The Nats overall are 8-4 in one run games and that might lead people to
believe that they have done a good job of winning the close ones, and while
they did end up winning yesterday, the way they went about it is not the path
to success. Against Matt Cain and Madison Bumgarner the Nationals scored a
combined three runs. That by itself may not sound good and no one is denying
that the Nats offense has been scuffling, but Matt Cain holds a career 3.35 ERA
and is one of the best pitchers in the NL. Madison Bumgarner is a rising star
and has been the Giants best starter this season and his career 3.17 ERA isn't
too shabby either, and while they Nats struggled to score runs against Cain and
Bumgarner the Giants scored a combined one run against Stephen Strasburg and
Gio Gonzalez. In other words, the Nats starters were just that much better.
In both games the Nats entered the late
innings with a one run lead and handed the ball to a bullpen that was believed
to be one of the best in the NL and in both games the Nats bullpen blew it and
forced the game into extra innings. The Nats ended up splitting these two
games, but they should have won both of them. These
games represent what playoff baseball is like. Whether it is
Strasburg vs. Cain, Gio vs. Bumgarner or Strasburg vs. Cueto, Gio vs. Latos or
Strasburg vs. Wainwright, Gio vs. Miller; if the Nats starters out-duel the
other team’s top pitchers they have to win the game. This is how the Nats are
ultimately going to win a World Series. While the lack of offense and ability
to score runs is very alarming the more alarming aspect of these last two games
was the Nats inability to close out games, and this isn't the first time it has
happened this season.
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From top to bottom the Washington
Nationals organization is slumping. The offense is OPSing a collective .656
better than only the Marlins, the manager continues to put useless offensive
player after useless offensive player in the two-hole, one of the most
important parts of the line-up, and the general manager is now calling up
useless relievers just in case Stephen Strasburg fails to go four innings. That
last one is the most puzzling. The general manager of the Nationals is betting
against his Ace starting pitcher.
The move to bring up Maya as the
eighth reliever makes some sense with every other reliever except the
recently called-up Abad, Storen, Clippard, and Soriano available if a lesser
pitcher known to struggle for five innings were on the mound, but they aren't.
Stephen Strasburg is pitching tonight and so far this season he has averaged
6.33 innings a start and has failed to get through the fifth innings twice. Now
if he goes six and the Nats use Clippard, Storen, and Soriano to finish out the
game they then have Gio Gonzalez on the mound tomorrow. Both Strasburg and Gio
are fully capable of giving the Nationals seven strong innings and good major
league relievers, like Storen, Clippard, and Soriano are, should be able to
pitch two days in a row. Thursday is then an off day followed by Jordan
Zimmermann who is averaging over seven innings a start. If the Nats want to
rest the bullpen then let Strasburg and Gio pitch, followed by an off-day, and
then have Jordan Zimmermann go on Friday.
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By now everyone knows there is a problem with Danny Espinosa. Major league
baseball players don't perform to a .212 wOBA unless there is something wrong,
and before the season Espinosa told everyone what was wrong. Sometime last
September he completely tore the rotator cuff off the bone. Instead of going
for a surgery that would have held him out until June he opted to try and
strengthen the muscles around it and play through it. It hasn't worked, but
Danny Espinosa isn't going to admit that it is a problem with his shoulder, and
there is a chance that their isn't, but when a player is pulling off of
fastballs down the middle and can't ever get the barrel to the ball there are
physical issues.
The bigger issue is the reason Espinosa
is playing through this injury. He is doing it in order to keep his job, but
instead he has played himself into a position to lose his job. This
situation isn't without solutions and some of them are even within the organization.
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If you are in any way like me and came of age in the 90's or are younger and
happen to like retro video games then you will remember games such as
Castlevania, and if you haven't played it stop reading this and go do so now.
Furthermore if you only have time for one Castlevania game it should be
Symphony of the Night. If you are still reading I am going to assume you have
played a Castlevania game and if the only one you have played was Castlevania
64 that you are a pathetic individual. Rebuilding the rails here the point is those
games were built around boss fights. Every level ended with a giant boss and
for Simon or Alucard or whoever the main character was each boss presented a
new challenge and had to be defeated in a unique manner.
Most of the Castlevania games, and all of
the good ones, came out in a time before AI and so the boss fights were
essentially giant puzzles. There was a pattern to how to win and the best
Castlevania games combined the platforming and action elements of the game
perfectly in its best boss fights, and every boss fight got more and more
difficult. Boss fights were always filled with frustration while trying to
figure out the pattern and once you did they still weren't easy. There was
nothing better than the sense of relief at landing the killing blow with one
bar of health left. The worst thing about all these boss fights is that you
always had to do them again. Near the end of the game there was always a stage
that was nothing but the previous boss fights, and that is what Stephen
Strasburg overcame last evening.
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In this week's guest blog I focus on the Nationals awful production from the important line-up spot, how much they miss Werth, and how Suzuki is the best option currently on the roster. Read all about it here.
