WaPo: Nats Fall To Their 7th Loss In a Row (RR)

[Washington] lost one player, Chad Cordero, who departed to deal with the impending death of a family member; another, Josh Wilson, to poor performance and a demotion to the minors; and still another, Ryan Wagner, to a creaky shoulder that he said he probably should have alerted club officials to sooner.

In their stead, the Nationals activated a pitcher, Jason Simontacchi, to start against the Brewers, and for a man who hadn’t started a major league game in nearly four years, he threw well Tuesday night. His one mistake turned into a three-run homer by Prince Fielder in the sixth, his last inning.

They added another pitcher, Winston Abreu, whose only previous stint in the majors resulted in a 10.13 ERA, and he retired the first two men he faced, then gave up a homer to J.J. Hardy. And they brought up a 33-year-old third baseman, Tony Batista, who played in Japan two seasons ago, then was cut by Minnesota in 2006, and he swung at the first pitch he saw, flying out as a pinch hitter in the ninth.

I hadn’t even realized Batista had been called up until he was the process of flying out… even then, I thought “THE Tony Batista?...no, can’t be”.  Then I thought, “Well - he DID swing at the first pitch”.