By OSWALD T. BROWN
WASHINGTON, D.C., Oct. 1, 2019 — My beloved Washington Nationals square off tonight (Tuesday, October 1) against the Milwaukee Brewers in the 2019 National League Wild Card Game, a single-elimination affair that I predict the Nationals will win and advance to face the Los Angeles Dodgers in the best-of-five National League Division Series.
Although our sensational righthander Max Scherzer has been plagued with injuries for an extended period this season, he is seemingly now healthy and is scheduled to start tonight’s game, but should he falter early, manager Dave Martinez has a sensational “bullpen” that will include starters Stephen Strasburg and Patrick Corbin from which to choose a reliever to replace him in this “must-win” game.
Once we advance to the Division Championship Series, I am also predicting that we will defeat the Dodgers, who won their division with an incredible 106 – 56 won-loss record, and advance to the World Series, which I predict we will also win.
Of course, I have some friends who die-hard Dodgers fans — like Jim Storr in Florida and Winston Sherman in Freeport, Bahamas — who will vehemently disagree with my predictions, but we have one of the best starting pitching rotations in baseball and there is a long-time axiom in baseball that “good pitching will always stop good hitting.”
It is no secret that I am a dyed-in-the-wool Washington Nationals and Washington Redskins football fan, and I am also a strong supporter the Washington Wizards, our men’s professional basketball team, and the Washington Mystics, our women’s professional basketball team, which incidentally won the first game of the WNBA Finals at the Entertainment and Sports Arena here in D.C. on Sunday night.
The fact that I am not pulling for the Mystics tonight when they play the Connecticut Sun in the second game of the best-3-out-of-5 series was as easy decision for me to reach. Connecticut Sun superstar Jonquel Jones is from Eight Mile Rock, Grand Bahama, and as a Bahamian – who was born and spent my boyhood years in Andros, the largest of the Islands of The Bahamas – I am immensely proud of the accomplishments of my fellow Bahamian and I am pulling for her to have a sensational game tonight in leading the Suns to victory.
