Heard this one before? Washington had a late lead on the first-place New York Mets, who rallied Wednesday night off Nats relievers Drew Storen and Jonathan Papelbon in a 5-3 win.
The Mets (78-61) swept the three-game series with the Nationals (71-68), and while it’s still too soon to be thinking about magic numbers, you can just about count the National League East race as being over and done with.
Stephen Strasburg (8-7, 4.30 ERA) was actually tagged with the loss, charged with three runs on five hits in seven and a third innings, striking out 13 and walking one. Strasburg had taken a 2-1 lead into the eighth, and had given up just three hits to that point, before Kelly Johnson led off the top of the eighth with a solo homer, his 14th.
After a strikeout of Kirk Nieuwenhuis, Curtis Granderson singled to center, and that was the night for Strasburg.
Yoenis Cespedes greeted Storen with a two-run homer, his 32nd, to make it 4-2.
Bryce Harper hit his second homer of the game, giving him 36 on the season, in the bottom of the eighth to close the margin to 4-3.
A Michael Conforto RBI single in the top of the ninth off Papelbon extended the lead to 5-3.
Mets closer Jeurys Familia set the Nationals down in order in the bottom of the ninth to rack up his 39th save.
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