Topsy-Turvy

Atlanta at Washington. Series Wrap-Up

Cowards 9, Nationals 7.

Good gracious, BallWonk, you seem most tardy of late. Highly unusual, what.

Indeed, BallWonk replies, and mutters something indistinct about elections in Egypt and the arrests in Lebanon and unforseen additions to his schedule.

Harrumph! the reader would be justified in saying, and maybe even a second Harrumph! Have you not got your priorities all topsy-turvy, man, losing days in wonkery on foreign subjects when there is a baseball season on the line right here in Washington?

But work, BallWonk protests.

Work be damned, sir, and so to you if you will not stand now at your Nationals' side in this hour of crisis!

But my dear reader, BallWonk does stand at his Nationals' side. He still believes. Four games back with eighteen to go? We can do that. But to do it, the Nationals are going to have to learn the lesson of the end of the Atlanta series. If you're going to score seven runs in one game and zero runs in another game, score the seven runs when your opponent scores four and none when he scores nine, not the other way around.

That was how we climbed to first place in May: Win the close ones, lose the blowouts.

It was the first of the Confucian maxims by which the Nationals must live if they are to win:

Win the close ones, lose the blowouts.

Walks and doubles.

Always send the runner.

That's it, grasshopper. Follow those rules and we will pick up those four games against whichever other member of the Keystone Kops leads the race for the dark-horse nomination today. (Florida, but wait 24 hours. It'll change again.)

As for the rest, BallWonk promises that he's done with the quiet prayer portion of the season. It's back to the pulpit from here on out, even if that means that Ms. BallWonk will have to watch a Metropolitans game on her tenth anniversary. We've got a pennant to win here; a guy has to have priorities.