Post-Game 140 Thread: A Kick To The Nuts

NATIONALS 8, DODGERS 5 (14)

There are PGTs that cause us Sons of Steve Garvey to skirmish and squabble in the staff room, descending into cage matches to determine which Son gets to pen the day's journal entry.

This was not one of those PGTs.

In fact, this loss was so painful, none of us Sons wanted to touch it with a ten-foot pole. 14 innings of back and forth ball looked like they were heading the Dodgers' way: a game-extending run by Justin Turner in the bottom of the ninth off of a Jayson Werth fielding error in right field; and a Carl Crawford HR in the bottom of the 12th to tie the game at 5-5. But three Nationals runs in the top of the 14th were just too much to overcome. In a boxing match with two division-leading pugilists, Washington got the knockout punch in the final round, and the Dodgers were down and out.

Crawford and Turner each had three hits; Dee Gordon and Yasiel Puig had two hits each. But the Dodgers went 2-for-9 with RISP and left 12 on base, wasting a nice effort from Carlos Frias (6.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 1 BB and 4 Ks). Kenley Jansen's bid for a four-out save went haywire when he came back out for the ninth, with Bryce Harper singling, Adam LaRoche with a two-run HR, and Denard Span singling in a third run to make it 3-2 Washington. Yes, the Dodgers answered in the bottom of the ninth when Werth fumbled a fly ball in right field, but letting the Nationals back into the game in the ninth was a dangerous play.

We may end up seeing the Nationals again, should we hold on for the post-season. After dropping the rubber match in this fashion, I'm pretty concerned.