On April 25, 2025, Jesse Winker of the Mets hit a low liner that was ruled caught in the air by Nationals first baseman Nathaniel Lowe, who turned it into a rare triple play. This was the first ever turned at home by Washington, but another aspect of the play set it apart from any other in the annals of the game.
Righty Jake Irvin had a 2-0 lead when he started the fourth inning by yielding back-to-back singles. The next batter was Winker, a former National. On July 4, 2024, Winker had hit a solo home run to give Washington a 1-0 victory over the Mets before his deadline trade to New York. He wouldn’t be a hero this time.
The left-hand batting Winker pulled a sharp liner to the right side. Thinking the ball would hit the ground, the runners took off. Little were they aware that first base umpire Alfonso Marquez, who was behind Lowe, ruled the play a clean catch for an out. Lowe, believing he made the catch, threw to shortstop CJ Abrams, who tagged second base for the second out and then tagged the runner from first, who arrived at the bag after the throw, to complete the triple play.
A video replay showed Winker’s hard-hit ball seemed to have barely skipped off the dirt before landing in Lowe’s glove. After recording the third out, Abrams threw the ball back to Lowe at first, just in case the catch was overturned. The return throw easily would have beaten the runner, assuring at least a double play.
Thanks to the amazing Jayson Stark of The Athletic, it turns out that this was not the first time Winker had hit into a triple play started by Lowe. The first baseman told Nats’ radio voice Dave Jageler that it “felt deja-vu-ish to him.” No wonder.
On April 30, 2023, in a Mariners-Rangers game, as former Ranger Lowe seemed to recall, he started a triple play on a ball hit by Winker. With help from Katie Sharp at Baseball Reference, Stark was able to report that the same fielder and batter never before had been involved in two triple plays.
Fly balls and line drives in the infield are not reviewable, although another umpire could have overturned Márquez’s call. Nobody did, despite Mets manager Carlos Mendoza’s vehement protest.
“I treated it like I caught it,” Lowe told the media. “So I figured that everybody was moving and we had a better play at second base than first, because we had all day to get back to first. So that’s three outs.”
“I thought my thumb was underneath it, Lowe said. “They (the Mets) didn’t think so. So I went to second first and got the ball back.”
The game had a thrilling finish. Trailing 4-3 in the bottom of the ninth, Dylan Crews led off with a triple and scored the tying run on Jose Tena’s single. The Nationals won, 5-4, on a two-out grounder that James Wood beat out for a hit. Abrams, on first after a force-out, kept on running and scored on a close play at home. The Mets challenged the safe call, a bang-bang tag play, but the call was upheld.
On this night in D.C., Washington’s third Post-1900 team joined the first two in turning a record-matching triple play. This was one of three that had never been done anywhere before.
The Nationals had turned triple plays twice before in the club’s tenure in D.C. The others were on July 29, 2016, at San Francisco and May 20, 2022, at Milwaukee. So triple plays are rare enough. To start a second one hit by the same batter is so rare as to be the first ever recorded in MLB history.
The 2016 Nats’ triple play against the Giants was the 37th-ever by a relief pitcher facing his first batter. Sammy Solis came in with the bases loaded. Brandon Crawford hit a sharp liner to Ryan Zimmerman at first. He stepped on the bag for the second out, then threw to third to nail the runner there.
On April 29, 1914, in Philadephia, Doc Ayers of Washington became the first reliever ever to retire three batters on his first pitch. First baseman Chick Gandil (yes, of the 1919 Black Sox) caught a liner for the first out, threw to third to get the runner there. The return throw to second got the other runner trying to get back (3-5-6).
On August 11, 1922, at Boston, Red Sox catcher Muddy Ruel fielded a bunt in front of home plate and threw to third to get the lead runner. The return throw to first retired the batter. Hall of Famer Sam Rice, who was on first. belatedly tried to advance from second but was throw out to complete an unusual 2-5-3-5 triple play.
On July 23, 1959, the Senators turned the first (and only) triple play involving an all-Cuban trio. Whitey Herzog line out to Nats’ pitcher Pedro Ramos, who threw to Julio Becquer at first for the second out; Becquer’s throw to Jose Vadlivielso at second beat the retreating base runner to complete the triple play.
In D.C. on July 15, 1969, the Tigers’ Daryl Peterson did what just a dozen relief pitchers since Ayers have done: Get a triple play on his first pitch. With runners on first and second, Ed Brinkman hit a sharp grounder to Don Wert at third, who tagged the bag to start an around-the-horn triple play.
The previous season – on July 30, 1968 — Nationals shortstop Ron Hansen caught a liner by Cleveland’s Joe Ascue. With the runners on first and second moving, Hansen tagged Russ Snyder near second and stepped on the bag to get Dave Nelson retreating to complete just the eighth unassisted triple play in MLB history. It had been 41 years since the last one and would be 24 years until the next unassisted triple play. So Hansen’s was the only one over 65 seasons.
Washington baseball history 