Washington Nationals at Tampa Bay Rays

Sunday at 1:40 PM ET wraps a weekend set at Tropicana Field, and both starters were still TBD as of mid-week — Ryan Pepiot is out for the year with a hip issue, so the Rays are mixing and matching, and Washington just ran Zack Littell out there Wednesday. Check the probables card above for whatever the teams have posted; the pitching matchup is going to do a lot of the heavy lifting on a getaway day.

Washington is the story of this series whether anyone outside the Beltway wants to admit it. Blake Butera has the Nationals 3 games over .500 for the first time in 7 years, they took 4 of their last 5 before dropping the Royals finale 6-2, and the rebuild timeline suddenly looks pulled forward. CJ Abrams and Dylan Crews are producing, the bats showed up against Seattle (8-3, 10-1), and a road set in Tampa is exactly the kind of spot a young team is supposed to bury or get buried in.

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R	H	E
WSH	0	0	1	1	0	1	0	0	0	3	6	1
TB	0	0	1	0	0	1	2	0	—	4	9	0

The Rays, meanwhile, just got dragged through California. They lost 4 of 5 to the Angels and Dodgers, including 4 straight one-run games to LA capped by a 5-4 sleepwalk on Tuesday. They scored a total of 7 runs in the 3 Dodgers losses. Tampa Bay is still 41-30 and the better team on paper, but the bats have gone quiet at the worst possible time and there's nothing like a cross-country flight back to the Trop to fix it. Or not.

The one bit of help on the way is Jonny DeLuca, who's been out since late May with a Grade 1 hamstring strain. Kevin Cash said earlier in the week that DeLuca could be activated during this weekend's series after his Triple-A Durham rehab work. Whether he's back in the lineup by Sunday or saved for next series, getting a real corner outfielder back matters for a Rays group that's been patching the outfield with duct tape thanks to Jake Fraley's hernia surgery and Gavin Lux's shoulder.

The pitching staff situation is the lurking issue for both clubs. Washington is still without Jake Irvin, Trevor Williams, Josiah Gray, and DJ Herz from its rotation, which is the rebuild tax catching up. Tampa lost Pepiot for the year and is short multiple bullpen arms. Whoever gets length out of their starter Sunday probably wins the game, which is the most generic baseball sentence ever written but it's especially true with both bullpens this thin.

Series finale, day game, hot team in town, home team in a funk — this has the shape of a Nationals upset bid if Butera's group keeps swinging the bats the way it has. The Rays don't typically lose series at the Trop, though, and there's usually a bounce-back response built in after a trip like the one they just had. Either way, it's a more interesting game than the standings would have you guess a week ago.

Sources