Before yesterday’s game, Washington Nationals manager Manny Acta lauded Chad Cordero’s aggressiveness and command during a stretch of 12 consecutive scoreless innings.
Cordero went after Pittsburgh’s Jason Bay and kept a 1-1 fastball down to his liking, but it wasn’t as far outside as he wanted. The result was an opposite-field home run in the ninth inning and the winning margin in a 3-2 Pirates victory in front of 25,622 at RFK Stadium.
“I just made a mistake,” Cordero said. “Any time you do that, especially to a guy like Jason Bay, he is going to make you pay for it and that’s what it was. It was down like I wanted but just not far enough out. … That’s not what I wanted to do, but I just made a mistake.”
The Nationals’ closer had not allowed a run since May 6, his final outing before going on the bereavement list while spending time with his ailing grandmother in California. Cordero (1-1) returned to the team the next week after her death and hadn’t allowed a run in 12 one-inning appearances, lowering his ERA by more than two runs before yesterday.
Bay’s 11th home run of the season gave the Nationals their third straight series loss at RFK and put a wrap on a disappointing 3-6 home stand. It also spoiled a sparkling start by rookie left-hander Matt Chico, who authored his best start of the season.
Chico matched his major league high of seven innings while allowing two runs on four hits and three walks. His five strikeouts were one short of tying a career high.
“[It was an] outstanding pitching performance,” Acta said. “He made a couple of mistakes early in the game … but he gave us seven innings and matched [emerging Pirates ace Ian] Snell inning-by-inning. It was a great outing.”
His one mistake came in the third inning. After walking the first two batters, Chico induced a double play from Jose Bautista. The next batter, Freddy Sanchez, hit a two-run homer to left to knot the score 2-2. Though Sanchez has spent much of the season as Pittsburgh’s No. 3 hitter, it was his first home run of the year.
Chico navigated through trouble in the first and second innings. After Rajai Davis led off the game with a triple, Chico got Bautista and Sanchez to fly out to shallow right and caught Bay looking for his first strikeout.
He struck out the first two batters of the second inning before catcher Ronny Paulino walked. Paulino tried to score from first on a double down the left field line by Jack Wilson, but Ryan Church threw him out at the plate. Chico retired 12 straight batters after Sanchez’s home run and 13 of the last 14.
“I thought I threw the ball well,” Chico said. “I had a rough third inning when I kind of lost everything there, but I just tried to battle back.”
The Nationals struck early when Dmitri Young hit his sixth home run, a two-run shot in the first inning just past the outstretched glove of Pirates right fielder Ryan Doumit, who was clinging to the top of the wall. But that would be all for Washington against Snell, who matched Chico for seven innings.
Snell struck out seven while yielding only three hits and three walks. He has gone at least five innings in every start and at least seven in nine of 13 this season. Pirates manager Jim Tracy pulled Snell after 86 pitches and Matt Capps (3-2) retired the six batters he faced.
“They were just swinging at everything,” Snell said. “When you get teams swinging at everything your pitch count is going to be low.”
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