He could have been Mad Max on a night his best was missing. Instead, he fenced and fought, shuffled and juggled. And so did the Washington Nationals bullpen.

Gerrit Cole trudged slowly off the mound, wiped the sweat from his upper lip and took a handshake and pat on the backside from manager AJ Hinch.

Ryan Zimmerman has come full circle, with a trot around the bases for the Washington Nationals. The first amateur player ever drafted by the Nationals in 2005, and the only person to wear their jersey during all 15 seasons the team has existed, Zimmerman hit their first World Series home run.

Juan Soto homered onto the train tracks high above the left field wall and added a two-run double as the Washington Nationals tagged Gerrit Cole and the Houston Astros 5-4 in the World Series opener.

Something was left out when the Houston Astros submitted their World Series roster. Namely, left-handed pitchers. For the first time since the very first World Series in 1903, a team has no lefties on its Fall Classic staff.

The starting rotations for the World Series between the Houston Astros and Washington Nationals are filled with former Cy Young winners and first-round draft picks.

After losing 100 games in three straight seasons, the Houston Astros are in position to become the first team to win 100 in four consecutive years.

What a relief for Houston Astros pitcher Joe Smith that manager AJ Hinch was only joking about his team’s makeup for the World Series.

Gerrit Cole enters this matchup against fellow ace Max Scherzer at 19-0 in his past 25 starts, including three wins in the playoffs. No pitcher has ever won 20 in a row in a single season.

Gerrit Cole is set to throw the first pitch of the World Series on Tuesday night in Houston. He led the majors with 326 strikeouts, was second to Verlander in the big leagues with 20 wins and topped the AL with a 2.50 ERA.

Rough as things were when Washington was 19-31 and people were wondering whether Nationals manager Dave Martinez was in over his head and might get fired, he never wavered. Just as important, neither did the support he received from GM Mike Rizzo and team ownership.

As Washington Nationals players raucously celebrated their dominant National League Championship Series sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals, the franchise failures of the Seattle Mariners gained a new level of ignominy even though their 2019 season ended weeks ago.

Ryan Zimmerman has been through it all with the Washington Nationals and now he will get to play in the franchise’s first World Series – and the first for any Washington baseball team since 1933.

Mike Shildt took the ball from Dakota Hudson and patted him on the back of the neck. Hudson was out of the game after recording one out on 15 pitches against eight Washington Nationals batters, and the St. Louis Cardinals were on the receiving end of what they did to the Atlanta Braves in the last round.

Washington is heading to the World Series for the first time in 86 years after the wild-card Nationals used a seven-run first inning and Patrick Corbin’s 12-strikeout performance to beat the St. Louis Cardinals 7-4 and sweep the NL Championship Series.

Stephen Strasburg took his turn silencing the Cardinals’ struggling bats, Nationals postseason star Howie Kendrick doubled three times and drove in three more runs, and Washington moved one win from the city’s first World Series appearance in 86 years by beating St. Louis 8-1 Monday night to take a 3-0 lead in the NL Championship Series.

Scherzer carries no-hit bid into 7th inning, Nationals beat Cardinals 3-1 for 2-0 NLCS lead.

ST. LOUIS – It turns out Washington’s Big Three is a Big Four. Don’t forget about Anibal Sanchez.

With the top teams out of the mix, it’s on to a most unlikely matchup in the NL Championship Series. The St. Louis Cardinals are back in the NLCS for the first time since 2014 after a stunner of an inning in Atlanta. They’ll face the Washington Nationals, who dispatched their playoff demons with an upset of the 106-win Dodgers.