{"id":15345,"date":"2018-08-06T16:33:27","date_gmt":"2018-08-06T20:33:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=15345"},"modified":"2018-08-06T16:36:08","modified_gmt":"2018-08-06T20:36:08","slug":"braves-at-nats-this-is-the-2018-season-deciding-series","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=15345","title":{"rendered":"Braves at Nats: this is the 2018 season-deciding series"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_1345\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/05\/miloneTom-Tom-PriddyFour-Seam-ImagesMiLB.com_.jpg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-1345\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1345\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1345\" src=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/05\/miloneTom-Tom-PriddyFour-Seam-ImagesMiLB.com_-300x226.jpg\" alt=\"Can Milone get another win? Photo: Tom Priddy\/Four Seam Images\/milb.com\" width=\"300\" height=\"226\" srcset=\"https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/05\/miloneTom-Tom-PriddyFour-Seam-ImagesMiLB.com_-300x226.jpg 300w, https:\/\/nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/05\/miloneTom-Tom-PriddyFour-Seam-ImagesMiLB.com_.jpg 500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-1345\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Can Milone get another win? Photo: Tom Priddy\/Four Seam Images\/milb.com<\/p><\/div>\n<p>So, despite winning 5 of 6 over the past week against two teams that havn&#8217;t really been trying for years, the Nats &#8230;. failed to make up a single game on Philly and head into the Atlanta series 6 games out.<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s because Philly was also playing a team that isn&#8217;t really trying (Miami), and just <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/teams\/PHI\/2018-schedule-scores.shtml\">finished off a nifty 4-game sweep at home<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>But hey, at least the Nats scored 3 touchdowns in a game, driving their RS\/RA average so far up that now by Pythagorean record they&#8217;re leading the division by two games!\u00a0 You know, in that fantasy world of stat nerds that nobody cares about but which I&#8217;ve been guilty of pointing at myself and saying, &#8220;See!\u00a0 they&#8217;re just unlucky and will win more soon!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>So here it is.\u00a0 I&#8217;ve already basically written off the season &#8230; but hey, maybe if the team plays a 22-7 August &#8230; and both Atlanta and Philly scuffle along at .500 &#8230; they can get close.\u00a0 But to play a 22-7 august &#8230; they need to take 3 of 4 against Atlanta this week.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s the <a href=\"http:\/\/washington.nationals.mlb.com\/news\/probable_pitchers\/index.jsp?c_id=was\">pitching match-ups<\/a> they&#8217;ll go to war with:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Game 1: <strong>Max Fried<\/strong> versus\u00a0<strong>Jefry Rodriguez<\/strong>.\u00a0 Hmm.\u00a0 Not a good start, having to call up a guy who has now fallen behind\u00a0<strong>Tommy Milone<\/strong> on the depth chart.\u00a0 I see the Braves jumping out to a quick 4 run lead and the &#8220;veteran leadership&#8221; packing it in early to regroup for the nightcap.<\/li>\n<li>Game 2:\u00a0<strong>Sean Newcomb <\/strong>vs\u00a0<strong>Max Scherzer.\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong>Scherzer will probably be unhittable, but Newcomb nearly threw a no-hitter against the Dodgers his last time out.\u00a0 I see this as a close Nats win.<\/li>\n<li>Game 3:\u00a0<strong>Mike Foltynewicz<\/strong> vs <strong>Tommy Milone<\/strong>: Atlanta&#8217;s best pitcher in 2018 versus the Nats &#8230; #10 starter?\u00a0 #9?\u00a0 Foltynewicz has already started against the Nats four times, throwing a 2-hit shutout against them in June (albeit in Atlanta).\u00a0 Odds are he&#8217;ll give up a few runs on the road against the Nats &#8230; can Milone keep up his magic show?<\/li>\n<li>Game 4:\u00a0<strong>Anibel Sanchez<\/strong> vs\u00a0<strong>Gio Gonzalez<\/strong>.\u00a0 Sanchez has been pretty good.\u00a0 Gio has not.\u00a0 \u00a0Any guesses how I think this one will go?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>So, you squint at these match-ups and &#8230; well a series split seems like an optimistic outcome.\u00a0 Frankly, I could see just winning the Scherzer start and the other starters getting bombed by Atlanta&#8217;s youthful, powerful lineup.<\/p>\n<p>The Phillies head to Arizona (tough), then to San Diego (not so tough) &#8230; but a 2-2 or even a 1-3 series here could really spell the end of it.<\/p>\n<p>how are you feeling, heading into this series?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>So, despite winning 5 of 6 over the past week against two teams that havn&#8217;t really been trying for years, the Nats &#8230;. failed to make up a single game on Philly and head into the Atlanta series 6 games out. That&#8217;s because Philly was also playing a team that isn&#8217;t really trying (Miami), and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[3948,385,1876,2278,1037,3947,2431,34],"class_list":["post-15345","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-natsgeneral","tag-anibel-sanchez","tag-gio-gonzalez","tag-jefry-rodriguez","tag-max-fried","tag-max-scherzer","tag-mike-foltynewicz","tag-sean-newcomb","tag-tommy-milone"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15345","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15345"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15345\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15350,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15345\/revisions\/15350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15345"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15345"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15345"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}