Having watched the Washington Nationals in 2013 I am amazed that they are 13-8 in one run games. That gives the indication that I am wrong about them being unable to win close games, but then I look at the schedule and am reminded that most of the one run games they have won shouldn't have been one run games. They won 8-7 against the White Sox on April 9, 7-6 against the Mets on April 20, 5-4 over the Tigers on May 9, and the other day in Cleveland they won 7-6 over the Indians. In each of those games they got out to a big lead, blew it, and then ended up winning a one run game. The close games they are losing are much different.
Go back and think about Jayson Werth swinging 3-0, Soriano blowing a save against the Giants and then Yunesky Maya entering the game, Henry Rodriguez in the tenth inning against the Braves, Fernando Abad Friday night in a tie game with Storen, Soriano, and Krol in the bullpen, and Fernando Abad again in the bottom of the ninth in a tie game last night with Storen and Soriano in the bullpen. From the management to the players this team is playing not to lose. Sunday's day game against the Indians is another perfect example. All they needed was a sac fly or a base hit the other way, but instead they got strikeouts and double play balls. Not one batter just tried to poke the ball the other way. The word hitting gets lost in situational hitting and the Nats can't hit overall, but they all have the talent and the ability to shorten up their swing and try and flare a ball into the outfield.
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The Nationals came in to Philadelphia after having lost 2 of 3 to the Cleveland Indians.The one game the Nationals won against the Indians came on a pair of clutch home runs from Chad Tracy and Anthony Rendon. The Nationals would get a clutch home run to tie the game in the 9th, but ultimately go on to lose as the Phillies walked off in the 9th.
John Lannan was non tendered by the Nationals after the 2012 season and became a free agent. The Phillies picked him up on a $2.5 million deal that included another $2.5 million in incentives. John Lannan made his first ever start against the team that brought him through the big leagues, and he did fairly well. He allowed 2 runs in the 5 innings he pitched and left the game with a 4-2 lead. Lannan allowed the 2 runs in the 1st and 4th innings. Werth picked up an RBI in the 1st inning, then Lombardozzi picked up an RBI as he and Kurt Suzuki hit a pair of doubles. Lannan's final line was 5IP's, 6 hits, 2 runs, 1 BB, and 4K's.
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Call me crazy,
but the Nats (34-34) are showing signs of life and a little consistency. Yes,
they are 3-3 at this point in their road trip, but with the exception of the
awful game pitched by Dan Haren against Colorado, they could as easily been 5-1
if a few things would have gone their way. They are currently sitting 6.5 games
behind the Braves for the lead in the NL East and are back to .500 baseball,
but the games feel different. They are hitting the ball. They are not scoring a
while lot, but they are hitting.
What is the
difference? Anthony Rendon. The guy is hitting .361 in 17 games this season. I
know he has only had 68 plate appearances in his career, but he’s yet to look
overmatched. Since being called back up
for the second time this season, he has hit safely in every game. He has the
longest current hitting streak on the team sitting at ten games. His last two
games have both been three hit games, so he does not seem to be slowing down. This
only makes the decision to sit Rendon for Friday’s opening game against the
Indians even more baffling.
The Nationals
head to Citizens Bank Park for a three game series with the Phillies (33-37).
The Phillies won two out of three against the Nats in their only other series
this season and the teams split the season series last year at nine a piece.
The Phillies’ Michael Young
is two RBI shy of hitting the 1,000 career RBI
mark. There are only 18 active players that have recorded 1,000 or more RBI,
so let’s hope he has to wait until the Phillies next series to join that club.
In injury news,
it looks like
Bryce Harper will start baseball activities after a week of rest
to reduce the effects of his bursitis and could start a rehab game by either
the end of the week or early next week.
Wilson Ramos aggravated his hamstring,
but it is reported that it will only affect his rehab calendar by a day or two
and he might be able to rejoin the team by then end of the month.
Danny
Espinosa has been playing in rehab games in Syracuse for the AAA Chiefs, but
neither Davey or Rizzo has said when he will rejoin the big league club.
