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 Glavine (0-1) matched the shortest start of his 22-season, 303-win career, departing with a strained right hamstring after letting all four batters he faced reach base. After throwing his 16th pitch, Glavine walked off the mound, then briefly doubled over.
He was replaced by Jeff Bennett, who got a double play grounder that scored a run to give Washington a 2-0 lead. Both runs were charged to Glavine.
In the second inning, Bennett issued four walks in a row -- a string that included Cristian Guzman's first free pass of the season and two with the bases full that forced in runs. Bennett helped along Washington's struggling offense again in the third by hitting Paul Lo Duca, who came around to score on Aaron Boone's RBI single.
Staked to that 5-0 lead, Washington starter Tim Redding (2-1) and five relievers did just enough to protect it and end the Nationals' longest losing streak since the franchise moved to the nation's capital.
Redding was charged with three runs in five-plus innings, and reliever Luis Ayala allowed Atlanta to pull within 5-4 on left fielder Wily Mo Pena's error, dropping a ball hit by Mark Kotsay.
That was part of an all-around rough season debut for Pena, rushed back from a minor league rehab assignment in the hope he could spark the lineup. Pena
-- on the 15-day disabled list since spring training because of a side muscle injury
-- hit into a bases-loaded double play and struck out in his other three at-bats.
Another Nationals player making his first appearance of the season was closer Chad Cordero. A day after coming off the DL, he got two outs then loaded the bases. Jon Rauch entered, threw one pitch, and got Brian McCann to fly out to right to earn his second save.
Redding is the only Nationals starter with a win to his credit this season, and he did enough to avoid serious trouble through five innings. Sure, he put runners on base, but double plays ended the first and second innings.
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The sixth was more problematic: Yunel Escobar led off with a single, and Chipper Jones followed with a homer to left on a 1-0 pitch that caught the middle of the plate. Both of Jones' homers this season came at Nationals Park; the other was March 30, in the stadium's debut.
Mark Teixeira followed with a double on Redding's 99th pitch of the afternoon, which would also be his last. Lefty reliever Ray King came on to face McCann and got a groundout, then left in favor of righty Saul Rivera, who allowed Jeff Francoeur's sac fly that made it 5-3.
Rivera put himself in a precarious position with two outs in the seventh, walking consecutive batters to bring up Jones. But this time, the switch-hitter grounded out.
Notes: Lo Duca was hit by a pitch on the right hand by Bennett in the third inning but remained in the game. The Nationals optioned C Jesus Flores to Triple-A Columbus before the game, opening up a roster spot for Pena, and so were left with Johnny Estrada
-- still working his way back from right elbow tendinitis -- as the only backup catcher. ... Braves 2B Kelly Johnson went 0-for-4, his first game without a hit this season. He walked in the seventh, then stole his first base of 2008.
[Associated Press; By HOWARD FENDRICH]
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This
material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or
redistributed.
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