In his second career start, Jackson Rutledge showed much improvement, only giving up two runs both on solo shots over six and a third innings.

The Nationals took Rutledge’s start and parlayed it into a 4-3 victory over the Chicago White Sox.

Rutledge, who had 90 pitches through 3.2 innings in his first start didn’t even crack 80 tonight.

Luis Robert opened the scoring with a blast to left in the fourth inning.  Prior to that swing, Rutledge had only allowed three baserunners (two singles and a walk) all to Tim Anderson and Robert.

In the sixth inning, Lane Thomas drove in Jacob Young on a sacrifice fly, his first RBI in four games.

The tie game wouldn’t last long as one out into the seventh inning Yoan Moncada took a ball 412 feet to end a quality start by Rutledge.

Down 2-1 after an Ildimaro Vargas walk and a Carter Kieboom pinch-hit single, the Nationals sent in Joey Meneses to hit for Blake Rutherford.

Meneses sent the ball out into the visiting bullpen his 12th of the season giving the Nationals a lead for good in the game.

I say it all the time and I’ll say it again, good things happen when Meneses hits a homer.  In fact, this season the Nationals are 9-1 when Joey Meneses hits a home run.

From there, Hunter Harvey had a shutdown eighth inning and Kyle Finnegan picked up his 26th save of the season, although not without some drama allowing one more White Sox to cross the plate in the ninth.

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