Nationals' bats can't maintain hot start in extra-innings loss

WASHINGTON -- For a second straight game, and the Major League-leading 16th time this season, the Nationals scored at least five runs.

And for a second straight game, it wasn’t enough to best a San Francisco club finding its groove at the plate -- despite the Nats forcing extra innings and being provided with ample opportunities to snag their first walk-off win of the season.

The 7-6 loss to the Giants in 12 innings on Saturday afternoon was the latest example of the three very different Nationals teams that show up in each game. There’s the quick-hitting team that jumps on a starting pitcher and does damage in the first inning or two. There’s the gritty team that stares down relief pitchers in the seventh through ninth innings. Then there’s the team that steps to the plate in the middle innings. That’s the team that Washington is working to wake up.

The difference was in stark contrast on Saturday. Washington pulled ahead 5-3 in the second inning, delivering a four-run second behind James Wood’s leadoff homer in the first -- his second opposite-field home run in a row.

Then the Nationals tied the game with some aggressive baserunning (and hitting) in the ninth inning, with Wood diving home just in time to beat the tag play at third base that ended the frame. And it was that tag play at third that could have changed the course of the game … if only Curtis Mead had slid.

As Wood chugged around the bases from second to home on a single from Brady House, Mead followed behind. Third-base coach Victor Estevez windmilled his arm behind the base, emphatically telling Mead to get down and slide. But he didn’t, and instead ran into a tag he might have otherwise avoided.

“[That] just can’t happen,” manager Blake Butera said postgame, “and we’ll talk about that tomorrow. … Watching it from the dugout like, it’s just -- we gotta slide.”

“If you’re asking, ‘Should I have slid?’ Yeah, I think I have to slide 100%,” Mead said. “It’s just a complete mistake. … I’m not really sure [what happened] to be honest. I looked at him, I think in my head I was focused on making sure the throw didn’t go home. But I didn’t think I had the throw beat. I definitely have to slide in that scenario.”

And yes, while Mead could have, should have, would have slid, the game might not have necessitated it if Washington had not gone quiet from inning three through eight. Mead’s misplay at third in the ninth -- and the team’s missed bunt opportunities in the later innings -- just exacerbated that.

“There’s a lot to take away from that game that we’re going to unpack as a team tomorrow,” Butera said. “I think ideally, you come out on the winning end of this. But there’s a lot of teaching moments in that game today, and a lot of opportunities for us to learn from things that happened throughout a lot of that game: things we did OK, things we didn’t do well, things that we need to do better if we want to be a winning ballclub.”

Washington entered Saturday with an MLB-best 19 runs scored in the first inning, and a National League-leading 44 runs scored in the seventh inning or later. The Nats have the capacity for a late rally just as much as they have the capacity for an early onslaught. It’s those middle innings in which they struggle to settle in and compete.

So the big second inning was a welcome change. It started with Daylen Lile, who singled before making it to second on a fielding error in the next at-bat. That was the first free pass the Nats took advantage of, with a pair of runners reaching on fielder’s choices, one via walk and one via hit-by-pitch.

Four runs on three hits, two fielder’s choices, a walk and a hit-by-pitch. That’s not too shabby.

But once Giants starter Adrian Houser began making his way through the lineup for a third time -- when most starters tend to falter as hitters get more used to their stuff -- the Nationals quieted.

And, despite the game-tying run in the ninth, Washington had trouble converting baserunners into runs in extra innings.

While the Nats were riding their own offensive roller coaster, the Giants were busy battling back. San Francisco overcame the 5-1 deficit while taking advantage of the Nationals’ miscues, particularly on the basepaths and in extra innings.

“I thought we had plenty of opportunities to win that game,” Butera said. “I thought we should have won that game. We just didn’t execute, that’s what it came down to. …

“Every day we meet as a team and go through plays from the day before, plays that we did well, plays we didn’t do well, and how we want to execute them as a team. I think tomorrow’s meeting will just be a good bit longer than usual.”