Happy Cade Cavalli Day to all who celebrate!

The Nationals made it official by selecting the contract of their top pitching prospect for his major league debut, one of several roster moves made before tonight’s series opener against the Reds.

When the 2020 first-round pick takes the mound at Nats Park, he will become the 24th pitcher drafted, signed and developed by the Nationals (2005-present) to start a game for Washington.

Cavalli is the No. 52 prospect in all of baseball, according to Baseball America, and No. 58 according to MLB Pipeline. He leads qualified Nationals minor leaguers with a .215 opponents’ batting average and ranks second in ERA (3.71), strikeouts (104) and WHIP (1.18). He went 6-4 with a 3.71 ERA in 20 starts for Triple-A Rochester this season.

More recently, the 24-year-old has been nothing short of dominant. Over his last seven starts, Cavalli went 3-1 with a 1.47 ERA, 43 strikeouts, 12 walks and a .180 opponents’ batting average. He didn’t allow an earned run in 15 ⅔ consecutive innings, recording 16 strikeouts and three walks in three starts from July 6 to July 27. In his last two starts with the Red Wings, Cavalli struck out 19 batters, allowing just five walks to go along with a 1.50 ERA and a .128 opponents’ batting average (5-for-39).

CHICAGO – Maybe it’s a fruitless exercise to break down specific at-bats in the 111th game of a season that has long since lost its significance. But there was one particular sequence during the Nationals’ 6-3 loss to the Cubs on Monday night that underscored much of what is wrong with this lineup.

Trailing 3-0 in the top of the fifth, the Nats gave themselves a chance to do something with two on and nobody out. And then proceeded to squander it before anyone had the opportunity to hope it might turn into something big.

It began with Maikel Franco getting a 3-2 fastball from Cubs starter Keegan Thompson on the inner half of the plate, thigh-high, and grounding into a 6-4-3 double play. And it ended immediately with a three-pitch strikeout by Victor Robles, who saw only one pitch in the at-bat that might have been called a strike had he taken it.

“We chased,” manager Davey Martinez lamented. “We chased a few times with guys on base. Franco’s got to get the ball up in certain situations, try to keep the ball off the ground there. … With guys on base, we’ve got to do a better job trying to get the ball in the strike zone, get the ball up and try to drive the ball.”

This, of course, was nothing new. It’s been a recurring theme all season for a Nationals lineup that leads the majors with 106 double plays grounded into while ranking 25th out of 30 teams with a .676 OPS with runners in scoring position.

CHICAGO – At this point, the Nationals will gladly take the bare minimum that could be considered a decent performance from a member of their rotation: five innings and a chance at a win. They hadn’t come close to getting such an outing over the last five days, and they’ve barely received any that meet that low standard over the last month.

So when Aníbal Sánchez managed tonight to not only complete five innings allowing only three runs, but then take the mound for the sixth as well, it felt like something of a step in the right direction for the Nats.

Not a step in a winning direction, mind you. But at least a step forward instead of backward.

It made no difference in the end, because Sánchez was charged with another run in the sixth, the bullpen gave up two more in the seventh and the lineup managed nothing but Luke Voit’s solo homer in the sixth and Joey Meneses’ two-run homer in the eighth during a 6-3 loss to the Cubs that wasn’t as close as the final score suggests.

Thus did the Nationals drop their sixth straight, falling to a major-league-worst 36-75. With the season more than two-thirds complete, they’re now on pace to lose 110 games.

Entering the eighth inning of tonight’s game, the Nationals offense had yet to take advantage of the opportunity provided by starter Erick Fedde and the bullpen. In a low-scoring game, the only offense to that point had come in the sixth inning when Luis García came around to score after a leadoff double to the right-center gap. Back-to-back groundouts to the right side of the infield allowed García to advance and eventually cross home plate with Yadiel Hernandez getting credit for the RBI.

But García delivered another leadoff double in the eighth, setting up Maikel Franco’s late-inning heroics in the Nationals’ 3-2 win over the Pirates in front of 18,213 fans at Nationals Park.

With García standing on second base, two outs and the Nats down 2-1 to the Bucs, Franco sent a first-pitch slider from right-hander Chris Stratton 105.5 mph off his bat and 418 feet to left-center field. The Nats third baseman gave an emphatic high-five to first base coach Eric Young Jr. as he rounded the bases as what would prove to be the game-winning run.

