Harvey outlasts Lester to nail down series
The All-Star break allowed Orioles right-hander Matt Harvey to flush an atrocious first half. Perhaps no pitcher has been better to start the second.
Building off the six scoreless innings he pitched against the Kansas City Royals, Harvey held the Washington Nationals to one hit over another six shutout innings Saturday night as the Orioles secured a series victory over their regional rival with a 5-3 win in front of a season-high announced crowd of 30,898 at Oriole Park.
The day began with Harvey set to oppose Nationals ace Max Sherzer; the two faced off as the starting
pitchers of the 2013 All-Star Game during Harvey’s heyday with the New York Mets. Instead, another matchup from his past was renewed. With Scherzer scratched with right tricep discomfort, the Nationals turned to Jon Lester, who started for the Chicago Cubs against Harvey and the Mets in Game 1 of the 2015 National League Championship Series.
Before Saturday night at Camden Yards, that August marked the last time Harvey pitched consecutive scoreless starts. He retired the first 10 Nationals he faced before Trea Turner doubled to right, but then retired Juan Soto and Josh Bell to strand Turner at third. He did not allow another base runner, his night ending after 83 pitches following a long bottom of the sixth for Baltimore’s offense.
With the trade deadline approaching, perhaps those 12 innings could convince a contender desperate for pitching to give Harvey, a 32-year-old pending free agent, a shot after he ended the first half with a 7.70 ERA, having lasted five innings in only one of his final dozen starts.
With his scheduled start moved up a day, Lester mostly matched Harvey, with a long home run from Trey Mancini on the first pitch he saw from Lester accounting for the only hit by either team through three innings. But after Harvey stranded the tying run in the fourth, Ryan Mountcastle doubled Baltimore’s lead with another solo shot in the bottom half.
The Orioles (33-64) broke the game in the sixth. Cedric Mullins led off with a double to knock Lester from the game, then Austin Hays soon doubled him home. Hays scored on a bases-loaded single from Pedro Severino, with Mancini recording the inning’s third run on Maikel Franco’s sacrifice fly.
With Harvey out of the game, Adam Plutko surrendered a home run to Juan Soto in the seventh, then allowed a leadoff
double in the eighth. Behind him, Tanner Scott hit two batters, struck out the next two, then allowed a two-run single by Turner. But Scott got Soto to popout in foul territory to end the inning.
On the three-year anniversary of the trade that sent him and two others from the New York Yankees to Baltimore for closer Zack Britton, Dillon Tate pitched a scoreless ninth for the save.