Washington Nationals news & notes: Lane Thomas and Nats beat Giants, 8-1 in series opener; Sean Doolittle ❤️ …

Notes and quotes from the series opener in Oracle Park…

OFFENSE IN ORACLE:

Lane Thomas started the season 2 for 28 with no extra base hits, three walks, and eight Ks over his first seven games and 32 plate appearances.

Thomas, 28, played in a career-high 156 games, and posted career highs in doubles (36), homers (28), and stolen bases (20), finishing up at .268/.315/.468 and 3.0 fWAR over 682 PAs in 2023.

He got off to a slow start this season, but finished up this past weekend’s series with the Philadelphia Phillies in the nation’s capital with back-to-back two-hit games in which the outfielder walked three times and stole four bases.

“He’s just trying to stay on top of the baseball, not trying to do too much,” Davey Martinez said when asked about things picking up for Thomas at the plate, after a second multi-hit game against the Phils.

Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images

A day earlier, Martinez diagnosed Thomas’s early problems as a timing issue.

“He just needs to get his foot down on time and start hitting the ball out front and just think about driving the ball to left-center field,” the skipper said. “When he does that, he’s good.

“And stay on the fastball,” Martinez added. “You can’t look for three or four different pitches up there, it just doesn’t work that way, so he’s a really good fastball hitter.

“When he gets them and he’s right he doesn’t necessarily miss them, and he’s missing his pitches, so got to get him to stay on his fastball.”

Thomas got all of a curve from Giants’ reliever Landen Roup last night in the series opener in Oracle Park, and hit it 402 ft. to center field in San Francisco for a two-run shot, and 5-1 lead in the first of three for Washington’s Nationals and Giants this week.

It was home run No. 1 for Thomas, who didn’t hit his first home run last season until May 1st, and with an RBI double by Ildemaro Vargas later in the third inning, the visitors were up 6-1 on the Giants, in what ended up a 8-1 win on the road.

Thomas went 3 for 5 overall in the opener, leaving him 7 for 11 with the home run and two walks in his last three games.

“I think that comes with more at-bats,” Thomas said, as quoted by MASN’s Mark Zuckerman after the series opening win:

“Obviously, you get enough in spring. But a spring training at-bat, there’s not many people in the stands. Stuff just speeds up (when the season begins). Once you get used to playing in these stadiums again, it starts to come together.”

“He’s getting himself ready a little earlier at the plate, which is great,” Martinez said in his post game presser. “I tell him, ‘Hey, when you hit the ball to right field, it’s because you’re ready, you’re on time, and the ball’s out over the plate. But he’s done really well. he’s playing good baseball. He’s running the bases well. He’s doing everything right, so today he gets that first [home run] out of the way, which is nice, helped us win a big game.”

Did Thomas make some adjustments, or is it just getting reps like he said?

“We’re constantly talking to him about his contact point, and hitting the ball out front, and the last couple days he’s been really conscious about doing that,” Martinez said.

“Even if he hits the ball the other way, he’s got to get the barrel out front of the zone. He’s done it. He’s done well, and when he does it, he’s really good.”

ALSO THIS:

AND THIS:

ABRAMS SITS OUT OPENER WITH GIANTS:

CJ Abrams sat out of the second and third games with the Philadelphia Phillies in D.C. over the weekend, and manager Davey Martinez decided to hold Washington’s shortstop out of the lineup for the Nationals’ series opener with the Giants last night in Oracle Park.

Abrams, 23, was diagnosed with a bone bruise in his left pinkie after an awkward slide in to second base as he tried to stretch a single during last Friday’s game with the Phils. Abrams went the rest of the way in that game, but hasn’t played since.

There were positive signs in the team’s workouts on Friday in San Francisco.

“He felt better today,” Martinez said before last night’s matchup. “He’s going to go out and do all baseball activity.

“Hopefully he’ll be available to pinch-run, pinch-hit, whatever we need him for. But if he goes through everything well, he’ll probably be back in the lineup tomorrow.”

What’s holding Abrams back now is gripping the bat as he swings, or at least doing so with no pain in the finger.

“He swung the bat better today in the cage,” Martinez explained. “Because it is his top hand.”

Photo by Jason Mowry/Getty Images

“Every time he goes to turn like that,” Martinez demonstrated, moving his hands through a swing, “… it kind of catches him. But they taped him up, he said the tape helped. Hopefully he’ll go out there today, take batting practice and get him out in the field.

“The good thing is it’s not his throwing hand. But he definitely has to squeeze the glove, so when the ball gets in there and it hits him in there, we’ll see how he feels.”

As of now, it’s just a matter of when Abrams can tolerate the pain in his finger.

“They’ve been doing some ultrasound stuff with him,” Martinez said of the treatment.

“But it’s just pain tolerance really now. The swelling went down tremendously today when I saw it, so that was great news.”

DOOOOOOO!!!!:

Sean Doolittle was born in Rapid City, South Dakota, and he spent the majority of his youth in New Jersey, but he lived in Atwater, California for a time, a couple hours outside the Bay Area, and he and his family were season ticket holders at the Oakland Coliseum, as he told reporters in announcing his retirement last summer, after an 11-year career which began in 2012, when he debuted with the A’s who’d drafted him in the 1st Round in 2007.

“This is all I’ve ever wanted to do,” Doolittle said of moving on from baseball, “… this was a dream that I’ve had since I can barely remember. When I was a kid, we had a season ticket package to A’s games, and I grew up — I fell in love with baseball going to those games.”

His time with the Athletics meant a lot to him, with the reliever forming a unique bond with the A’s fans, and he found that again in his time with the Nationals (2017-2020 & 2022-’23).

Photo by G Fiume/Getty Images

Shortly after he told the club about his decision to retire, Washington’s GM and President of Baseball Ops Mike Rizzo approached Doolittle about staying with the club as a coach, a job he took, joining the team as a Pitching Strategist on Manager Davey Martinez’s staff.

Doolittle returned to the Bay Area (in San Francisco) last night, and a reporter in Oracle Park wanted to know how things were going with the pitcher turned coach and mentor.

“He’s been incredible. He really has,” Martinez said, in his pregame press conference before the series opener with the Giants.

“But I’ve known that about him — managing him here, the stuff that he went through here, he’s just that guy. He took on this coaching role very seriously, and he’s done really, really well. He’s helped [Pitching Coach Jim] Hickey out in many different ways. Players — he’s just removed from the game, so he understands players really well, the pitching part of it. I love having him. I really do. We have really good conversations. He’s learned a lot. He’s learned a lot from Hickey, from [Bullpen Coach] Ricky [Bones], but he’s also very vocal, he’s not afraid to speak his opinion, as you probably know, and I love that about him.”