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This past week was, how should I put it, middling for our
beloved Washington Nationals, as they went 3-3 while on the road against two
fairly average teams in the Colorado Rockies (37-33) and the Cleveland Indians
(34-34). The Nats were able to take two of three from Colorado despite not swinging
the bats well in situational moments, and they were essentially gifted those
wins thanks to an incredibly fluky Ross Ohlendorf performance on Wednesday
combined with terrible injury luck/bad umpiring to hurt the Rockies on
Thursday. In Cleveland, the Nats were two-hit in game one (scoring their only
run on a wild pitch) and shutout in the final leg. The win they got in
Cleveland came after blowing a five run lead and was secured on an Anthony
Rendon home run that should have not happened if Nick Swisher was competent
defensively. The Nats have not swept a series since they took down the White
Sox in the third series of the season, and their series win in Colorado was
their first road series win since they downed the Pirates in the first weekend
of May. Put simply, their offense continues to struggle in increasingly
embarrassing fashion, and anytime this team seems to gain momentum, they lose
it within the next two games. Still, there is optimism on the horizon, despite
my cynicism. Let’s take a quick look at some observations from the past week,
from the good to the bad to the NL East in general.
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Yesterday the Nats lost a baseball game, and as many would like to point out
they lost this game because of situational hitting. By that most people mean
situational out making. The Nats had three golden opportunities to score runs.
Twice they had first and third with no outs and once the bases loaded and no
outs, and every time the Nats failed to plate even one run. By run expectancy
the number of runs that can be expected to be scored in those situations by an
average MLB offense are 1.6 and 2.2. The Nats however do not have an average
MLB offense. An average MLB offense is hitting .253/.317/.401 and the Nats,
.233/.292/.374. In other words because the Nats aren't even an average hitting
team their run expectancy is going to be lower, but it shouldn't be to a point
where zero is an acceptable or an expected outcome, but like most things in
baseball an average is reached due to extremes more often than consistency.
Most people look at those situations
and blame the Nats poor situational hitting ignoring the fact that most teams
hover right around 50% in scoring runners from third with less than two outs.
The Nats are no different at 46% and while that is second worst in baseball it
isn't that far off from the league average of 50%, and the Nats being sixth
worst in opportunities is far more troubling. No matter how the Nats were doing
in such situations people would take issue and remember the good old days when
teams always scored runners from third with less than two outs. Those days
never existed. The MLB average is always somewhere around 50%, and the
correlation in runs scored is found more with opportunities than it is with the
production in the situation itself. The St. Louis Cardinals are only 2% better at
plating a runner from third with less than two outs than the Nationals, but
they have scored over one and a half more runs per game, but have had 38 more
base runners on third with less than two outs.
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The Nationals are currently sitting at 34-34, something that seemed
unfathomable at the beginning of what seemed to be a promising season. Much has
been written about what some perceives the Nationals problems to be: errors,
Danny Espinosa, Zach Duke and offensive ineptitude to name a few. Something
that has been mentioned, but not truly quantified or comprehended, is how much
the time missed by Ryan Zimmerman and Bryce Harper due to injuries has affected
their fortunes this season.
The Nationals' longest losing streak
this season is four games. They have accomplished this twice. The first time
after Zimmerman went on the DL, the second time after Harper injured himself in
Los Angeles. The Nationals longest winning streak is five games. This occurred
the day after Zimmerman returned from the DL, one of the few times both were in
the lineup together this year. Just from a general perspective we can already
see what these two mean to the team.
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by: Andrea Borrelli
The Nationals power hitters came to play Saturday and
supported a strong start by Jordan Zimmermann. In what has become commonplace for
the Nats so far this season the lead was squandered and the Nationals had to
fight to pull out a 7-6 win.
The game looked like it might be a stress-free when Ryan
Zimmerman and Jason Werth hit two back-to-back home runs in the first and Ian
Desmond smashed a solo shot in the second. The top of the third brought two
more runs, including Zimmerman coming home on a wild pitch, bringing the score
to 5-0. Indians’ starting pitcher, Scott Kazmir, ended up being pulled after
two and two thirds innings and 75 pitches.