“I know we were just down for one run," Franco said after the game. "Obviously, I just think about see the ball and drive the ball, just get a hit to try to tie the ballgame. And I got better results. He threw me a slider first pitch and I was able to put good contact on it. And I got the success.”

That success sent Nats Park into a frenzy as the home team celebrated energetically in front of the dugout.

BALTIMORE – As the Nationals start this five-game road trip up I-295 at Camden Yards, they’re hoping their offensive explosion from Sunday carries over to tonight’s game against the Orioles.

After averaging just three runs over their previous eight games, the offense jumped all over Phillies pitchers en route to a 9-3 win two days ago to end an 11-games-in-10-days homestand. 

One way manager Davey Martinez is trying to create more runs is moving one of his hottest hitters up in the lineup. For the first time this season, Luis García will bat fifth, his highest spot in the lineup this year.

“He's swinging the bat well, and we're monitoring his swings and his approach,” Martinez said of García during his pregame media session. “Looking for someone, one, to drive in some runs. Two to actually get on base with some of those other guys as well. And he's done that so far.”

That he has. Since joining the Nats on June 1, the left-handed-hitting shortstop has slashed .360/.372/.507 with five doubles, two homers, 10 RBIs, one walk, one hit by pitch and nine runs scored. He has recorded a hit in 15 of his 19 games with the Nationals this season and has reached safely in 16 of the 19. His 27 hits in June rank second in the National League and his .360 average ranks sixth.

His week began with a freak injury after he slipped in the dugout and banged his knee on the corner of the Nationals bench, sidelining him two days. When he returned, he went 0-for-14 and saw his batting average dip to an unfathomable .216. Along the way, his manager criticized him for not hustling out a double-play grounder.

So when Juan Soto took a mighty swing at the first pitch he saw from Zach Eflin in the bottom of the second Sunday afternoon and proceeded to watch the ball fly 420 feet into the second deck in right field at Nationals Park for a three-run homer, what exactly did it feel like?

“It’s like a flush,” the slugger said. “It’s like you flush your mind, your body, everything. You just feel amazing. Your work is coming through, and you just feel amazing when you see the ball flying like that.”

It was as cathartic a moment as Soto has had on a baseball field in a while. It may or may not have signaled a turning point in his disappointing season – he still wound up 1-for-5 in the Nats’ 8-3 victory over the Phillies – but it certainly energized the 23-year-old and his teammates, who have desperately needed that kind of production from their young leader.

“We need Juan to be Juan,” said Maikel Franco, who also homered during the game. “I know it’s going to come. Everybody gets excited. After that, everybody (got) excited, and they wanted to just continue to play hard and have great at-bats and do well for the team.”

At the end of a brutal homestand that included 11 games in 10 days and left their pitching staff in shambles, the Nationals handed the ball to Jackson Tetreault, held their breath and hoped for the best.

Seven sparkling innings later, they exhaled and exulted, having watched the rookie right-hander author one of their best starts of the season, turning in the kind of pitching performance they desperately needed all week but finally got at the very end to emerge with a cathartic 9-3 victory over the Phillies.

Five days after an inauspicious major league debut, Tetreault put together a dazzling start against a tough lineup to earn his first career win and snap his team’s eight-game losing streak, not to mention a club record 12-game losing streak to the Phillies that extended back to last season.

"It's awesome," the seventh-round pick from the 2017 draft said. "Hopefully many more to come, but to get the first one under the belt is a really good feeling. And to be able to celebrate it with all the guys here was really cool."

Aided by an opportunistic lineup that got home runs from Juan Soto and Maikel Franco, Tetreault became only the third Nationals starter to complete seven innings this season, joining Erick Fedde and Patrick Corbin, who surprisingly did it on back-to-back nights at Coors Field in early May.

It’s always nice to be home. After a 10-game road trip in which they went 3-7, the Nationals were happy to return to D.C. to start this long homestand tonight against the Brewers.

You could feel it in the clubhouse before the game. Despite coming off a three-game sweep at the hands of the Marlins and getting into town late last night, players seemed to be in high spirits this afternoon. Even manager Davey Martinez was particularly chipper in his pregame press conference.

