Washington Nationals hitter Juan Soto gives thanks to the Almighty after slugging a first inning home run against the San Francisco Giants at Oracle Park in San Francisco on Fri Apr 29, 2022 (AP News photo)

Washington. 14. 22. 0

San Francisco. 4. 11. 2

By Lewis Rubman

Friday, April 29, 2022

SAN FRANCISCO–An old baseball quip went, “Washington, first in war, first in peace, and last in the American League.” That’s not quite true today. Washington no longer is in the American League, and its won-lost record is only the second worst in the senior circuit. The Nats came to town, however, at 6-15, last in the National League East.

The Giants, coming off Tuesday’s razor thin loss to the Athletics, brought a stellar mark of 13-6 with them to Oracle Park, tops in the NL West. Before tonight´s action started, they announced that Brandon Belt and Dominic Leone had been placed on the IL Jakob Junis had been optioned to Sacramento, and left handed pitcher Darién Núñez had been released.

On the relatively positive side, Joc Pederson still is day to day, and Jason Krizan, Mauricio Llovera, and Ka’ai Tom have been promoted from the RiverCats. Krizan made his big league debut tonight, starting in left and batting sixth. He went 0 for 3.

Gabe Kaper’s crew had well-travelled veteran lefty Alex Wood (2-0 ERA 2.51 at game time) on the mound to face the visitors from the District of Colombia. His opposite number was the superannuated (by baseball standards) with Washington starter Aarón Sánchez.

Sanchez the 40 year old right hander brought a lifetime record of 35-35 ERA 3.95 with him. About two-thirds of his deliveries are curves or sliders. Sánchez went 1-1 ERA 4.05 for the Giants last year, his only season with the team. San Francisco released him last August, and Washington signed him to a minor league contract this March.

They promoted him last Saturday to face his former teammates in Nationals Park. They shelled him in that, his lone appearance in the majors this year. He started and lasted in 4-1/3 innings, taking the loss, after allowing six hits and four earned runs. That left the Barstow native with a brutal basic record of 0-1 ERA 8.31

When the tumult and the shouting from the 38,256 fans in attendance had died down, the Nationals had massacred the Giants by a whopping 14-4.

Washington got off to an early lead. After Wood struck out César Hernández, Juan Soto parked a 94mph sinker 409 feet, into the center field bleachers in the top of the first.

They picked up two more runs in the second, when Maikel Franco led off with a solid double to left and, with two outs, Víctor Robles singled him home, taking second on the throw. He, too, crossed the plate, making it 3-0 on Alcides Escobar’s line drive single to right.

Only an outstanding play at third by Jason Vosler on González’s shot down the left field foul line kept the Nationals from widening their lead further.

Vosler wasn’t through. In the home half of the inning, with Austin Slater on base with a bunt single to third, the Giants’ third sacker laced into a 1-1, 78mph Sánchez curve and, like Soto, parked the ball over the center field fence, 409 feet from the plate. This narrowed DC’s lead to 3-2.

They lost no time in stretching it. With one down in the top of the third, Wood walked Cruz, who made it to third on Josh Bell’s single to right.

Franco hit his second straight two bagger, a sizzling drive down the line to left that brought in Cruz with Washington’s fourth tally. The fifth came after the brief interval afforded by Wood’s strike out of Keibert Ruíz, when Lane Thomas´s swinging bunt drove–or, rather, dribbled–in Bell.

A slicing sacrifice fly by Luis González with runners on the corners and one down in the home fifth brought Austin Slater home with the Giant’s third run.

It came as no surprise that Wood didn’t come out to face the Nationals in the sixth. He’d thrown 86 pitches, 62 of which either were strikes or hit by his opponents, in his five innings of work, and the last was the only one in which he set the side down in order.

All of the five runs he allowed were earned, and he gave up a home run, seven other hits, a walk, and a wild pitch. His successor was Yunior Marte.

Marte started off well, getting Thomas to fly out to left center. But Robles followed with a grounder that bounced off the bag at third for an infield single.

He moved over to second when Marte plunked Escobar and scored on a single to right by Hernández also moved Escobar to second and brought Jarín García to the mound as the Giants’ third pitcher of the night.

Soto proceeded to sock a liner against the Levi’s landing that rebounded so hard that he was held to a single and, although Escobar scored, Hernández stopped at second. Then things got even. uglier. Cruz hit a grounder to first.

Ruf fielded it and threw to Crawford at second for the force, but Crawford´s relay to García, covering first, went awry, allowing Hernández to score and Cruz to advance to second. Bell then drove him home with a single to right. García then struck out Franco to end the carnage. Four runs had been scored, and San Francisco trailed, 9-3.

Austin Voth entered the game to relieve Sánchez after the fifth inning. The ex Giant hadn’t pitched particularly well, but he stood in line for the win when he made his exit.

His line showed three runs, all earned, on six hits, one of them for the distance, no walks, but one wild pitch, and four strikeouts. His 71 pitches included 51 that were counted as strikes. He reduced his ERA to a still hefty 6.75.

Voth did not have any easy time of it. Flores greeted him with a single to center. Crawford followed with a safety to right center that put runners on first and second. Voth got Estrada to strike out swinging but unleashed a wild pitch with the debutante Krizan, still hitless after two at bats, at the plate, putting two men in scoring position with but one down.

But Kerizan went down swinging for the second out, and Voth went to the showers, replaced by Steve Cishek, who put out the fire by coaxing a weak fly ball to medium right out of Slater to end the threat.

It was Mauricio Llovera who took on the task of keeping a bad situation from deteriorating into a disaster in the top of the seventh. He succeeded, but by the skin of his teeth, leaving two. men on before finishing a scoreless inning.

I won’t even try to describe the disaster that the top of the eighth represented for the Giants. It’s enough to say that the Nationals sent ten batters to the plate and that five of them crossed it, Crawford made his second throwing error of the game, Kervin Castro, who was charged with all five Washington runs–and all of them were earned– and Tyler Beede charged with no runs and four hits respectively in two-thirds and one-third of an inning, also respectively. Beede stayed in the game to mop up in the top of the ninth.

Sánchez was, needless to say, the winning pitcher, and there was no save for anyone to be credited with. In addition to Sánchez, Voth, and Ciskhek, Washington used Sam Clay, Francisco Pérez, and Paolo Espino to silence the Giants´ bats.

The second contest of this three game weekend series is scheduled to start at 1:05 Saturday afternoon. The Nats will try to get further under the Giants’ skin with rookie right hander Joan Adón (0-3 ERA 6.98) facing fellow righty Logan Webb (2-1 ERA 2.96).