per outing. The
Sparks rank fourth.“It’s probably our defense that
will win those games more than
our offense,” forward Emma
Meesseman said, “since they’ll
probably both be pretty high-
scoring.”
The key to improving the de-
fense isn’t so dissimilar from the
key to getting ready for the play-
offs, in Thibault’s view. Both re-
quire strict attention to detail.
Addressing small habits —
things as minor as making a
strong pass under pressure —
also will help the Mystics as they
continue to play without starting
guard Kristi Toliver, who has
missed the past four games be-
cause of a contusion in her right
knee. Thibault said her recovery
is “slow going” and that she
probably won’t play Friday in
Chicago or Sunday at home
against New York. She could miss
Tuesday’s game against Los An-
geles as well. The team signedguard Shey Peddy to another
seven-day contract in her ab-
sence.
As Toliver’s injury illustrates,
focusing on the little things is
also the most efficient way to
improve a team at this point in
the season, when players’ bodies
and minds are fighting fatigue
and rosters are fighting injury.
“You can’t ask a player right
now to be 10 possessions better,”
Thibault said. “But if every player
on the team could be one or two
possessions better each half, the
cumulative effect of that is huge.
Because [in the playoffs] you
have to be more exact, more
perfect because teams know you
inside and out. They’re going to
take away the first and second
option and get to your third
option. You’ve got to know where
the mismatch is. You’ve got to be
better.”
[email protected]Mystics are in playo≠ mode a bit early
With seven games left in the regular season, Thibault is drilling team to become precise and tough
BY RICK MAESEThe fastest man in the world —
and one of the United States’s bud-
ding Olympic stars — is mired in a
doping case that could threaten
his eligibility for next summer’s
Tokyo Games, according to media
reports.
Christian Coleman missed
three drug tests in a 12-month
period, which could trigger a sus-
pension that bars the 23-year-old
sprinter from this year’s IAAF
world championships and next
year’s Olympics, according to re-
ports from the Associated Press
and the Daily Mail, both citing
unnamed sources.
Coleman has the fastest 100-me-
ter time of the year — 9.81 seconds
— and was expected to be one of the
United States’s biggest stars in To-
kyo, in line to assume Usain Bolt’s
throne in track and field’s signa-
ture sprint race.
Coleman’s agent did not return
a message seeking comment
Thursday. Officials with the U.S.
Anti-Doping Agency do not com-
ment on confidential cases or on-
going investigations.
Coleman is disputing at least
one of the missed tests, according
to the Daily Mail, and his ability to
race in the world’s biggest events
in the next year could hinge on
those efforts. He could face a two-
year ban from the sport if he’sunable to present a compelling
defense.
Missing a drug test — an ath-
lete’s failure to be available or
share his or her whereabouts with
drug testers — is treated as a dop-
ing violation, and three misses can
be treated as a positive test.
Missing more than one test is
unusual and can raise red flags for
doping agencies. As Kara Gouch-
er, a long distance runner who
competed at the 2008 and 2012
Olympics, said on Twitter on
Thursday: “Missing 3 tests in a
12 month period is bad. You can
literally text an update of your
location at any time.”
Coleman won the national title
in the 100 at last month’s U.S.
championships. He has had his
sights set on avenging his second-
place finish from the 2017 world
championships at this year’s
championships, which begin next
month in Doha, Qatar.
He has posted the world’s fastest
time each of the past three seasons,
and his personal-best finish of 9.79
came last year at a Diamond
League event in Brussels.
Coleman ran at the University
of Tennessee before turning pro-
fessional in 2017, when he signed a
multiyear contract with Nike. As a
20-year-old, Coleman competed
for the United States’s 4x100 relay
team at the Rio Olympics.
