Game Wrap 5/22/2013: Nationals 2 Giants 1

Madison Bumgarner and Gio Gonzalez hooked up in another pitcher's duel that ended in a draw, but this time it was the Nationals who won the bullpen game in extra innings.  Key Lines:

Marco Scutaro- 0 for 3, 2 BB.  BA= .331.  Scutaro gets on base twice but ends his hit streak at 19.  For the second game in a row, came close to hitting one out late in the game.

Madison Bumgarner- 7 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 2 BB, 5 K's.  ERA= 2.89.  Bumgarner's line was identical to Gio's except Gio retired 1 more batter.  Nice matchup.

Rafael Soriano(Nationals)- 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K's, Save(13).  ERA= 3.00.  Soriano got the Save in this one.  He called out Bryce Harper for not playing deep enough on Blanco's triple last night.  Alex Pavlovic commented over on Giants Extra that Harper should have made the catch implying that Harper gave up on the ball too early.  I disagree with both Soriano and Pavs.  Harper was playing plenty deep.  What does Soriano want, for him to play on the warning track?  That ball was scorched and just went over his head before any player could have reasonably reacted.  As for giving up on it, it was not catchable, IMO after seeing multiple replays.  Even if Soriano was right, it is bush league for him to call out Harper publicly like that:  1. Harper is a 20 year old kid who is learning the game at the MLB level because he is so talented, he's still better than any savvy vet you could put out there.  2.  Harper already publicly took responsibility for the play.  3.  If it wasn't for Bryce Harper, the Nationals would have lost today's game 1-0 and Soriano wouldn't have gotten a chance to save this game.  Talk about picking yourself up!  

The Loss put the Giants in a 3 way tie for first place in the NL West with the D'Backs and Rockies after the Rockies topped the D'Backs 4-1.  The Padres lost to the Cardinals 5-3 to remain 4.5 games behind in 4'th place. The Dodgers responded to Donnie Baseball's callout with a 9-2 drubbing of the BrewCrew.  Things are getting mighty inneresting down in Dodgerland with Donnie not only calling out his players but upper management at the same time.  It was so pointed that there is some speculation out there that Donnie might be trying to get himself fired, which is actually the first thing I thought of when I read the comments.  Ironically, the player who got sat down was with the team before the new ownership took over.  Gotta say while I don't think much of Donnie as a manager, I agree with his assessment of the team.  As for Ethier, I've thought for a long time that Ethier was more interested in posing for GQ photo shoots and preening for the TV cameras than he was in actually, you know, playing baseball!

The Giants get tomorrow off then get a chance at payback of the Rockies in AT&T Park with a weekend series.  First matchup is Tim Lincecum vs Tyler Chatwood.

Great series with the Nats.  An NLCS matchup of these two teams would be a real treat to watch!