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SAN FRANCISCO - Down two games to none the cards are certainly stacked against the Washington Nationals. Cheap Jonathan Allen Jersey . If they need some motivation, though, all they have to do is look across at the opposing dugout. Washington tries to stave off elimination on Monday, as the National League Division Series shifts to San Francisco for Game 3 at AT&T Park. History is not on the Nationals side. Since the current divisional format began in 1995 there have been 46 teams who have gone ahead 2-0 in a Division Series and only five have lost the series. However, the last team to do it was the 2012 Giants, who, of course, went on to win the World Series. Yeah, it can be done, Washington manager Matt Williams said Sunday. It can certainly be done. You have to start with the first one. It may be a tall order, though, against a Giants team that has won an NL- record 10 straight postseason games and will be throwing their ace, Madison Bumgarner, in front of what should be a raucous crowd. Bumgarner has already left his mark on this postseason, throwing a four-hit shutout to beat the Pittsburgh Pirates in the wild card game. If there was no Clayton Kershaw we may very well be talking about an NL Cy Young Award for Bumgarner, who set career-high marks in wins (18) and strikeouts (219) this season and pitched to a 2.98 ERA. We are confident with Bum on the mound on Monday, said Giants first baseman Brandon Belt. Definitely not taking it for granted. We have seen teams come back down from 0-2 and win the series. We are going to go in there and try to play our best baseball. If we dont, they will take advantage of it. While Bumgarner was one of the best road pitchers in the league this season, he was quite ordinary at home, going 7-6 with a 5.03 ERA in 15 starts. In seven starts versus the Nationals, hes pitched to a 2.60 ERA. This will be Bumgarners ninth career postseason appearance. He is 4-2 with a 3.02 ERA. As boring as it sounds, youve got to treat it like any other game, he said. For me, its fun and exciting to go out there and get amped up and pumped up for the game. But for me, and a lot of people, when you do that, you dont play as good of baseball as you should. So its important to push all the nerves and anxiety and excitement aside and just play good, fundamentally sound baseball. Washington, meanwhile, will be throwing a postseason stalwart of its own in Doug Fister, who actually matched up against Bumgarner in the 2012 World Series as a member of the Detroit Tigers. Fister is no stranger to October baseball, as Mondays start will be his 17th postseason appearance. A surprise injury replacement during his postseason debut in 2011, Fister has gone 3-1 with a 2.08 ERA in 15 October games, all with the Tigers. Its definitely a benefit with having some experience, Fister said. But it just comes down to executing, and that is a big thing. These guys have played well for a long time and they are on quite a roll. But at the same time, we have been backed into a corner before. Weve been through a lot of ups and downs, and I think thats something thats definitely going to help us here where were down 0-2. Fister missed the first month of the season with a lat strain, but eventually enjoyed the best statistical season of his career, going 16-5 with a 2.20 ERA over his final 24 starts. The righty also walked a total of just 24 batters in those games. We dont have a choice now, Williams said. It is a must-win (game) for us. Then we must win Game 4 and hopefully get it back to (Washington). That is all we can do at this point. San Francisco moved to the brink of its third NLCS appearance in five years with a thrilling 18-inning win on Saturday. Pablo Sandovals RBI double tied the game with two outs in the ninth inning, and Belts solo homer in the 18th gave the never-say-die Giants a 2-1 victory and spoiled what was an outstanding outing from the Nats Jordan Zimmermann. Belts leadoff blast off Tanner Roark (0-1) produced the deciding run in the longest game by time in postseason history. The real hero of the game may have been Giants reliever Yusmeiro Petit, who held the Nationals to a single hit over six scoreless innings in a splendid performance out of the bullpen I was trying to get as much as I could out of him, Bochy said. Just six days removed from throwing the first no-no in Nationals history, Zimmermann yielded just three hits and retired 20 straight hitters before being lifted after walking Joe Panik with two outs in the fateful ninth. Drew Storen promptly allowed a single to Buster Posey, then Sandoval followed with a double to score Panik with the tying run. Posey actually raced home on the play only to be thrown at home on a play that was confirmed via replay review. The Nats had their way with the Giants in the regular season, taking five out of seven games. TSNs Game Notes: * Madison Bumgarner has pitched 16 straight scoreless innings in the postseason, 4th-most in franchise history. In his last start a€“ a win over the Pirates in the NL Wild Card game, Bumgarner became just the third pitcher in postseason history to throw a shutout with double-digit strikeouts in a winner-take-all game (Justin Verlander, Sandy Koufax). * The Giants are heading home with their ace on the mound, but hes been a much better pitcher on the road this season. Madison Bumgarner This Season a€“ Including Postseason Home Road W-L 7-6 12-4 ERA 4.03 2.07 WHIP 1.24 0.95 Opp BA .260 .218 K/BB 4.2 6.4 * The Nationals are trying to stay alive to win a postseason series for the first time since the 1981 Montreal Expos beat the Phillies in the NLDS. * Washingtons Doug Fister finished the regular season strong, going 4-0 with a 1.26 ERA over his last 4 starts. Cheap Casey Dunn Jersey .com) - The Toronto Blue Jays will look to snap a three-game skid Friday night when they continue their road trip in the opener