House That Hank Built
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3 takeaways: Atlanta Braves quickly start spoiling Washington’s last stand

By Alan Carpenter

WASHINGTON, DC - SEPTEMBER 13: Mike Soroka #40 of the Atlanta Braves pitches against the Washington Nationals during the first inning at Nationals Park on September 13, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Scott Taetsch/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON, DC - SEPTEMBER 13: Mike Soroka #40 of the Atlanta Braves pitches against the Washington Nationals during the first inning at Nationals Park on September 13, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Scott Taetsch/Getty Images) /
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WASHINGTON, DC – SEPTEMBER 13: Mike Soroka #40 of the Atlanta Braves pitches against the Washington Nationals during the second inning at Nationals Park on September 13, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Scott Taetsch/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON, DC – SEPTEMBER 13: Mike Soroka #40 of the Atlanta Braves pitches against the Washington Nationals during the second inning at Nationals Park on September 13, 2019 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Scott Taetsch/Getty Images) /

Friday night’s contest against the Nationals continued to show that the Atlanta Braves are well-prepared for the post-season… and that they’ll enter October as a division winner.

For weeks, Nationals fans had been pointing to this part of the schedule where they would finally get a chance to get to the division lead by beating the Atlanta Braves head-to-head.

There’s probably still pointing involved… but not at the calendar.  And the chatter has all but ended.

In fact, Nats fans are probably starting to look over their own shoulders a bit as their team has now dropped 7 out of their last 11 contests.

Most importantly:  for the fourth time in these 7 important match-ups, Atlanta has prevailed… and that happened in convincing fashion on Friday night.

This game featured a repeat of the same pitching pairing produced last Sunday at SunTrust Park that ended in the favor of the visitors – Max Scherzer and Mike Soroka.

But just as the venue switched to the other city, the fortunes of each mound starter also switched.

Our takeaways from this game follow:

3. Soroka the Stopper

For now, this is the top story of the night – that Mike Soroka (12-4, 2.57) bounced back from a tough outing against these same Nationals last Sunday and kept them at bay on Friday.

It wasn’t spectacular, but it was certainly highly effective:  no runs and a single hit allowed.

This was 6 innings of confused-looking hitters for the Nationals as they managed only a lead-off double in the hit column in the 4th inning.

Soroka did walk 3 batters, and that indeed made for a bit of nervous play in the 2nd and that 4th inning.

In that 2nd frame, it was the 1st two batters that got free passes, but Soroka induced a double-play grounder from Ryan Zimmerman and then a “3 unassisted” to Freddie Freeman to get out of the soup.

In that 4th inning, the final walk came with 1 out after the Adam Eaton double started things off.  An infield grounder to Soroka and a liner to center allowed him to escape once again.

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