I can't tell you the last time I really listened to music for a sustained
period of time. Every time I get into my car the radio is either on the local
sports talk shows or MLB Network Radio on XM. I spend a lot of time in my car
during the day and therefore listen to a lot of talk radio, and when it is the
local stations I blow a gasket at least once per listen and just turn the radio
off. I had one of those moments yesterday but it inspired me.
The main complaint of the host was that
the Nats weren't scoring enough runs in their past twenty games. This was
before last night's game so it only includes the Cardinals, Reds, Braves,
Pirates, Tigers, and Cubs, but all those teams have something in common. Each
and every one of them are in the top half of MLB in starting pitcher ERA, and
if you've paid any attention to what the Cardinals are doing it is nothing
short of amazing. The Nats over their last twenty games faced lots and lots of
good starting pitching, and had issues for most of them in getting the offense
going. They were also missing Ryan Zimmerman for most of those games and Bryce
Harper has fallen into a mild May slump with a .255 wOBA for the month.
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Something funny happened after the Nats loss to AJ Burnett. Davey Johnson
decided to hold a team meeting one day after Ryan Zimmerman returned to the
line-up. It should come as no surprise that over the last week Ryan Zimmerman
has been one of the top producing regulars and while his .353 wOBA is well
above league average it isn't quite up to Ryan Zimmerman standards, but it is
much better than what the Nats were getting from his replacements. The other
good news for the Nats offense is that Adam LaRoche has started to hit, and
even more importantly several Nats have started to get on base.
Everything isn't going quite like
clockwork. Bryce Harper has fallen into a bit of a mini slump. He is still
getting on base by drawing walks but he isn't hitting the ball the way he was
in April. That will come around, and hopefully it isn't when the rest of the
line-up goes back to sleep. There will be a period of time this season where
everyone is clicking all at once on offense and that will be a good week or two
for the Nationals, but most of the time one or two guys will be hot, and that
is where the importance of line-up depth and having all the regulars in the
line-up comes in.
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When the Nats signed Rafael Soriano it was met with mixed reaction. Stats
don't back up the need for a lock down closer. When leading heading into the
ninth baseball teams have a greater than a 90% chance to win that game, and
that is right around where the Nationals have been this season. The current MLB
average win percentage with a lead heading into the ninth is 94.9% and the
Nationals are at 94.7%. That misses quite a bit of the nuisances of
the Nationals bullpen this season and why even as an overpay paying for the
marginal wins Soriano has provided was worth it.
Imagine the Nats bullpen without
Soriano. Think back to Game 5 and who it was standing on the mound and Descalso
first tied the game and Pete Kozma drove in the go ahead runs. Think about the
image of Drew Storen sitting in front of his locker staring in horror at the
ground. Now fast forward to 2013 and look at Clippard and Storen. Neither
pitcher is pitching like they have in the past. Clippard is walking
an astronomically high 6.8 per nine and Storen is giving up a too
high for a reliever 1.5 HR/9. Both have struggled at times and in his one
chance to close out a ball game Storen blew it. No one has made a big deal of
the mild struggles of Storen and Clippard, but imagine if the Nats didn't have
Soriano. Imagine all the columns being written with the focus being on Game 5
and the mental state of Drew Storen. All the columns on if Storen truly has a
closer's mentality and all that other nonsense.
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There are moments when observing the game of baseball when you realize that someone is so good at playing it that just watching them exist brings pleasure. Last evening I had that type of moment with Miguel Cabrera. For years Cabrera was one of the more under appreciated players in baseball. That could be because for many of those seasons he was the second best playing in baseball to only Albert Pujols and last season he was the second best player to Mike Trout, but in winning the Triple Crown and MVP things have changed. There is now attention on Miguel Cabrera like there never has been before, but the pleasure from watching him doesn't come from any type of spectacular feats. It simply comes from watching him work.
His at bats last evening went like this. He first came to the plate with a runner on first and one out facing Jordan Zimmermann, a pitcher who has been equally under appreciated and just as enjoyable to watch. The battle went like this. Fastball hit foul, fastball ball, slider ball, fastball foul, then on the fifth pitch of the at bat with the count even Cabrera got another fastball and drilled it. A sharply hit line drive right at Nationals short stop Ian Desmond. Five pitches and a sharply hit line drive. That is a good at bat even if the result was a double play.
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My guest post on MASNsports.com this week looks at how Strasburg has pitched so far this season and why his approach vs. the Pirates will ultimately yield good results.
The Nats have never been good
with PR. Just look at how they went about the Metro situation last
season. The Nats decision to not offer refunds are exchanges for rain
delayed games is another episode in a long history of the Nats PR
struggles. The no refunds part is easy to understand. No one offers
refunds for tickets. It has been on every single ticket I have ever
gotten from Ticketmaster, Tickets.com, and Live Nation (while they still
existed). No refunds is obvious, but it is the exchanges part people
have an issue with.
Up until
this season Nats fans could exchange tickets of rain delayed games for
most mid-week games and some weekend games not labeled as premium or
prime or whatever they called it. Now the Nats are not offering
anything. First it is important to understand that this is an area
deathly afraid of rain. As soon as one drop of water hits the pavement
people are rushing to the grocery store to fill carts with milk, bread,
and toilet paper. With this in mind if there is even one cumulus cloud
in the sky walk-up sales are going to drop off the table and places like
StubHub will be flooded with people desperate to move tickets to a game
they are certain will be rained out.