of a three-game set against the Cincinnati Reds at Great American Ball Park. Cheap Caleb Brantley Jersey . The Padres made the moves before Fridays game at Washington. They promoted infielder Jace Peterson from Double-A San Antonio and right-hander Kevin Quackenbush from Triple-A El Paso. http://www.cheapredskinsjerseyssale.com/?tag=mason-foster-jersey-sale . McCutchen hit his first home run in over a month, doubled twice and scored two runs to help the Pirates beat the Los Angeles Dodgers 5-3 on Sunday and take three of four from the defending NL West champions.TORONTO – High above the ice, while practice took place on Thursday afternoon in Toronto, stood Maple Leafs general manager Dave Nonis. He watched his team work through various drills, hash out lingering points of confusion and prepare for the latest biggest game of the year - a Friday clash with the Philadelphia Flyers. Nonis can do nothing, however, to affect the fortunes of his skidding team at this very late stage in the season, one tumbling precariously close to another late-season collapse. "Eight games left," said Phil Kessel, shortly before departure to Philadelphia. "Weve got to win some games and get in the playoffs here." "This is desperation time," Nazem Kadri added. "Were playing for our lives, so weve got to go start acting like it." It was exactly two years ago that the 18-wheeler of 2012 officially crashed for good. Losing for a stunning 19th time in 24 games against the Carolina Hurricanes on a late March night, the Leafs were eliminated from the postseason, the culmination of an epic unraveling that would cost Ron Wilson his job. Can they avoid a similar and yet perhaps more stinging fate this time around? The thought would have been almost unthinkable only two weeks earlier, but with six straight losses - all in regulation - and not a single point gained, the Leafs are indeed facing that reality. With a blink or two of the eye, theyve been passed by seven teams, now trailing the Detroit Red Wings and Columbus Blue Jackets for the final two wild card positions, and are in danger of fumbling away a second-straight trip to the postseason. Aspirations of capturing second spot in the Atlantic Division and home-ice advantage in the first round have been replaced by simply making it outright. The shift has been stunning. "I know right now it seems like were at a low point, but we will come through it," said captain Dion Phaneuf, speaking after a near 90-minute practice in Toronto, his performance and subsequent absence afterward a point of much consternation just a couple days earlier. "Im not going to stand here and say that weve played well. We havent. We havent won games, but theres been stretches that weve done some good things, we just havent found a way to win a game and were going to have to do that Friday." The pressure to do so has never been higher. At some point, the pit of despair becomes just too deep to dig out of, the snowball too large to stop from rolling. That was the case for the club in 2012. Cheap DaRon Payne Jersey. Four straight early February losses rapidly morphed into nine of 10, a souring fan-base and the sudden dismissal of Wilson. Things would get no better in the early days of Carlyles tenure with 10 more losses in the next 14 games, including the aforementioned knockout blow on March 27. "Theres pressure in any situation like this," said Kessel, "[but] weve just got to bounce back. If we can get a couple wins here, it would be positive for our group. Weve just got to keep going then." Fear of it all slipping away has seemingly seeped in. Head coach Randy Carlyle observed "tenseness" in the early stages of Tuesdays loss to St. Louis, pushing his club to be more assertive against Philadelphia, currently third in the Metropolitan Division - three points ahead of Toronto. "If youre going to stand there and youre in a street fight and youre not going to move, youre going to allow somebody to swing away, youre going to get hit," said Carlyle. "But if you move and try to avoid the hit and do what you do youre not going to get hit as many times, simple as that." Starts have become the most obvious foe to success during the two-week slide, early and often deep deficits too much to overcome. "So we have to move ourselves," said Carlyle. "We have to move our feet, we have to continue to move the puck effectively, we have to skate … Those are the things that we have to correct and we have to correct it for [Friday] night." "Were starting the games terrible," Kessel said. "Were getting down a couple goals. Theyre out-playing us the first half of the game and then all of a sudden we wake up and we come [back] and its just too late." The same could be said of their playoff fortunes. A collapse under these circumstances might pale in comparison to 2012, given their comfortable state with just weeks to go - they were up three points on the Montreal Canadiens and Tampa Bay Lightning as recently as two weeks ago, now trailing both by a wide margin - and the heightened expectations of a club seemingly on the rise. Its a sting they wont want to experience again. "It snowballed on us," Phaneuf said after that season-sealing loss to Carolina two years ago. "We lost a lot of tight games and we just could not recover or find a way out of it as a group." Will they this time around time around? The answer will come soon enough. Cheap Adidas Hockey Jerseys Wholesale College Jerseys Cheap Nike Basketball Jerseys Cheap Football Jerseys Free Shipping Cheap Baseball Jerseys Cheap Jerseys Free Shipping Cheap Jerseys From China Wholesale Nike NFL Jerseys Cheap NFL Jerseys China Wholesale Nike NBA Jerseys Cheap NHL Jerseys Authentic Cheap MLB Jerseys Authentic Wholesale Soccer Jerseys China Cheap NCAA Jerseys China Stitched NFL Jerseys Cheap Custom Jerseys China Cheap Basketball Jerseys Authentic NFL Jerseys China Cheap College Jerseys Wholesale Football Jerseys ' ' '