The Washington Nationals had won nine of their last 10 games going into Thursday night's matchup with the Miami Marlins (GameTracker), and left fielder Kyle Schwarber is the No. 1 reason for their success. Schwarber moved into the leadoff spot full-time 10 games ago and has gone 14-for-39 (.359) with nine home runs and 18 RBI since.
Schwarber's torrid hot streak continued Thursday night. He opened the game with a leadoff homer against Marlins righty Cody Poteet, then added a three-run home run in the second inning to break the game open. Schwarber is up to 11 home runs and 22 RBI in his last 11 games. To the action footage:
Schwarber's last five games has been especially good. He's gone deep eight times in those five games, and is the seventh player in the Modern Era to hit eight homers in a five-game span, according to ESPN's Jesse Rogers. Schwarber joins Barry Bonds, Shawn Green, Josh Hamilton, Frank Howard, Ralph Kiner, and Manny Ramirez in the club. That's some company.
"He's well on his way to doing some really special things with this uniform on, so hopefully it continues," Nationals first baseman Josh Bell told reporters, including MLB.com's Paul Casella, about Schwarber's hot streak earlier this week. "It's been a lot of fun to watch, for sure."
Thursday's homers were No. 20 and 21 on the season or Schwarber, moving him into fourth place on the MLB home run leaderboard Only Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (24), Shohei Ohtani (23), and Fernando Tatis Jr. (22) have gone deep more times. Schwarber took a .240/.325/.519 batting line into Thursday's game.
The Nationals signed Schwarber to a one-year contract worth $10 million over the winter, after he was non-tendered by the Cubs. Washington came into Thursday in second place in the NL East at 35-36. They're four games behind the first place Mets.
