Nationals dare to err

The Washington Nationals seemingly are unraveling everywhere.

The club’s lack of offense after the All-Star break has been well documented. Now this normally strong defensive team is breaking down in the field, too.

A ninth-inning error by third baseman Vinny Castilla, his second of the game, allowed the last-place Colorado Rockies to escape with a 5-4 victory before 30,165 last night at RFK Stadium in the opener of a three-game series.

The Rockies’ victory was just their eighth road win in 43 games. The loss was the ninth in 12 games for the Nationals (53-40) and reduced their lead in the National League East to just one game over the Atlanta Braves, who played a late game in San Francisco. Washington has been in first place since June 5.

Nationals starter Tony Armas Jr. left the game in the third inning with two balls on leadoff batter Byung-Hyun Kim, the Rockies’ starting pitcher, because of dizziness and dehydration on a stifling hot night.

After the game, Armas was unavailable for comment, but manager Frank Robinson said the pitcher “couldn’t catch his breath and was dizzy.”

Castilla’s second error proved the most costly. Pinch hitter Eddie Garabito led off the ninth with a single up the middle and went to second on a sacrifice. With two out, Aaron Miles hit a routine grounder to Castilla that would have ended the inning, but the veteran third baseman pulled up too early on the ball, and it went through his legs into left field as Garabito scored the winning run.

“When something is going bad, it’s bad,” said Castilla, who had just four errors before last night. “Tonight I just missed the ball.”

Armas threw just 31 pitches before he removed himself from the game. Armas’ exit became even more bizarre when left-handed reliever Joey Eischen came in from the dugout instead of the bullpen.

With the Nationals desperately needing Eischen to give them innings, the veteran responded with his longest and perhaps best outing of the season.

Eischen completed the walk to Kim but then worked three decent innings. The Rockies tied the game 2-2 in the fifth inning off him, but Eischen would have been out of the inning if new center fielder Preston Wilson hadn’t played too shallow on Cory Sullivan’s deep fly ball.

Sullivan was credited with a triple after his drive struck Wilson’s glove and scored Dustan Mohr. Overall, Eischen allowed two runs on three hits and struck out two.

The Rockies took an 1-0 first-inning lead off Armas. With one out, Miles singled to left and advanced when Armas walked Todd Helton. Miles, who owns a 13-game hitting streak, then scored on Eric Byrnes’ single to center.

The Nationals took the lead in their half. Jose Vidro walked, and Jose Guillen moved Vidro to third with a line-drive double into the gap in left. Vidro scored on Wilson’s bloop double to shallow center, and Guillen scored on Ryan Church’s groundout to shortstop.

The Rockies recaptured the lead in the sixth. Eischen surrendered an inning-opening double to Helton before giving way to right-hander Hector Carrasco. A broken-bat infield single by Byrnes pushed Helton to third, and he scored when Nationals shortstop Cristian Guzman mishandled a weakly hit grounder by Garrett Atkins.

“I was surprised because normally we don’t make three [errors] in a game,” said Guzman, who is now 0-for-15 at the plate since returning to the lineup from a strained left hamstring after the All-Star break.

The Rockies boosted their lead to 4-2 when Danny Ardoin delivered a sacrifice fly to right that scored Byrnes.

The Nationals tied it once more in their half of the seventh. Vidro singled with one out before Rockies reliever Mike DeJean hit Guillen and walked Wilson.

Church delivered a deep sacrifice fly to center to score Vidro, but Sullivan’s throw to third bounced in the dirt and skipped past Atkins as Guillen scored the tying run.