Did the late arrival time at Nationals Park allow them to catch up on sleep? Or were they over-caffeinated after not getting enough sleep? We don’t know for sure, but whatever it was it led to an 11-5 win over the Brewers in front of 26,111 in attendance on South Capitol Street.

“I am tired. … I got three hours of sleep," Martinez said immediately after tonight's game. "By the end of the game today, I looked at (bench coach Tim Bogar) and said, 'I'm beat.' ”

It was a picture-perfect Friday night in our nation’s capital. With a gametime temperature of 79 degrees and a per usual perfect national anthem from local favorite D.C. Washington, the Nationals settled right into a victory in which they received contributions from all aspects of the roster.

MIAMI – As he walked through the Nationals’ clubhouse Tuesday afternoon, Ehire Adrianza found faces both familiar and unfamiliar. Many of those who came over to say hello were with the veteran utilityman all spring in West Palm Beach, expecting to open the season with him on the roster. Some barely registered during big league camp, only joining the major league club once the regular season began.

It’s been more than two months since Adrianza suffered a left quadriceps strain during the final week of spring training, forcing him first to the 10-day injured list and eventually to the 60-day IL. Now, at last, he’s healthy and on the active roster, finally making his Nats debut during Tuesday night’s loss to the Marlins.

“For me, it’s like opening day right now,” he said. “I’m getting to know the guys a little bit more, and get used to the team. I’m ready to go.”

When he pulled up lame running out a groundball March 31 in Port St. Lucie, Adrianza knew his chances of making the Nationals’ opening day roster had just taken a severe blow. He did not, however, know he wouldn’t be making his season debut until the team’s 57th game.

Turns out the injury required a lengthy period of inactivity, then a slow process of building himself back up, jogging on a gravity-reducing treadmill, then on the field, then finally performing baseball activities before he was ready to play in games. The entire process took more than two months.

CINCINNATI – Wherever the Nationals go, the attention always focuses on their big-name players. Your Juan Sotos, Josh Bells, Nelson Cruzes, Josiah Grays, Patrick Corbins, etc.

While all of those stars contributed to the Nats’ three wins over the Reds this weekend, some unsung heroes played a significant role as well.

Not all of them got their fair share of praise over the last three days, partially my own fault for not incorporating them more. So let’s take some time to give them their time in the spotlight.

Lane Thomas is an obvious one, though he did get his fair share after hitting three home runs on Friday night. Those jump off the page, obviously, but he did a lot more this weekend.

Thomas went 7-for-14 with three home runs, a double, four RBIs, a walk and five runs scored in the three games he played in Cincinnati, once again showing his uncanny ability to produce in National League Central ballparks. All along the way, he played perfect defense in the outfield, including a nice sliding catch Saturday afternoon.

CINCINNATI – It’s been over a month since the Nationals completed a road series win. They took two out of three in San Francisco on April 28-May 1. They have lost five straight since.

That streak ended today as the Nationals beat the Reds 5-4 in front of 16,380 at Great American Ball Park to win their third straight game and therefore this four-game series.

The first inning had a lot of action this Sunday afternoon. Facing right-hander Luis Castillo, who doesn’t have great career numbers against the Nats, the guys in navy blue were able to jump out to an early lead, something they haven’t done in about a week.

César Hernández walked and Lane Thomas singled to start the game, and Josh Bell drove in both with an RBI double to right field, putting the Nats on the board first for the first time since Monday in New York.

But Patrick Corbin ran into trouble of his own in the bottom of the inning. The Reds’ game plan against the southpaw was clear: Attack the fastball and run on the basepaths.

CINCINNATI – The Nationals have made a bad habit of falling behind early in games this week. They have allowed their opponents to score first in six of their last seven games, including today’s matchup against the Reds.

To the Nats’ credit, they were able to claw their way back and win last night’s game. They had to claw their way not once but twice today in a wild 10-8 win over the Reds in front of 23,128 fans at Great American Ball Park.

“I tell the guys, 'Hey, we give up a run or two the first thing, there's still a lot of baseball left. We got a good enough offense that we can inch our way and come back and end up winning these games. So don't get down,” manager Davey Martinez said before today’s game.

Stay in the fight, or something like that.

That’s exactly what they did.

MILWAUKEE – The ball came off Luis Urias’ bat, headed down the third base line and bounced directly to a charging Maikel Franco, at which point anybody watching immediately must’ve had the same thought.

Could this be a triple play?