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The Marlins have a long history of getting rid of players that are about to
make a lot of money. It wasn't that long ago that the Marlins were a promising
young team with Miguel Cabrera, Josh Willingham, Dan Uggla, and
Hanley Ramirez. They have all since been traded away for pennies on the
dollar, and the Marlins are now the Marlins. It is certain that some of the
players they acquired in their most recent fire sale will have decent
major league careers, but then the Marlins will repeat the process all over
again.
Miguel
Cabrera was a rookie in 2003 and thus survived the fire sale that preceded
that, but as he approached the age of 25 as one of the best players in baseball
the Marlins knew they weren't going to be able to afford him. They started
shopping him and as everyone knew the price for a 24 year old with a career
.313/.388/.542 batting line was high, but the Marlins are the Marlins and their
main goal in trading a player isn't to get value, but to fill their coffers.
The trade looked good at first. Cameron Maybin was thought to be a five tool
center field prospect and Andrew Miller a future left handed Ace. No matter
those players’ ceilings or what they could be they weren't Miguel Cabrera.
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After winning games by the score of 5-4 and 6-2 there are suddenly stories about how the Nats offense has awakened. There will be those that want to credit the team meeting that Davey Johnson called for before the Nats game Saturday against the Pirates and then there will be those that want to credit the return of Ryan Zimmerman to the line-up. The latter is more apt than the former, but I have a different theory.
In their previous twelve games starting with the St. Louis series and ending with the loss to AJ Burnett the Nats averaged 2.5 runs a game, but they also faced starting pitching with an average 2013 ERA of 3.25. The average starting pitcher goes just about 6 1/3 innings a start and that converts to 2.3 runs allowed, or almost the exact amount the Nationals scored during that time frame. The three pitchers that they hit well in that time frame, Arroyo, Leake, Teheran, also happen to be the worst of the twelve starters the Nats faced in that time frame. The answer to why the Nats offense woke up may having nothing to do with the Nationals at all, but with the quality of the starting pitching they are facing.
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Jordan Zimmermann came to the Nationals in a somewhat unusual fashion. Not unusual in any interesting or meaningful way but only in the amount of anger that was caused that the Nationals decided to take the draft picks from losing Alfonso Soriano to free agency then by trading him at the deadline for prospects. There was the thought that closer to major league prospects would have been better than high end draft picks, and in the case of Josh Smoker that may have been the case, but with the second pick the Nats acquired from the Cubs they took a division III pitcher from the University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point. What attracted them to this pitcher was his overall toughness. The main highlight video that surfaced was of him pitching in the snow with his jaw wired shut. The Nationals believed it was that type of bulldog mentality that top of the rotation starters are made out of.
There was a time, before Stephen Strasburg, before Gio Gonzalez, when Jordan Zimmermann was going to be the Ace of the Nationals. It wasn't that long ago really. Zimmermann didn't make very many starts in the minors in 2009, the year he was called up, but in 2008 he was dominant. He started 24 games finishing the season at AA Harrisburg and with a 2.89 ERA, 9.0 K/9, and 3.2 BB/9. It was a showing that got many Nationals fans excited and when he debuted in the majors in 2009 he was off to a promising start pitching to a relatively high 4.63 ERA, but that will happen when your middle infield is made up of Cristian Guzman and Ronnie Belliard. Jordan Zimmermann pitched well that season striking out 9.1 per nine innings and walking a paltry 2.9. Then it happened. Jordan Zimmermann felt tightness in his elbow, and that was all it was thought to be, but it never cleared up, and turned out his UCL was damaged.
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There are a lot of teams in the history of baseball that have had poor Aprils and then have gone on to make the playoffs. Some of those teams had outside forces or prospects help them and some just started playing better. The former isn't much of an option for the Nationals, but the latter is. The downside to having a roster built to win for the long-haul is when that roster under performs changes aren't easy to make. The Nats biggest offensive issue is the lack of production from the middle of the order. No, check that. The biggest offensive issue is from everyone in the line-up who isn't Bryce Harper. The only two line-up spots the Nats are getting above a .700 OPS from is third and eighth and only from eighth because there is no reason to pitch to the Nats number eight hitters with the pitcher on deck and no one on base.
Without Ryan Zimmerman the line-up has become a discombobulated mess. Werth was moved out of the number two spot and now that line-up spot is worth a paltry .576 OPS. The Nats are stuck in a position waiting for the players they have to play like the talents they can be. There is really nothing else to do. The strength of the Nationals was thought to be how well the roster was set-up not just for 2013, but for the years to come, and now that is turning into a weakness. If LaRoche were only on a one year deal it would be no big deal to platoon him with Tyler Moore or sit him on the bench so that the Nats can get something better than a .500 OPS from the most important offensive positions. Under the two year deal that isn't much of an option as LaRoche is here this season and next and it is too early to say he is a complete waste and buy out his deal like the Mets did with Jason Bay.
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