WASHINGTON — With small playoff chances and the hardest remaining schedule in the Major Leagues, the Reds can no longer afford to squander any series. Especially against a team also not currently contending like the Nationals and while they have All-Star Chase Burns on the mound.
But that's exactly what happened on Saturday. Burns had a rare subpar night as his consecutive winning decision streak was halted during an 8-2 Reds loss, which gave Washington the first two games of the three-game series.
"I thought to be able to do what we did against Burns -- one of the best pitchers in the game who's obviously on a pretty good streak this year for a good reason -- really good stuff, couldn't have been more proud of our at-bats, top to bottom," Nationals manager Blake Butera said.
The Reds (56-60) were one of baseball's hotter teams coming into the weekend; this is only the second series out of seven they've dropped since the All-Star break.
Burns, 23, was seeking to be the first Reds pitcher since Brooks Lawrence in 1956 to notch 13 consecutive winning decisions. Instead, he was handed his first loss since April 10 to the Angels.
Over his 5 1/3 innings, Burns was charged with a season-high-tying five runs and six hits with three walks and six strikeouts. His record dropped to 13-2 while his ERA jumped from 2.35 to 2.61 over 22 starts and 124 innings. The Reds are now 16-6 when he pitches.
“They just had some really good approaches," Burns said of the 58-61 Nationals. "I think there were some good positives. I think the slide-step is really good, the changeup was really good. A game of inches, just barely missed some spots, they have a good lineup.”
As he often does, Burns relied heavily on his fastball and slider, but his fastball wasn't always located where the right-handed wanted it – especially during Nationals rallies in the third and sixth innings.
“Just not getting it up enough or they were seeing it up well," Burns said. "They put some really good swings together.”
Burns struck out three of his first four batters and worked around a two-out walk in the second inning to keep the game scoreless. But in the bottom of the third inning, José Tena led off with a single and went to third base on CJ Abrams' one-out double to right field.
Both runners scored when Abimelec Ortiz got to an 0-2 fastball for a single that rolled into left field for a 2-0 Washington lead.
The Reds’ lineup had just picked up Burns in the top of the sixth inning with Eugenio Suárez's game-tying two-run home run to left field. It was Suárez's 16th of the season and second in two nights, but proved to be all the offensive support the lineup could provide.
Burns returned to the mound for the bottom of the sixth with 73 pitches and had retired eight of his previous nine batters. Dylan Crews led off with a double to the gap in left-center field and scored on Daylen Lile's RBI single to left field. Keibert Ruiz launched a double over center fielder Dane Myers' reach and with one out, Nasim Nuñez walked to load the bases.
All of the sixth-inning hits came on Burns' fastball.
“He got beat on a couple of fastballs tonight," manager Terry Francona said. "I don’t ever want to say he should’ve thrown a breaking ball. That’s too easy and it’s not fair."
After the Nuñez walk, Francona emerged from the dugout for the pitching change.
"The hope is [to] have a nice good inning, get him through six – tie game – go to our bullpen," Francona said. "It ended up being a long inning and he couldn’t get through it. And I got uncomfortable. That’s my biggest concern with him right now. At the end of his outing, trying to reach back for more when he’s nearing 100 [pitches]. That, to me, is where it starts to get a little iffy.”
Lefty reliever Sam Moll replaced Burns and gave up a two-run double to the left-field corner from pinch-hitter Andrés Chaparro while a third run was prevented by a relay throw to the plate.
With Burns in his second pro season and already at his career high for innings, while the club is trying to allow him to keep pitching to the end of the season, Francona wasn't taking chances.
“I actually think he could have got out of it. I always feel like that with him," Francona said. "Just there’s more to balance than just the sixth inning of today’s game. And that’s a responsibility that I take very serious.”