What become another rote loss for the Nationals served as a touchstone day for the Padres. Early Thursday, they summoned to the majors slugging first baseman Anthony Rizzo, one of the most promising prospects in baseball. Hernandez welcomed him to the majors in the second inning, striking him looking at a sinker the started toward his front hip and darted back over the edge of the plate.
When Rizzo led off the fifth inning, he showed Hernandez why San Diego had clamored for his arrival. Rizzo blasted a 2-2 pitch halfway up the fence in right-center field. It caromed off the wall and skidded past Ankiel. Rizzo made it to third base, his first career hit a triple. He scored on a two-out infield single Denorfia dribbled to the right side.
The game unraveled once Hernandez left. The Padres scored three runs in the sixth after Sean Burnett loaded the bases by walking Rizzo, the only batter he faced. Cole Kimball also walked the first batter he faced, forcing in a run, and then he gave up a sacrifice fly.
“You can’t come out of the bullpen walking people,” Riggleman said. “It’s the major leagues. That’s not going to work.”
In the seventh, Henry Rodriguez entered and induced two quick outs. And then he lost the strike zone completely. He allowed three walks and a single to the next four hitters he faced, mixing in a run-scoring wild pitch.
“With Henry, we know we’re going to get that,” Riggleman said. “That just comes as part of his development as a major league pitcher.”
The only solace came across the country, back east, where Ryan Zimmerman appeared in his latest minor league rehab game. Zimmerman played a full nine innings for the first time since undergoing surgery in early May to repair a torn abdominal muscle. He went 2 for 4 with a double for high-Class A Potomac. Zimmerman is scheduled to be off Friday. He could join the team in San Diego, depending on how he feels after playing the full game, but most likely he will return Tuesday when the Nationals come home.
Surely, they need their best player’s bat in the lineup. The Nationals scratched together a few opportunities to score Thursday, but their lineup has not been deep enough without Zimmerman to consistently cash in on them. The Nationals went 1 for 7 with runners in scoring position Thursday and left 12 men on base.
The loss dropped the Nationals’ record on their Western trip to 3-5, so they will have to win their next three games against the Padres to come home with a winning record.
“We lose a lot of good games we’re supposed to win,” Hernandez said. “We feel it. We’re human. We don’t feel too good about the games we’ve lost. It’s hard. But we got to continue to play. We don’t get hot. The time’s going to come. We don’t know when.”
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