MacKenzie Gore retired the first ten batters he faced last night in the nation’s capital, then worked around the first hit he allowed with one out in the fourth, and set six more Boston Red Sox’ hitters down before a leadoff walk in the seventh (which he erased with a force at second in the next at-bat).
But a blister/cracked finger nail, on his left middle finger, drew manager Davey Martinez and the club’s trainer Paul Lessard to the mound, and Gore was lifted from the outing, after an 85-pitch effort in which he struck out seven and gave up just one hit and two walks, picking up 13 swinging strikes (spread pretty evenly over four pitches) and 14 called strikes (with 12 of them on his four-seam fastball) in a dominant outing in Nationals Park.