Nationals’ shortstop Trea Turner became the second player (Wil Myers being the first) in the 2017 season to hit for the cycle against the Colorado Rockies on Tuesday, April 25, 2017. It was the third cycle in Washington Nationals history and the first in nine years. The last player to hit for the cycle while wearing a Nationals jersey was Christian Guzman on Aug. 28, 2008. It was also the ninth cycle in Expos/Nationals history.

In addition to that, Turner’s 7 runs batted in is tied for second-most in a single game in Nationals history.

Turner recorded a single in the first to start it all off, then hit a 2-run double in the second, and a two-run round tripper in the sixth. Then, in the seventh inning, with the score 11-5 in the Nationals favor and the bases loaded, all Turner needed to do to hit for the cycle was hit a triple. It is a well-known fact that hitting a triple is the hardest thing to do in a cycle, but someone forgot to tell Trea Turner that because on a full count, Turner roped a line drive down the right-field line and was able to get all the way to third without any real difficulty.

After Trea Turner’s trip to the disabled list that cost him 10 games, Manager Dusty Baker placed Turner in the number 2 spot in the batting order. Hoping to set off a spark, Baker put Turner in the leadoff spot and received great results, Turner’s batting average, as a matter of fact, went from .219 to .297 after his outstanding performance.

Dusty Baker was equally impressed with the feat as we were saying, “That was great. That was awesome,” Baker told reporters.

“Especially the hardest one to get is the triple, but this is the place — if you want to the triple, here is the place. The homer to the opposite field, I don’t know how many runs he drove in — “

“Seven,” reporters said.

“Seven runs? Well, that stands out. That’s — woooo — there aren’t many guys that can say they drove in seven runs in a game. I just hope he remembers how he did it and duplicates it over and over and over.”

Interestingly enough, Turner himself didn’t know he had accomplished the feat until he saw the visitor’s dugout asking for the ball. “That was kind of my confirmation that I actually did it,” Turner said. “I saw people ask for the ball and I saw people clapping at me.”

“That was kind of my confirmation that I actually did it,” Turner said. “I saw people ask for the ball and I saw people clapping at me.”

“I actually was not thinking about [the cycle],” Turner said. “It’s funny. When you don’t think about it, it happens.” “I was worried about getting the runs in, making sure I try to get some runs put up on the board, because I know they can score them pretty fast over there, so I was pretty consumed with the at bat and then when I got to second base I realized I had a shot at it.”

“Last year I had a chance to hit for the cycle,” he added, “in one of the games and that’s all I thought about my last two at-bats and it’s funny, when you don’t think about it, you actually accomplish it.”

(Quotes from this article)

Even though Turner was outstanding, the same could not be said about their bullpen as they went into the seventh leading the powerful Rockies 15-6, but ended up having to use their closer as their bullpen gave up 6 runs to make the score 15-12. Which makes you wonder, what would have happened to the Nats if Trea Turner’s DL was a little bit longer than 10 games and he could not play this game. Would it have been a 8-12 loss for the nats? Or would their potent lineup be able to pull through and win the game? Feel free to share your opinion in the comments.