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The Nationals wasted a great start by Gio Gonzalez by getting nothing
going offensively and the Cleveland Indians walked off with a 2-1 win
in the first game of a three game set.
The winning run came in
the bottom of the ninth inning. Fernando Abad got Mike Aviles to line
out for the first out of the inning but then ran into trouble. Drew
Stubbs singled to right and then advanced to third on a perfectly
executed hit and run with Micheal Bourn.
With
the winning run just 90 feet away and only one out the Nats gave up the
double play opportunity when Bourn swiped second. They elected to pitch
to left-handed hitter Jason Kipnis anyways to get the lefty-lefty
match-up with Abad. Kipnis hit weakly to first, but that was enough for
the speedy Stubbs who slid in under Kurt Suzuki's tag to end the game.
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Last week, I took a look at the
Nats' 2nd round pick, RHP Jake Johansen of Dallas Baptist University. I
was not incredibly pleased with the idea of taking a guy with bad
control issues with the team's first pick, figuring that he could have
been there in the 3rd round or later as well. At least the Nats got him
signed and ready to have his 99 mph fastball coached.
As
of yesterday, Baseball America has reported the signings of Johansen,
Gunter, Yezzo, Napoli, Joyce and Middleton. Currently, the Nationals'
picks are $418,900 under budget (thanks to signing the five round 6-10
guys to under-slot deals). Voth should sign for around slot money, so I
would expect for the Nats to offer Drew Ward around $800,000 and Nick
Pivetta around $475,000, give or take a bit. The Nats have a chance at
signing their top 25 picks (all college and junior college players
besides Drew Ward).
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The Cleveland Indians were one of baseball’s biggest
surprises through late May, using a strong
offense, decent starting pitching, and a good bullpen to record a 26-17
record at the 43-game mark of the season.
Although Cleveland has struggled since – the Indians have
gone 6-16 over the past 22 games, mostly due to their offense slowing
down –, the team’s season has still been fairly successful for a team with modest
expectations coming into the season.
Much of the Indians’ success is due in large part to shrewd
moves made in the offseason, mitigating the loss of Shin-Soo Choo by
acquiring Nick Swisher, Michael Bourn, and Mark Reynolds via free agency and
Drew Stubbs and a few solid bullpen arms via trade.
The cost-benefit analysis and marginal upgrades behind the
acquisitions of Swisher and Bourn, upon reflection, deserve particular praise.
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One of the biggest stories coming into this season was who would the Nats sixth starter be. Who would they use if injuries occurred or a fill in was needed? First it was Zach Duke, and he was horrible. Then it was Nathan Karns, and he didn't look ready for the majors. And finally it was Ross Ohlendorf and while he wasn't supremely impressive he got the job done. The Nats pitching depth in the upper minors is still a question mark. Ohlendorf was good in one start, but that won't likely last, Karns had his moments in his starts but a 25 year old two pitch pitcher at AA is more likely a future reliever than anything else, Chris Young has struggled at AAA, and the Nats don't believe that Danny Rosenbaum's stuff can get major league hitters out.
Hopefully the only thing that let's one of these pitchers back into the majors is a rain delay and the Nats deal with no more injuries to their top four. If Haren continues to struggle the Nats are just a little over a month from the trade deadline and that issue will be solved that way, and while that may fix the fifth starters spot for next season it most likely won't. The Nats don't have the major league ready prospects to make a trade for a top of the line starter like Justin Masterson or the Philies Cliff Lee. Any trade the Nats make is more likely to bring back a more traditional back of the rotation type unless they take on someone else's big contract mistake.
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The Nats
got a much needed win against the Colorado Rockies this afternoon, winning 5-4
in a wild rubber match that brings the Nationals above .500 (33-32) for the
first time since May 29th. With the win, Washington successfully
took two of three on the road against a tough hitting lineup at the hitters
friendly ballpark of Coors Field, and have shrunk the Braves’ NL East lead to
5.5 games. Let’s take a closer look at how the Nats got it done.
