The Washington Nationals will try to match their longest winning streak of the season Monday night against the host Seattle Mariners.
The Nationals, who are in last place in the National League East, have won consecutive games just nine times this season. Their only three-game winning streak came at home May 2-4 against the Chicago Cubs.
After losing 13-3 on Friday at San Diego, the Nationals posted 2-0 and 8-3 victories over the weekend. Lane Thomas and Jeimer Candelario hit solo homers on Saturday, and Candelario added a double and a homer in going 3-for-5 with three RBIs on Sunday.
“Those guys have been hitting the cover off the ball all season,” Nationals pitcher Josiah Gray said. “Hopefully, those guys continue to have success.”
Thomas leads the Nationals’ regulars with a .295 batting average and 13 home runs and is tied for the team lead with 39 RBIs. Candelario is batting .261 with 10 homers and 36 RBIs.
“I can’t say enough about Lane,” Nationals manager Dave Martinez said. “I keep saying this: ‘If he keeps doing what he’s doing, to me, he’s an All-Star.’ He really is.
“He’s playing really well in the field. He’s knocking in big runs, hitting home runs for us. And Jeimer’s just been steady — hitting the ball and playing good defense for us, as well. When those two guys get going to hit some home runs, we’ll score some runs.”
The Mariners return home after a 2-4 trip to New York and Baltimore. They scored 10 runs in the finale against the Yankees and then 13 in the their first game against the Orioles before losing the next two games.
Seattle continues to struggle to manufacture runs. The Mariners hit four solo homers in a 6-4 loss in 10 innings on Saturday, and their only runs in a 3-2 loss on Sunday came on Cal Raleigh’s two-run shot onto Eutaw Street beyond the right-field wall at Camden Yards.
“We do have a lot of baseball left,” said Mariners manager Scott Servais, whose team is 4 1/2 games back in the American League’s wild-card race.
The three hits and five baserunners the Mariners had Sunday tied their season lows, and they were held to two or fewer runs for the 17th time.
“Outside of (Sunday) and getting shut down, I do think we’re trending in the right way offensively, and I don’t think you can just throw it in the trash because you have a rough day. You have to stay with it,” Servais said. “We have a homestand coming up, and we need to continue to swing the bats like we did in the middle of this trip because it’s in there. We’re capable of doing it. It just has to be consistent.”
The Nationals’ Trevor Williams (4-4, 4.14 ERA) is scheduled to start Monday against Seattle’s Luis Castillo (4-6, 2.89) in a matchup of veteran right-handers.
Williams is coming off a 3-0 victory against visiting St. Louis on Wednesday in which he allowed five hits over six innings, with no walks and four strikeouts. He is 2-0 over his past three starts. This will be the first time Williams has faced Seattle in his eight-year career.
Castillo is 0-5 with a 4.81 ERA in six career starts against the Nationals.
Castillo, the Mariners’ ace, has lost all four of his starts this month despite a respectable 3.42 ERA. He took a 4-2 defeat Wednesday against the Yankees, allowing three runs on four hits over five innings, with four walks and three strikeouts.
–Field Level Media
