Robles catches 'tough break' in OF, but displays potential 

DENVER -- When you lose a game like the Nationals did in their 7-6 defeat against the Rockies at Coors Field on Sunday afternoon, specific moments -- particularly high-leverage moments -- become scrutinized as opposed to perhaps being lost in the aura of victory if the outcome had been flipped.

In Sunday’s game, which Washington led at one point, 6-3, the play that stood out the most came when Rockies catcher Elias Díaz stood at the plate with a runner at third base and one out in the sixth inning.

Díaz already had a pair of hits in the contest, a bloop single into right-center field in the second inning and a 443-foot home run to left in the fourth. If you surveyed the field as Díaz prepared for reliever Erasmo Ramírez’s 2-2 offering in the sixth, you’d have seen the Nats’ defense playing straight up, except for the center fielder.

Victor Robles was shaded extremely to his left, all the way into the right-center-field gap. On the next pitch, Díaz lined a ball to straightaway center, where Robles, had he been playing in his normal position, would barely have had to move to make the catch.

Instead, it turned into an RBI double to bring Colorado within a run. Three batters later, Díaz scored the tying run on a Charlie Blackmon single up the middle. By the end of the frame, the Rockies had gone ahead for good.

The moment encapsulated the dynamics of a young team experiencing growing pains as it tries to go from where it is, to where it wants to be. The result wasn’t what Washington preferred to see, but the process by which it came about is what’s important to the Nationals right now.

“Throughout the series, it seemed like Díaz was trying to hit the ball the other way,” Robles said through a translator. “As the at-bat got longer, I saw the swings he was taking, trying to hit the ball in that direction as well. So I started shading him that way.”

Manager Dave Martinez didn’t have a problem with Robles’ thought process. He liked that the 25-year-old, who was also ranked by MLB Pipeline as the eighth-best prospect in all of baseball in 2017, was being proactive.

“I thought it was pretty smart of him,” Martinez said. “It was just a hanging breaking ball [from Ramírez]. If he threw him a fastball, he was gonna hit the ball [to the right side]. So I like the fact that Vic is thinking. It took a few years for him to understand how to play out there. That was just a tough break.”

It’s tough breaks like that one that the Nats will inevitably experience with the learning curve it takes to get back to contention. Robles, in particular, has had his share of growing pains, but he’s been a bright spot for Washington over the first 10 games of the 2023 campaign. He is raising hope -- a small sample size notwithstanding -- that this could be the year that he reaches the potential that has been seen in him since he was a teenager.

Robles went 2-for-4 with a pair of singles and an RBI in Sunday’s loss, and he left Colorado hitting .387 on the season. The first of his two hits got the Nats on the board with runners at the corners and two outs in the second inning. He executed his part of a hit-and-run play to perfection, poking a single through the vacated right side of the infield as second baseman Ryan McMahon went to cover second.

That at-bat was another example of how Robles is doing things differently in 2023.

“He’s made some adjustments with his swing and the way he approaches the game,” Martinez said. “He’s not trying to hit home runs. He’s trying to put the ball in play and stay in the middle of the field. [Hitting coach] Darnell [Coles] and [assistant hitting coach Pat Roessler] did a great job with him during Spring Training, to get him to understand that.”

Is this the year Robles takes over Washington? Time will tell. But between his hit-and-run prowess Sunday, his well-executed squeeze play to bring in a run Saturday and his all-around performance so far in 2023, he’s certainly off to a fast start.

“We talk to Vic a lot about what he can be, and he’s doing it,” Martinez said. “That’s the kind of player that I can see him being: a guy that constantly gets on base, does the little things well, plays good defense.

“He’s doing well. We’ve just got to sustain it now.”