The Nats welcomed Ross Detwiler back
to the hill, making his return to the five man rotation after being sidelined since
May 15th with back problems. Yet this game began inauspiciously for the
Rockies. In the bottom of the first, Detwiler’s very first fastball was smashed
into the gap for a double by Dexter Fowler. The next batter, Jordan Pacheco,
fouled off a pitch that hit the Rockies three-hole hitter, Carlos Gonzalez, in
the left foot. He was forced to leave the game and be replaced by Tyler Colvin,
thus removing one of the two most dangerous hitters in the Rockies lineup.
After surrendering the run, Detwiler then hit Dexter Fowler in the third inning
when the leadoff man tried to square around a bunt. It should be noted that
Fowler appeared to lean into the pitch, so the pitch probably should have been
called a strike, but the center fielder was noticeably hurt and ended up
leaving the game in the 4th. In the 4th, Detwiler gave up
a double to Michael Cuddyer, which was then bobbled and poorly fielded by
Jayson Werth in right field, allowing Rockies shortstop Troy Tulowitzki to
score all the way from first. Cuddyer was then plated by Wilton Rosario one out
later. Detwiler was only able to go one more inning before surrendering the
game to long reliever Craig Stammen. Det’s final line: 5 innings, 6 hits, 3 ER,
2 SO’s. Not great, not terrible, but good enough to keep the Nats in the game.
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With their 5-1 win last night the Nats got back to .500 and are now six
games behind the Braves. If the Braves play .500 baseball from now until the
end of the season they will finish with 87 wins, and if they play at their
current pace of .591 ball they will finish with 96 wins. The Nats have some
control over that as they have nine games head to head against the Braves left
on the schedule, but even that amount of control is minimal. The Nats need to
not focus on making the playoffs and more on winning series. The odds are that
one of the teams in front of them, be it the Braves, Rockies, Giants,
Diamondbacks, Reds, or Pirates, will fall off. The Nats need to focus instead
and controlling what they can control. They need to win the series they play
and claw their way to 90 wins by the end of the season.
Doing that is easier said than done. At
32-32 with 98 games left to play the Nats need to go 60-38 or play .612 ball.
Over the course of a 162 game season that is a 99 win pace. And while that
isn't easy to do in three and a half months’ time it is a lot easier to do that
in 98 games than it is over the course of 162. The Nationals need a few things
to start going right. Most importantly they need to offense to pick up.
Remember the Nats need to play .612 baseball over the next 98 games. What they
have done in the first 64 doesn't matter that much. They can't go back and win
those games, they can't change the run differential that was, nor go back and
take out Danny Espinosa for Rendon sooner or keep Harper from running into the
wall in LA. The Nats are helpless to change the past, but the future is in
their hands.
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When the Nationals signed Rafael Soriano this offseason it supposedly set up
a nigh unbeatable triumvirate in the bullpen of Soriano, Drew Storen and Tyler
Clippard. All were elite relievers who had experience closing out games,
combined they would shut down opponents in the later innings.
But that hasn't been the case this
season. All three have had their struggles, but none as much as Storen. Just a
year away from a 43 save season Storen currently has a 4.85 ERA, 4.14 FIP and
1.54 WHIP. While not in the closer role this season Storen already has
three blown saves, just two less than in 2011 when he was the full-time closer.
Storen isn't that bad, his talent was not suddenly stolen away from him by the
aliens of Moron Mountain, so why is he having so much trouble this year?
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For his first game with
the Nationals, Ross Ohlendorf went six innings allowed only one run, two hits,
walked two and struck out two, as the Nationals kept their bats going in a 5-1
victory over the Colorado Rockies.
Ian
Desmond had a great day at the plate and on the field. After a jaw-dropping
diving catch at the bottom of the third, Desmond hit an RBI single in the fourth
batting in Ryan Zimmerman and putting the Nats on the board 1-0.
In the top of the sixth
with two outs, Jeff Kobernus walked followed by Ryan Zimmerman who then hit a
double and batted Kobernus in. Rockies then retired LHP Jorge De La Rosa and
brought in Adam Ottavino. After a ground-out from Jayson Werth(who went 0-5
with a strike out) Ottavino intentionally walked Adam LaRoche. That move proved
fatal to the Rockies as Desmond singled and batted in both Zimmerman and
LaRoche, extending the Nats lead to 4-0.
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