And when Franco stepped on third, fired to second and watched as teammate César Hernández made a smooth turn to get the ball to Josh Bell at first base in plenty of time to retire Urias, it almost felt too good to be true.

Has a triple play in a big league game ever looked as easy as the 5-4-3 triplet-killing the Nationals pulled off during Friday night’s loss to the Brewers?

“It’s not easy,” Franco insisted afterward. “But you know, sometimes the play tells you what you have to do. I know I’ve been on the line and the ball was (hit) hard on the line, and I just catch the ball and I think about go to second, and César made the good turn.”

MILWAUKEE – The worst thing a team struggling to win – and, more specifically, struggling to score runs – can do is try too hard to make something big happen.

The Nationals have been trying too hard for several weeks now, committing unforced errors in the field, on the bases and at the plate. It seems to be happening on a nightly basis during their current road trip. And tonight it may have come to a head in absolutely agonizing fashion.

Trailing the Brewers at the time 2-0 with one out in the top of the seventh, Lane Thomas drove a ball off the wall in deep right-center. And when it caromed to the side a bit, Thomas had himself an easy triple.

Except third base coach Gary DiSarcina wanted more. He waved Thomas around, shooting for an unlikely inside-the-park home run. And when the Brewers successfully relayed the ball to the plate to nail Thomas for the second out of the inning and the home crowd of 29,609 roared with approval, all the Nationals could do was watch in disbelief as it happened yet again.

"He thought he may have had a shot," manager Davey Martinez said of DiSarcina. "But when you don't score any runs, you try anything you can to get a run across the plate."

Quick quiz: Who leads the Nationals in RBIs? It’s Josh Bell, right?

Yes, but it’s not only Bell. Also checking in with 21 RBIs through the season’s first 36 games is an unexpected contributor: Maikel Franco.

While Bell’s offensive exploits have been front and center since opening day, Franco’s contributions have been delivered in a bit more quiet fashion. But sure enough, the veteran third baseman’s two-run homer during Saturday night’s blowout win over the Astros brought him up to Bell’s RBI total and the team lead.

Some of this is a reflection of Juan Soto’s struggles to drive in runs – he has only 11, despite eight homers and an .890 OPS – but it’s also a credit to Franco, who surprisingly finds himself on pace for 95 RBIs at the moment, a total that would shatter his previous career-high of 88.

 “He’s been great,” manager Davey Martinez said. “He’s worked really hard. He and (assistant hitting coach Pat Roessler) have built a really good relationship. They work hard in the batting cages. He’s got a really good routine going on right now.”

No major league club has played better, or particularly pitched better, this month than the Astros. The Houston staff that walked into Nationals Park tonight had surrendered a grand total of 12 runs over the last 11 games. Not surprisingly, all 11 resulted in victory for Dusty Baker’s squad.

So consider what the Nationals just did on this Saturday evening, and try to explain it. Scoring a run in the first and then multiple runs in the third, fourth, fifth and sixth innings, they torched the Astros’ previously ironclad pitching staff during a 13-6 win that kind of defied logic.

The same Nats lineup that has struggled so mightily to produce extra-base hits got five of them in this game, including Yadiel Hernandez’s three-run homer, Nelson Cruz’s three-run double and Maikel Franco’s two-run homer.

All told, the Nationals crossed the plate more times tonight than they did their previous four games combined, putting an end the Astros’ winning streak with emphasis and giving a crowd of 22,949 plenty of reason to cheer, something that has been in woefully short supply this season.

"Just good at-bats," Cruz said. "We were patient. We hit strikes. We were facing pretty good pitchers, from their starters to their relievers. To be able to score that many runs, it shows how good of a lineup we have."

Five scoreless innings by Patrick Corbin is nothing to scoff at these days. The Nationals are counting any encouraging results by the long-slumping lefty as major positives, and for the third straight start this evening Corbin was quite encouraging.

Davey Martinez also doesn’t want to jeopardize those encouraging results going down the drain in one bad sequence. So when Corbin departed tonight’s game against the Mets at the end of the fifth, zeros on the scoreboard but four walks and 86 pitches on his register, the Nats manager decided not to press his luck.

"Man, he had a lot of high-leverage innings there. He got into a lot of jams," Martinez said. "And he threw the ball well. He just walked a lot of guys. I talked to him in the fifth inning, and he was honest: He got a little fatigued. Reason being, he threw (86) pitches in five innings. He worked through a lot of different situations."

