Baseball fans in Washington waited 34 years for games like tonight's Nationals - Braves tilt. It was worth the wait.

Although Chad Cordero gave up a homerun for the second consecutive game, this time to 48 year old Julio Franco, he showed that even when he didn't have his good stuff, his stuff is still good enough. With Andruw Jones on 3rd and Johnny Estrada on 1st with only one out, Cordero struck out pinch hitter Bryan swinging and Rafael Furcal looking to save his 13th game in 15 chances. Cordero's ERA has "ballooned" from 0.78 to 1.44 in the last two games. No sweat. We'll take it.

Things looked very shaky in the first inning, as John Patterson, pitching for the first time since coming off the disabled list, gave up a single to Rafael Furcal to lead off the game. Rookie Kelly Johnson and first baseman Adam LaRoche walked during the inning as well. Patterson bore down and allowed only one run to score on a Chipper Jones groundout. From that point, Patterson was lights out, retiring the last 13 batters he faced before pitch count issues forced him out of the game in the 5th inning. He had a no decision.

Things looked bleak in the 6th inning. After getting two quick outs, C.J. Nitkowski gave up a 4 pitch walk to Kelly Johnson and a long double to Chipper Jones to make the score 2-0. Manager Frank Robinson brought in T.J. Tucker who allowed a Julio Franco single that scored the second run of the game, making it 3-0. Behind three runs with three innings to go: not exactly the situation where the Nats shine. But this time, they did.

Granted, it looked like the Nationals should have done better. Washington loaded the bases with nobody out before Marlon Byrd grounded into a double play, scoring one run Gary Barnett then singled off of Rafael Furcal's glove scoring the second run of the inning. The Nats continued their come from behind effort, scoring three more runs in the 7th to make the score 5-3. It stayed that way until Chad Cordero gave up Franco's homerun in the 9th.

After losing five straight and 7 of 9 on their road trip, the Nationals have now won two straight against the Braves and find themselves only 1 1/2 games out of first. The team, who just a few days ago was getting pummeled by the press and the blogosphere is again the darling of the community. Funny how that works.