PHILADELPHIA — At the end of a turbulent but ultimately satisfying day of baseball, the Washington Nationals made the short train ride north to New York, a relaxing, pain-free trip.
It’s a good thing, too, because after a roller-coaster ride of an afternoon resulted in a 7-6 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies, the last thing the Nationals needed were more bumps in the road.
This 3-hour, 25-minute game at Citizens Bank Park featured the following chain of events: a 22-year-old pitcher getting ejected (along with his manager) in his big league debut after plunking two consecutive batters, a star from the opposing team breaking his hand on one of those beanballs, another strong effort from an exhausted bullpen and a dramatic rally keyed by another 22-year-old rookie’s three-run homer.
Leave it to Dmitri Young, the veteran first baseman on the verge of signing a contract extension, to sum up this latest Nationals victory.
“There’s no quit,” Young said. “We don’t know how to quit.”
Not that anyone would have blamed Washington’s players for doing so after left-hander John Lannan was ejected in the fifth inning for hitting Phillies sluggers Chase Utley and Ryan Howard.
Lannan, a Long Island kid who was drafted two years ago out of Siena College and rocketed his way through three levels of the Nationals’ farm system this season, never could have dreamed his big league debut would go like this.
“No, that never crossed my mind,” he said, still a little shocked two hours after he was tossed by plate umpire Hunter Wendelstedt.
Here’s how it happened: With one out in the fifth and the Nationals trailing 3-2, Lannan hit Utley on a high-and-tight 0-2 fastball. Utley, the Phillies’ All-Star and MVP candidate, suffered a broken right hand, an injury that could end his season.
Howard, the reigning MVP who hit the game-winning homer in the 14th inning late Wednesday night and launched another two-run shot off Lannan in the third yesterday, came up next. Lannan’s first pitch, another high-and-tight fastball, caught Howard in the shoulder.
“I wasn’t throwing at anybody,” said Lannan, who struggled with command all afternoon. “I was just trying to make good pitches and it got away from me.”
The Phillies agreed.
“He’s a young guy,” Utley said. “He hit two guys in a row, but I don’t think he was throwing at us.”
Wendelstedt, though, didn’t see it the same way. Without warning, he ejected Lannan, citing an edict from Major League Baseball that tells umpires to “red flag” any pitcher who surrenders a home run and then hits the same batter his next time up.
“I can’t read his mind. I don’t know if he intentionally did it or not,” Wendelstedt told a pool reporter. “I can’t judge my decision whether the guy’s been in the league 20 years or if it’s his first day. It’s a bad time to lose your control.”
Washington manager Manny Acta, who rarely confronts umpires and hadn’t come close to being ejected this season, was livid. He got into a lengthy argument with Wendelstedt, insisting there was no way Lannan could have intended to hit both Phillies, and wound up getting ejected himself.
“Even [Wendelstedt] admitted earlier in the game to us, when he turned to our dugout, that [Lannan] was all over the place,” Acta said. “I don’t think this kid will want to come up to the big leagues in his debut and make that type of impression.”
Thus, Lannan joined an exclusive club of players who were ejected in their big league debuts. According to SABR statistician David Vincent, it has happened only four other times, most recently by Cincinnati Reds third baseman Aaron Boone on June 20, 1997.
Still stinging from their 14-inning collapse the previous night, with a bullpen that was overworked and down to only four available pitchers, the Nationals had every reason to simply accept a three-game sweep at the hands of the Phillies.
But that hasn’t been their style all season, and it wasn’t going to change yesterday. The depleted bullpen cobbled together 42/3 innings of one-run ball, highlighted by Jon Rauch’s two scoreless innings, and left the door open for the club’s lineup to come back.
Felipe Lopez got things started with a two-run single in the seventh, cutting the Phillies’ lead to 5-4. Jesus Flores, the rookie backup catcher starting only because Brian Schneider played all 14 innings Wednesday night, then delivered the latest clutch hit in his impressive season. One night after hitting a go-ahead double in the ninth inning, Flores took reliever Mike Zagurski deep to left for the three-run homer that gave Washington the lead for good and capped a dramatic victory on a wild afternoon.
“I believe in these guys in my locker room,” Acta said. “They’ve got a lot of heart. They showed it in this series, and they’ve showed it the whole year.”
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