So out came Corbin and in came Carl Edwards Jr. to make his first appearance for the Nationals. Summoned from Triple-A Rochester earlier in the afternoon after allowing only one run on three hits over 14 1/3 innings, the 30-year-old reliever was now being entrusted to protect a two-run lead in a big league game.

By the time Edwards departed, that two-run lead had morphed into a one-run deficit. The right-hander surrendered two singles, a walk and then a two-run double to Jeff McNeil that proved the difference in what wound up a 4-2 loss to New York.

ANAHEIM, Calif. – To beat the Angels tonight, the Nationals simply needed to get home runs from Josh Bell, Yadiel Hernandez and Nelson Cruz, two clutch hits from Maikel Franco, 5 1/3 solid innings from Josiah Gray and effective work from a bullpen that turned to none other than Erasmo Ramirez for the most high-leverage situation of the game.

Hey, whatever works, right?

This 7-3 victory on a lovely Saturday evening in Orange County may not have gone by the book. But at this point, the Nationals can’t afford to stick to a book that at times during the season’s first month hasn’t worked.

Contributions can come in a variety of ways, from a variety of players. On this night, that included a much-needed power display from the slumping Cruz and two big innings of relief from a guy who spent the season’s first two weeks at Triple-A Rochester and until now had only pitched with the Nats trailing, except for one appearance with them leading by eight runs.

That would be Ramirez, the 32-year-old journeyman reliever who was entrusted with the seventh and eighth innings tonight, stared down the heart of the Angels’ imposing lineup and lived to tell about it. The right-hander got into a two-out jam in the seventh when he surrendered back-to-back singles to Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani, but he proceeded to get Anthony Rendon to fly out to left on the next pitch, leaving the former Nationals star third baseman 0-for-8 in the series.

DENVER – After a cold, rainy Wednesday night here at Coors Field, it’s a beautiful Thursday afternoon for the series finale between the Nationals and Rockies. The Nats have a chance to win their second straight road series, which would be no small feat under the circumstances.

They’ll hope to get the bats going again after getting shut down by left-hander Austin Gomber on Wednesday. Today they face right-hander Antonio Senzatela, who has only a bit of experience against Nationals hitters during his career. César Hernández (3-for-9, double), Josh Bell (3-for-5, double, two walks) and Maikel Franco (2-for-5, triple) have enjoyed the most success against Senzatela.

Aaron Sanchez, meanwhile, makes his third start since joining the Nats rotation. The 29-year-old right-hander faced the Giants each of his previous outings, losing to them once and then beating them in the follow-up game. Today he faces a Rockies lineup that really hasn’t done much so far this series, scoring five of its seven total runs in the bottom of the fourth Tuesday night, an inning that would’ve ended with a zero on the scoreboard if not for Alcides Escobar’s error on a tailor-made double play grounder.

Friendly reminder: Today’s game is available only on YouTube. It’s free and requires no login, only a computer, tablet, phone or smart TV of your choice. Here’s the link to watch it.

WASHINGTON NATIONALS at COLORADO ROCKIES
Where: Coors Field
Gametime: 3:10 p.m. EDT
TV: YouTube
Radio: 106.7 The Fan, MLB.com
Weather: Mostly sunny, 62 degrees, wind 8 mph in from center field

No injury is good news for any ballclub. But a Josh Bell injury would qualify as particularly damaging to the Nationals as currently constructed.

Bell, who departed Wednesday night’s game in the fourth inning with tightness in his left knee, is scheduled to undergo an MRI this morning. He was cautiously optimistic after the game it’s nothing serious, and described his departure from the game as “precautionary,” so there’s no need to panic yet.

That said, we got a glimpse of what the Nationals would look like minus Bell during the final six innings Wednesday, and it wasn’t pretty.

Maikel Franco moved from third base to first base. Lucius Fox came off the bench to take Franco’s spot at third base. That hurt the Nationals defensively, and it hurt them offensively. (The light-hitting Fox actually became their cleanup hitter in the process.)

Bell has been the only consistently productive bat in the lineup through the season’s first two weeks. His .977 OPS leads the club, and his 11 RBIs are tied for fifth in the majors. Remove him from the equation for any length of time, and the drop-off in production is staggering.