The last time Washington Nationals fans saw Aníbal Sánchez, he was threatening to toss a no-no in a National League Championship Series game.
Sánchez ultimately got through 7⅔ innings before allowing a hit in Game 1 of the NLCS against the St. Louis Cardinals. That outing on Oct. 11 — with five strikeouts and just one walk against a Cardinals team that was fresh off a 13-1 win over Atlanta at the time — got Washington rolling to an eventual sweep.
It was a masterful performance, one of the highlights of Sánchez’s career. Now the question won’t be necessarily whether Sánchez can replicate it, but how he’ll fare after two full weeks without game action when he starts Game 3 of the World Series Friday night against the Houston Astros.
The 35-year-old Venezuelan says he’s anxious to get on the field, but not worried about the gap between starts. After all, he already dealt with a similarly long layoff not long ago — 11 days passed between Sánchez’s last start of the regular season, Sept. 25, and his first playoff start, Oct. 6.
“I think most of the time, like right now, probably you need to rest because I’ve been throwing a baseball since February, probably January,” he said. “So right now it’s not something that’s going to affect you. So for me, I’m fine with the rest.”
In his first season with Washington, Sánchez got off to a terrible start, failing to win a start until May 29 after a brief stint on the injured list. But as manager Dave Martinez said Thursday, he’s been “unbelievable” since returning from the IL, going 11-2 the rest of the year.
The Nationals’ pitching situation could look a lot worse if not for Sánchez becoming their reliable No. 4 starter.
When the playoffs arrived, while other teams in the running had to play the occasional “bullpen game” after exhausting their top two or three starters, Sánchez has helped the Nationals avoid that potential pitfall. Given how the bullpen posted a collective 5.68 ERA in the regular season, Washington is clearly stronger with their big four starters going six or seven innings into a postseason start — and using an occasional inning of relief from usual starting arm Patrick Corbin along the way.
Corbin was originally projected to start Game 3, but he was pushed back a day after throwing 21 pitches out of the bullpen in Game 1 of the Series. Martinez confirmed Thursday that Corbin will start Game 4.
“It wasn’t a hard decision for me to say (Sánchez is) going to be Game 3 starter,” Martinez said. “He’s got great command of all his pitches, which is a lot. Hopefully he goes out there and keeps us in the ball game and we have a chance to win again.”
After a difficult ending to his time with the Detroit Tigers in 2016 and 2017, Sánchez was worried about it possibly signaling the end of his major league career. He bounced back with the Braves in 2018 and earned himself a two-year deal with the Nationals.
Now, he says, he feels blessed that he’s about to pitch in a World Series game for the second time, after his 2012 appearance with Detroit.
“Thank God that I got this opportunity,” he said. “Without him I don’t think that I was here.”
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