WASHINGTON -- Miles Mikolas was hyped up. The ceremonial pregame flyover for the Nationals' home opener on Friday afternoon got his adrenaline pumping as he prepared to face the back-to-back World Series-defending-champion Dodgers.
Mikolas stepped onto the mound for his first game as a member of the Nats, and he swiftly retired Shohei Ohtani, Kyle Tucker, Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman, Will Smith and Max Muncy in order.
“I love a flyover; it gets me pumped,” Mikolas said. “Maybe if we had a flyover every inning, I would have been a little bit better.”
But the F-16C Fighting Falcons from the 121st Fighter Squadron of the D.C. Air National Guard only made one trip over the stadium. And the Dodgers' lineup made adjustments.
“This lineup’s really, really good,” manager Blake Butera said. “Miles almost had to be perfect against these guys, and he did a great job the first couple innings. But you see how deep this lineup is.”
Ohtani erased the Nationals’ three-run lead in the third-inning with his first home run of the season -- a Statcast-estimated 401-foot game-tying blast to right-center field. There wasn’t much time to regroup. Mikolas gave up a single to Tucker in the next at-bat, before Betts rocked a two-run, 380-foot go-ahead homer to left field.
The five-run third inning changed the course of the game, which ended as a 13-6 Nationals loss. Mikolas allowed 11 runs on 11 hits -- including two more home runs, those from Andy Pages and Freeman -- in 4 1/3 innings. He walked one batter and struck out four across 87 pitches.
"I did a lot of good things, and I did some bad things,” Mikolas said. “The unfortunate part about baseball sometimes is, three really good pitches, you just get one out. And you make three really bad ones, and it can be five, six, seven runs. Obviously my mistakes weren’t very timely. I did do some things that I’ve been working on well, but the overall result is obviously not good.”
The 11 earned runs marked a career high for the 37-year-old Mikolas. He had allowed 10 runs three times in his career: June 27, 2014, vs. Reds (4 1/3 innings); Aug. 13, 2014 vs. Rays (6 innings); and Aug. 9, 2022, at Rockies (2 2/3 innings).
Mikolas also set a team mark for most earned runs allowed in a Nationals game (2005-present).
“You’ve got probably less room for error than with most lineups,” Mikolas said. “They’re top to bottom, one of the best lineups in the league. A lot of great players over there. You can only tiptoe that line for so long before either they figure it out or they get your mistakes.”
Mikolas is the first individual pitcher to give up at least 11 runs to the Dodgers since Alec Bettinger of the Brewers on May 2, 2021. Mikolas entered the game 1-5 with a 6.20 ERA in seven starts (10 games) against the Dodgers.
“I think a little bit of it is, we’ve had a lot of history with Mikolas, so we’ve seen him, know some of the tendencies,” said Dodgers manager Dave Roberts. “And outside of that, they were just not missing today, and we got some traffic, took some walks, and got a lot of hits.”
Mikolas signed a one-year, $2.25 million contract in February. In his 11th season, Mikolas is 0-2 with a 14.26 ERA in his first two starts of the season against the Phillies and Dodgers.
“Knowing Miles, the competitor he is, he was frustrated, obviously,” Butera said. “He'll be fine. He'll flush it, he'll make his adjustments and we'll fix this.”
The Nationals fell to 6-16 in team home openers since 2005 and 5-14 in Nationals Park home openers (since 2008). They drew a sellout crowd of 41,161.
“The fans showed it up, it was great,” Mikolas said. “I wish I had done a better job for them, a better job for the offense, and the defense was good today. We scored enough runs to win, but I didn't do my job out there.”