'You tip your hat': No-no ends Nats' impressive streaks

PHILADELPHIA -- For nearly 19 full seasons of being in Washington, the Nationals avoided being no-hit. That 18-year streak ended on Wednesday night, when they were blanked by Phillies right-hander Michael Lorenzen in a 7-0 shutout at Citizens Bank Park.

Washington batters saw 124 pitches, drew four walks and struck out five times vs. Lorenzen. After two hours and nine minutes, many of them watched Lorenzen and the Phillies celebrate from the visitors' dugout.

“It’s his moment,” manager Dave Martinez said. “... You tip your hat to the guy for doing what he did. That’s a lot of outs to get, and he did well.”

The Nats had faced Lorenzen 13 times (two starts) in his nine-year career -- which he spent with the Reds, Angels and Tigers prior to being acquired by the Phillies on Aug. 1 just prior to the Trade Deadline -- but Keibert Ruiz (two at-bats) and Lane Thomas (one at-bat) were the only players who had previously faced him.

“We knew he had a good fastball, four-seam and two-seam, [a] good slider, good changeup,” said Martinez. “His changeup was really effective to lefties today. His slider was really good. But he kept on throwing strikes. He kept our hitters off balance and threw strikes.”

Lorenzen stifled the Nationals with a pitch mix of four-seam fastballs, changeups, sliders, sinkers and sweepers. They had eight whiffs on his changeup.

“It’s unbelievable, to be honest,” said Lorenzen. “I’ve always dreamt about being able to throw a no-hitter.”

Washington began the game with lengthy at-bats, running up Lorenzen’s pitch count to 24 in the opening frame. Lorenzen was frustrated, and he knew if he wanted to go deep in the game, he would have to be more efficient. The Nats were retired in order for the first time in the third, and then again in the fifth.

“I didn’t even really notice what was going on until about the sixth,” Thomas said. “I think that’s when you start to maybe overcompensate a little bit and put some stuff in play you normally wouldn’t swing at.”

Over the final three innings, Lorenzen retired all nine Nationals he faced.

“I think they were really trying to stay back and stay in the middle of the field,” Martinez said. “We barreled some balls up, probably eight or nine. In the eighth inning, we hit some balls well. It just wasn’t our day. Sometimes it’s meant to be, and today was meant to be for him.”

Washington’s final chance to break up the no-hitter came with the Nos. 2-4 hitters in the top of the ninth. By then, though, Lorenzen was locked in.

“That was the coolest moment of my baseball career, going out there for the ninth,” Lorenzen said. “... Just walking out of the dugout and hearing the fans go wild, it gave me the chills. It gave me that boost of energy that I needed for sure."

Thomas grounded out to third to open the inning, and Joey Meneses -- who homered twice the night before in Game 2 of a doubleheader -- was called out on strikes. Dominic Smith then came to the plate for a final attempt.

Smith swung at a slider down the middle and knowingly dropped his head as the ball flew into center field and into the glove of Johan Rojas. Lorenzen ran toward catcher J.T. Realmuto and the Phillies erupted in jubilation.

“Everybody’s trying to get a hit,” said Smith. “We’re trying to talk about it, we’re trying to jinx him, we’re trying to do everything we can to disrupt his rhythm that he had tonight. Everybody knew what he was doing and how effective he was, and we were trying to mix it up, swing early, take a couple pitches, work the counts. He was able to combat that, throw strikes and eventually get the job done.”

Not only had the Nationals not been no-hit since the team moved to D.C. in 2005, they entered Wednesday’s contest with another impressive streak: they had not been shut out since April 19 against the Orioles. Their 96-game stretch was the longest streak in the Majors this season.

“I think we’ve done a really good job late in games, even if we’re down a few runs, to take some good at-bats and not really just roll over and give up,” Thomas said. “So we’ve got to continue to do that.”

Following a night that was a first in Nationals history, the club will look to keep its approach the same.

“It’s only one game,” Martinez said. “Come back tomorrow and go 1-0.”