WASHINGTON (AP) — Joey Meneses homered for the third consecutive day, Patrick Corbin earned his first home victory since May 20, and the Washington Nationals defeated the Texas Rangers 7-2 on Sunday.
Stone Garrett and Dominic Smith also homered for last-place Washington, which won the final two games of the series after dropping 15 of its previous 16 at Nationals Park.
Texas enters the All-Star break atop the AL West despite losing eight of its past 11. The Rangers (52-39) have not won a series since taking two of three June 19-21 from the Chicago White Sox, but still are tied for their fifth-best record through 91 games in franchise history.
Atlanta Braves ace Max Fried has thrown 35 pitches over 1 1/3 scoreless innings for Triple-A Gwinnett in his first appearance since May 5.
Kansas City Royals pitcher Ryan Yarbrough is returning to the mound to start against Cleveland in his first major league game since the left-hander was hit in the face by a line drive two months ago.
Major League Baseball has made the games faster, the bases bigger and defense a little bit harder. Now, if it could only do something about those stubborn strikeouts.
Blake Snell allowed only one hit and struck out 11 in six shutout innings, Matthew Batten hit a two-run shot for his first homer in the majors and the San Diego Padres beat the New York Met 3-1 on Saturday night.
Meneses has batted third or fourth most of the season for Washington after hitting 13 homers in 56 games last season. But he had only two in his first 80 games this season before going deep twice Friday and once more Saturday.
He added another Sunday, taking reliever Josh Sborz to right-center in the seventh. It is the second time in his career Meneses has homered in three consecutive games.
Corbin (6-10) matched his victory total from all of last year, when he led the majors with 19 losses. He retired the first 10 men he faced and allowed one run and five hits while striking out six over seven innings.
Smith hit Texas starter Dane Dunning’s first pitch of the fifth inning to right-center to open the scoring. Lane Thomas added an RBI single later in the inning.
Dunning left with two men on in the sixth, and Sborz allowed Luis García’s infield single to load the bases. Alex Call followed with a two-run single, and CJ Abrams added a run-scoring single to make it 5-1.
Garrett homered two batters after Meneses’ shot in the seventh to end Sborz’s outing.
Dunning (8-2), one of Washington’s first-round picks in 2016, pitched for the first time at Nationals Park and allowed four runs in 5 2/3 innings. The right-hander allowed seven hits while striking out four.
Adolis García drove in both of the Rangers’ runs, on a bloop single in the sixth and a force out in the eighth.
UP NEXT
Rangers: Texas has not revealed its rotation for when it returns home Friday to open a three-game series against Cleveland.
Nationals: Washington has not announced its pitching plans for after the All-Star break. The Nationals begin a three-game series Friday at St. Louis.
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