Down to their final out, Miami Marlins rally for walk-off win over Washington Nationals
Jorge Soler knew he had wasted his share of opportunities Tuesday. Three times he stepped up to the plate with runners in scoring position. Three times he came up empty.
He wasn’t going to let that happen again with one final chance to make a statement.
With the Miami Marlins down to their final out, with Soler down to his final strike, Soler got all of Hunter Harvey’s 99.1 mph fastball near the heart of the plate. He watched as it sailed 405 feet to left-center field for a walk-off, two-run home run that capped the Marlins’ 5-4 win over the Washington Nationals to begin a three-game series at loanDepot park.
It was the first walk-off home run of Soler’s MLB career.
“I told ‘Pipe’ [bench coach Luis Urueta] that I was not feeling well because I was leaving a lot of runners on base,” Soler said. “It feels really good to finally get that hit to help the team. You can see everybody’s enjoying that moment.”
The home run was Soler’s team-leading 10th of the season. The Marlins are 6-2 in the eight games in which Soler has hit at least one home run.
Even more: Six of his 10 home runs, including Tuesday’s walk-off, either tied the game or gave the Marlins the lead.
“When he’s hot,” Marlins manager Skip Schumaker said, “we’re so much better. That’s just the reality. ... When you have Soler up, you always feel good because he can change the score like that. And I don’t care what kind of slump he’s in. You just feel good. With one swing of the bat, he can do something like that.”
But Soler wouldn’t have had that opportunity in the ninth inning if not for the two at-bats before his.
With Miami (21-21) already down to its final out, Garrett Cooper hit a Harvey splitter low in the zone on an 0-2 count 400 feet to left-center field for a double. Luis Arraez followed with an RBI single, again with two strikes against him, to right field to cut Miami’s deficit to one run.
And then Soler capped the rally with his walk-off home run.
“Three hits in a matter of five minutes to come away with a win like that,” Cooper said. “You don’t get too many of those.”
Especially the way the Marlins were playing leading up to that ninth inning. Before Arraez’s single, Miami was 0 for 8 with runners in scoring position. Soler specifically was 0 for 3, including a groundout with the bases loaded and two outs in the seventh.
They had stranded nine runners to that point as well. Soler alone stranded six.
Miami’s only runs had come on a Joey Wendle bases-loaded fielder’s choice in the second inning. An errant throw from Nationals shortstop CJ Abrams got past pitcher Josiah Gray who was covering first. Jean Segura and Peyton Burdick scored as a result.
And then Miami nearly gave up the game in the top of the eighth when the Nationals (18-24) scored three runs against Huascar Brazoban and Steven Okert.
That near collapse started when Luis Garcia hit a one-out infield single against Brazoban and moved to third on a Joey Meneses walk — Garcia was attempting to steal second on the 3-2 pitch to Meneses, and Nick Fortes’ throw was off target, allowing Garcia to take the extra base.
Jeimer Candelario, who safely reached base in all four of his plate appearances on Tuesday, then tied the game at 2-2 with a single through the right side that scored Garcia.
Brazoban’s night ended there. Okert entered trying to clean up the mess.
Okert got a Keibert Ruiz to pop out for the second out of the inning before walking Alex Call to load the bases. Dominic Smith then gave the Nationals the lead with his two-run single up the middle.
But the Marlins didn’t waver, even as they started running out of outs to play with.
And then finally, they put together a two-out rally punctuated by Soler’s home run.
“Games like this are the ones that set us apart,” Soler said. “It brings a good momentum and gives us a lot of hope.”
Another Jesus Luzardo quality start
The walk-off salvaged another solid outing from Jesus Luzardo, who continues to be a bright spot in an otherwise underwhelming start to the season for the Marlins’ rotation as a whole. The 25-year-old left-handed pitcher held the Nationals to just one run over six innings while striking out seven.
The only run Luzardo gave up was a solo home run to Lane Thomas to lead off the sixth inning.
Tuesday was Luzardo’s fifth quality start — defined as pitching at least six innings while giving up no more than three runs — through nine starts this season, including his third in his past four starts.
Another Bryan De La Cruz hit
With his leadoff single in the fourth inning, outfielder Bryan De La Cruz extended his hit streak to a career-long 10 games. He had two hits on Tuesday overall and is hitting .375 (15 for 40) with three doubles, one home run and five runs scored in that span.
Another one-run win
With the walk-off, the Marlins improve to 13-1 in games decided by one run this season. That’s after they went 24-40 in one-run games just a season ago.
This story was originally published May 16, 2023 at 10:26 PM.
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