The Washington Nationals had a roller coaster of a win last night that showed good and bad

For the first 6 innings, the Nationals were in total control. That is largely due to the stellar work by Andrew Alvarez. He has fully established himself as a real piece in this Nats rotation. Since he re-joined the rotation following the deadline, he has a 2.15 ERA and a WHIP under 1.

Alvarez has made it clear that he learned a lot from Foster Griffin this season. After Griffin got traded, Alvarez stepped into his shoes and provided similar performances. He has taken what he learned from Griffin and has used it to become a much better pitcher.

Even at the beginning of the year, Alvarez did a nice job limiting runs. However, he allowed a lot of base runners and could not go deep into games. Blake Butera only trusted Alvarez to go 4 innings or so. When he got past about 60 pitches, he would hit a wall.