Max Scherzer dismissed the idea that the Washington Nationals needed any additional sort of additional motivation to bring it over the final week of the season, even though the 2019 World Series champions are all but eliminated from contention for a postseason berth.
Asked if there was anything that needed to be said to make sure the effort is still there over the final week, Scherzer told reporters, “that goes unsaid in the big leagues, this is the pros.
“You don’t have to worry about effort, everybody brings it every single day, we’ve shown that a million times, so that’s really an unfair thought to even have.”
“I think we’re still one of those teams that’s never going to — not going give up until we’re really out of it,” veteran backstop Yan Gomes said, when asked about potentially playing a spoiler role down the stretch.
“I think we showed that last year, but I don’t know, if you want to call it a spoiler’s role I think we’ll take that and make everybody work for it.”
If they needed any motivation, not officially being eliminated is enough, though that’s going to happen at some point soon (most likely).
“I think the two teams that we have the remainder of the week are in a better spot than we are, so kind of just the thought of playing spoiler too, can kind of motivate you,” Brock Holt said after the Nationals beat the Phillies 5-1 in the series opener last night.
“Any time there’s a little bit of hope, obviously we all know what’s going on, but it motivates you a little bit more.”
“Like I say every day,” manager Davey Martinez added last night, “... for us it’s just about competing every day. Going 1-0 every day. And these guys, as you could see tonight, a testament to these guys, they go out there and they play baseball. They play hard, they never feel like they’re out of it, which I love and they’re going to out there and try to win every game that they possible can.
“Tonight they went out there, we wanted to score early, we did that, we had some pretty good at bats, moved the baseball, and we scored enough runs to win.”
They’ll try to go 1-0 again tonight.
HERE’S THE NATIONALS’ LINEUP FOR THE 1ST OF 2 TODAY IN D.C.:
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— Washington Nationals (@Nationals) September 22, 2020