[email protected]Missed drug tests mean
Coleman could face ban
KEITH SRAKOCIC/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Trea Turner, left, scored in the first inning after Adam Eaton’s bunt single and an error by the Pirates.TONI L. SANDYS/THE WASHINGTON POST
Elena Delle Donne and the Mystics lead the WNBA in scoring and assists, among other offensive stats.JEFF CHIU/ASSOCIATED PRESS
If sprinter Christian Coleman is suspended for missing three drug
tests, he would sit out the world championships and the Olympics.Nationals 7, Pirates 1
WASHINGTON ABRH BI BB SO AVG
Turner ss........................ 5 1 2 0 0 2 .296
Eaton rf .......................... 4 1 1 0 1 1 .291
Rendon 3b ...................... 5 1 2 1 0 2 .324
Soto lf ............................ 3 1 0 0 2 1 .286
Kendrick 1b .................... 5 1 3 3 0 0 .323
Suzuki c.......................... 5 0 1 0 0 0 .270
Dozier 2b ........................ 3 0 0 0 0 1 .234
Strickland p.................... 0 0 0 0 0 0 ---
Parra ph ......................... 1 1 1 0 0 0 .278
Rodney p ........................ 0 0 0 0 0 0 ---
Adams ph ....................... 1 0 0 0 0 1 .245
Guerra p ......................... 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000
Robles cf ........................ 5 1 2 1 0 1 .250
Scherzer p ...................... 2 0 1 0 0 0 .178
Suero p ........................... 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000
A.Cabrera 2b .................. 2 0 1 1 0 0 .333
TOTALS 41 7 14 6 3 9 —
PITTSBURGH ABRH BI BB SO AVG
Frazier 2b ....................... 4 1 1 1 0 0 .264
Reynolds lf ..................... 4 0 1 0 0 1 .324
Marte cf ......................... 4 0 1 0 0 1 .288
Bell 1b ............................ 3 0 0 0 1 1 .278
Moran 3b........................ 4 0 1 0 0 1 .282
M.Cabrera rf................... 4 0 1 0 0 0 .276
Newman ss .................... 4 0 2 0 0 0 .298
Diaz c.............................. 4 0 0 0 0 1 .243
Brault p .......................... 2 0 0 0 0 2 .310
Rodriguez p .................... 0 0 0 0 0 0 ---
Osuna ph ........................ 1 0 0 0 0 0 .300
Stratton p ...................... 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000
TOTALS 34 1 7 1 1 7 —
WASHINGTON.............. 200 000041 — 7 14 0
PITTSBURGH ................ 001 000000 — 1 7 1
E: Bell (11). LOB: Washington 10, Pittsburgh 7. 2B:
Turner 2 (26), Rendon (35), Kendrick (19), Parra (9),
Moran (22). HR: Kendrick (14), off Stratton; Rendon
(28), off Stratton; Frazier (7), off Scherzer. RBI: Kend-
rick 3 (53), Robles (54), A.Cabrera (14), Rendon (101),
Frazier (33). SB: Marte 2 (24), Newman (11), Robles
(20).
WASHINGTON IP HR ER BB SO NP ERA
Scherzer........................ 4 4 1 11 3 71 2.41
Suero............................. 1 1 0 00 2 19 4.88
Strickland ..................... 2 1 0 00 0 24 1.00
Rodney .......................... 1 0 0 00 2 17 3.06
Guerra ........................... 1 1 0 00 0 21 4.97
PITTSBURGH IPHR ER BB SO NP ERA
Brault ..........................67221 4983.98
Rodriguez.....................10000 2163.53
Stratton .......................27552 3603.60
WP: Strickland (2-0); LP: Brault (3-3).
PB: Suzuki (6).
T: 3:19. A: 10,587 (38,362).HOW THEY SCORED
NATIONALS FIRST
Turner doubles. Eaton singles. Turner scores. Fielding
error by Bell. Rendon doubles. Eaton to third. Soto
called out on strikes. Kendrick grounds out. Eaton
scores. Suzuki lines out.
Nationals 2, Pirates 0
PIRATES THIRD
Brault strikes out swinging. Frazier homers. Reynolds
flies out. Marte singles. Bell walks. Moran strikes out
swinging.
Nationals 2, Pirates 1
NATIONALS EIGHTH
Rendon strikes out swinging. Soto walks. Kendrick
homers. Soto scores. Suzuki flies out. Parra pinch-hit-
ting for Strickland. Parra doubles. Robles singles. Parra
scores. Cabrera singles, advances to 2nd. Robles scores.
Turner strikes out swinging.
Nationals 6, Pirates 1
NATIONALS NINTH
Eaton grounds out. Rendon homers. Soto walks. Kend-
rick singles. Soto to second. Suzuki singles. Kendrick to
second. Soto to third. Adams pinch-hitting. Adams
strikes out swinging. Robles pops out.
Nationals 7, Pirates 1NATIONALS ON DECK
at Chicago CubsToday 2:20 MASN
Tomorrow 2:20 MASN
Sunday 2:20 MASNvs. Baltimore Orioles
Tuesday 7:05 MASN,
MASN 2
Wednesday 7:05 MASN,
MASN 2
vs. Miami MarlinsFriday 7:05 MASN 2
Aug. 31 7:05 MASN 2
Sept. 1 1:35 MASN 2Radio: WJFK (106.7 FM)