James Wood just delivered one of the rarest plays in baseball, and he did it against the New York Mets in the kind of comeback win that defines a season. The Washington Nationals outfielder hit an inside-the-park grand slam Tuesday night, the first by any player in Major League Baseball since 2022, and sparked a 9-6 win that pulled Washington out of an early 5-0 hole.
It happened in the bottom of the second inning. The Nationals had loaded the bases with two outs against Mets right-hander Nolan McLean. Wood worked the count, got a sweeper over the heart of the plate, and crushed it to deep left-center field at Nationals Park. Mets left fielder Nick Morabito made a leaping attempt at the wall and got a glove on it. The ball ricocheted off the glove, off the wall, and bounced into the gap.
That was Wood’s cue. He had already turned on the jets out of the box, and once he saw the ball get away from Morabito, he never let up. He flew around first, second, and third, and made a head-first slide into home plate, beating the relay throw by a step. Bases cleared. Nationals score four. The game completely changed.
Wood became the first player to hit an inside-the-park grand slam since Raimel Tapia pulled it off for the Toronto Blue Jays at Fenway Park on July 22, 2022. Wood is also just the 26th player in the divisional era of MLB, which dates back to 1969, to accomplish the feat. It is the kind of play that sometimes goes years without happening anywhere in the league.
The 23-year-old has been the best story in Washington baseball all season. He is leading the entire major leagues in runs scored. He has been the engine of a Nationals lineup that finally looks like it has some pieces around their young core. He has emerged as the kind of player teams build around for the next decade, and the inside-the-park grand slam is just the latest highlight in a season that has been full of them.
The Mets are the bigger story coming out of this game, though. Two outfielders. One ball. Multiple defensive miscommunications. Morabito made the initial leap, and when he came down, the other outfielders were not in position to back up the play. The ball ended up rolling untouched while Wood rounded the bases.
This is not the first defensive lapse New York has had this season. The Mets came into Tuesday’s game with one of the worst outfield defensive metrics in the National League. They have made multiple highlight-reel level miscues in the field over the last month. The pitching staff has held up well, but the defense behind them is starting to drag down the entire team.
For the Nationals, this was a statement win. They were down 5-0 in the second inning. They could have folded. Instead, Wood’s slam ignited a lineup that scored nine unanswered runs and reminded the league that Washington is not the easy out it used to be. The Nationals are a team to watch. They have young talent, they have momentum, and they have a clubhouse that seems to believe in what they are building.
Wood is the most exciting player on the roster. At 6-foot-7, he is one of the largest hitters in the major leagues. He combines power with surprising speed, which is exactly why he was able to circle the bases on the inside-the-park slam. Most players his size could not have made it home on that play. Wood barely broke a sweat.
The replay is going to live on Nationals social media for the rest of the season. The bat flip after contact. The head down running. The slide into home. The dugout exploding. It is the kind of moment a young team needed to remind themselves what they are capable of.
For the Mets, this was the latest piece of evidence that something has to change defensively. For the Nationals, this was confirmation that James Wood is the centerpiece of their next contending team. The play itself was the rarest highlight you can produce in a major league game. Wood made it look easy.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
