Improvisation has led to Nats’ inconsistency

By Dave Utnik

Published: June 23, 2008

WASHINGTON — The lineup is rarely the same. Injuries have made sure of that.

Virtually every day this season Washington Nationals manager Manny Acta has been forced to improvise — often calling on reserve players or minor leaguers to fill a vacancy on the field.

Plan A and Plan B were used up ages ago. The Nationals are way farther down the alphabet now. The major league roster has featured 40 players — 20 of them pitchers — and the group that took the field against Atlanta on Opening Night has never appeared again.

Through it all, Acta has maintained both patience and optimism, even going so far as to issue this reminder prior to a 3-2 loss to the Los Angeles Angels on Monday: “We won a series against the Cubs, don’t forget. So you never know in this game.”

Each game has been a mystery in Washington. The Nationals (30-48) have used seven different players in left field and the injury situation has become so bizarre that second baseman Ronnie Belliard is now at third.

Still, there are occasions when this patchwork team hangs with — and beats — the best the ma-jor leagues has to offer. In addition to winning a series against the Cubs, they’ve swept the Braves, taken three of four from the Mets and out-played the Phillies. On Monday, the American League West-leading Angels nearly joined the list.

Following a 1 hour, 10 minute rain delay, Jason Bergmann held one of baseball’s most dangerous lineups to one run in a seven-inning outing that rivaled his best of the season and fill-in left fielder Willie Harris went 2-for-3 with a solo home run, a triple and two runs scored.

Heading into the eighth, the Nationals had the lead against John Lackey (5-1) and Bergmann was in line for what would have been his second win of the season. But he settled for a no-decision in-stead after the Nationals’ notoriously unreliable bullpen blew another late-inning advantage.

“He did a tremendous job. He pitched ahead in the count all night and threw a lot of first-pitch strikes and had a good curve ball,” Acta said. “He was on tonight.”

Reliever Saul Rivera wasn’t. Though he wasn’t all to blame this time. Second baseman Felipe Lopez and catcher Paul LoDuca each committed an error to allow the tying run to score and then Garrett Anderson lined a go-ahead base hit into right field as the Angels (47-30) celebrated a come-back victory in their first game in Washington since August 15, 1971.

“It’s not easy. To win 2-1 you almost have to play perfect and we were far from perfect when we made as many errors as runs we scored,” Acta said. “Obviously we want to win the ball game. Some things just got out of hand defensively.”