2016 NLDS Game 5 vs. Chicago Cubs

Lore & Background

The 2016 Nationals entered the postseason as the NL East champions with 95 wins, carrying the momentum of a season that felt like it was finally putting the 2014 NLDS loss to the Giants to bed. Home-field advantage sat with Chicago, meaning the series would end at Wrigley Field if it went the distance—and it did. The first four games were a back-and-forth slugfest that kept both fanbases on edge. By the time Game 5 arrived, the Nationals were one loss from elimination. Bryce Harper, the reigning 2015 MVP and the face of the franchise, answered with a two-homer outburst that became one of the most iconic individual performances in the team's short modern history. Yet baseball is a team sport, and the Cubs' depth—behind a rotation and bullpen that would go on to win the World Series—proved too much in the end. In the broader sweep of Nationals lore, Game 5 of 2016 occupies a place alongside the 2014 NLDS loss and the 2019 Wild Card win (followed by a World Series championship): a moment where the ceiling felt within reach and the floor caught them just short. It is the game fans replay mentally every October, the 'what if' that haunts the franchise's identity as a team perpetually one step away from the summit.

In Their Own Story

The August wind off the lake cuts through the Wrigley Field crowd in a way that makes the noise feel muffled, like the whole city is holding its breath behind glass. Harper steps into the box, the crack of the bat echoing off the ivy-covered brick, and for a moment the Nationals' blue and red banner in the stands seems to glow. The ball sails over the left-field seats and the roar from the visiting section is a single, sustained chord. He does it again. And again. Three times the diamond looks the same, but everything has changed. The Cubs' dugout is quiet, calculating. The Nationals' bench is electric, almost delirious. But the game doesn't end there. The next three outs belong to Chicago, and the Wrigley crowd swells into a wall of sound that swallows the Nationals' celebration whole. In the tunnel, the silence is louder than any cheer ever was.

Reader's Guide

With the Cubs holding home-field advantage, Game 5 landed at Wrigley Field, and the stakes could not have been higher: one more loss and the Nationals' season was over. Bryce Harper delivered a three-home-run performance, one of the most memorable individual outings in the franchise's postseason history. The Nationals' offense roared, and for stretches of the game the capital's fans in the upper deck believed the upset was within reach. But the Cubs' pitching and overall depth carried them to the win, closing the series 3-2. Chicago advanced to the NLCS and, ultimately, to the World Series title. The game is remembered not just for the result but for the feeling it left behind. It crystallized the Nationals' identity in the 2010s: a team that could compete with anyone, that could produce legendary individual moments, yet kept falling one game short of the championship stage. For fans who followed the club through the 2012, 2014, and 2016 runs, Wrigley Field in 2016 became a pilgrimage site of 'almost'—the place where the dream kept breaking just before it landed.

Did You Know?

• Bryce Harper hit two home runs in Game 5, one of the few multi-homer games in the Nationals' short postseason history.
• This was the first time the Nationals and Cubs met in the postseason; their regular-season rivalry in 2016 had already produced several high-scoring, dramatic games.