MLB.com asks the following question: how can Cristian Guzman be hitting so badly?
Are you kidding? It should be obvious even to a novice why Guzman isn't hitting. He lunges at most every ball, completely forgetting that he should plant and then turn on his back foot. The most Guzman can do is slap at the ball, meaning that even when he makes contact he looks like he's playing badminton.
Question: how many other major league hitters do you mistake for a badminton player?
Precisely our point.
Wednesday, August 31, 2005
Where have you gone, Esteban Loaiza?!
Seven hits, four walks, and five runs. That's a far cry from the Esteban Loaiza who looked so good for much of the season. Loaiza was pedestrian or worse today as he dug a deep hole for the Nationals, giving up three runs in the first and two in the fifth. Three runs tends to be a tough deficit for the Nationals; five tends to be insurmountable. Frank Robinson can't pull a starter in the third inning every time he gets in trouble, but Loaiza sure looked like he didn't have his best stuff today.
The offense was good enough to tie the game 3-3 in the top of the fifth. There was, of course, the obligatory blown opportunity. In the bottom of the first the Nationals had the bases loaded with only one out. Having already scored one run, this was a great opportunity for a big inning. Forget the big inning, all the Nationals needed was a fly ball to score one more run. Unfortunately, the Nationals have two guys in their lineup named Preston Wilson and Vinny Castilla, and both of them came up with the bases loaded. Wilson popped out to the shortstop, and Castilla grounded out to the pitcher. That, dear readers, is called a pathetic display of hitting.
Two more runs would have been nice, especially since the Braves scored two runs after the Nats tied it in the top of the fifth. With one out, Ryan Langerhans doubled, Marcus Giles walked, and Chipper Jones singled to load the bases. This would have been a good time to pull Loaiza, but Frank Robinson had other ideas. Andruw Jones, who homered in the first, singled to score two. Loaiza made the long walk to the dugout, but it was too late. It was 5-3, and the Nats were done.
The lesson here is that the Nats can't afford to give up five runs and expect to win the game. Let's hope that Livan Hernandez does better in the second game. We really can't afford another loss tonight.
The offense was good enough to tie the game 3-3 in the top of the fifth. There was, of course, the obligatory blown opportunity. In the bottom of the first the Nationals had the bases loaded with only one out. Having already scored one run, this was a great opportunity for a big inning. Forget the big inning, all the Nationals needed was a fly ball to score one more run. Unfortunately, the Nationals have two guys in their lineup named Preston Wilson and Vinny Castilla, and both of them came up with the bases loaded. Wilson popped out to the shortstop, and Castilla grounded out to the pitcher. That, dear readers, is called a pathetic display of hitting.
Two more runs would have been nice, especially since the Braves scored two runs after the Nats tied it in the top of the fifth. With one out, Ryan Langerhans doubled, Marcus Giles walked, and Chipper Jones singled to load the bases. This would have been a good time to pull Loaiza, but Frank Robinson had other ideas. Andruw Jones, who homered in the first, singled to score two. Loaiza made the long walk to the dugout, but it was too late. It was 5-3, and the Nats were done.
The lesson here is that the Nats can't afford to give up five runs and expect to win the game. Let's hope that Livan Hernandez does better in the second game. We really can't afford another loss tonight.
Tonight's Games
Tonight's first game.
We really need the pitching staff that has been the bedrock of our team to lead the way tonight. If the Nationals are to win the Wild Card Race (we never know whether to capitalize those words) their starting pitching staff will have to pitch well. The Nationals don't hit well enough to come back from big deficits, and, as much as we think the Deivi Cruz deal was a good trade, that's not going to change. So the starters will have to pitch deep into most games and give up no more than 2-3 runs, preferably 2.
Esteban Loiza and Livan Hernandez pitch tonight for the Nationals. Each has played a big part in the team's success, but each has faltered somewhat down the stretch. We need them to pitch like they did in the first half and to quiet the Braves' offense. Let's hope for a return to form.
The lineup for the first game isn't pretty. Marlon Byrd leads off, he of the .588 OPS and -4.9 VORP. We'll have to live with Cristian Guzman for a bit longer because he's starting tonight. It will be nice to have a regular shortstop with a positive VORP as opposed to one who excels at ending an inning. To make matters worse, Gary Bennett is starting the first game at catcher. Ugh!
Go Nats!
We really need the pitching staff that has been the bedrock of our team to lead the way tonight. If the Nationals are to win the Wild Card Race (we never know whether to capitalize those words) their starting pitching staff will have to pitch well. The Nationals don't hit well enough to come back from big deficits, and, as much as we think the Deivi Cruz deal was a good trade, that's not going to change. So the starters will have to pitch deep into most games and give up no more than 2-3 runs, preferably 2.
Esteban Loiza and Livan Hernandez pitch tonight for the Nationals. Each has played a big part in the team's success, but each has faltered somewhat down the stretch. We need them to pitch like they did in the first half and to quiet the Braves' offense. Let's hope for a return to form.
The lineup for the first game isn't pretty. Marlon Byrd leads off, he of the .588 OPS and -4.9 VORP. We'll have to live with Cristian Guzman for a bit longer because he's starting tonight. It will be nice to have a regular shortstop with a positive VORP as opposed to one who excels at ending an inning. To make matters worse, Gary Bennett is starting the first game at catcher. Ugh!
Go Nats!
Uh oh
Deivi Cruz is a very similar player to Pat Meares. According to baseball-reference.com, when compared to Cruz, Meares' similarity score is 918.
Meares also has a similarity score that's very close to another National: Cristian Guzman. This is interesting, because in 1999 the Pirates signed a contract with Meares that was just as outrageous as the contract the Nationals signed with Guzman, and the Meares contract was one of the reasons the Pirates fired GM Cam Bonifay. In other words, Jim Bowden didn't learn anything from the Pirates' blunder. Given the similarity of the three players, can a ludicrous long-term contract with Cruz be far away?
Meares also has a similarity score that's very close to another National: Cristian Guzman. This is interesting, because in 1999 the Pirates signed a contract with Meares that was just as outrageous as the contract the Nationals signed with Guzman, and the Meares contract was one of the reasons the Pirates fired GM Cam Bonifay. In other words, Jim Bowden didn't learn anything from the Pirates' blunder. Given the similarity of the three players, can a ludicrous long-term contract with Cruz be far away?
Wild Card Standings
The Wild Card Race has tightened, with five teams being within 1.5 games of each other and four within .5 games. The Nationals are now only 1.5 games out, and they can definitely win it. Go Nats!
| Team | Record | Pct. | GB |
| Philadelphia | 70-62 | .530 | -- |
| Florida | 70-62 | .530 | --- |
| Houston | 69-62 | .527 | .5 |
| New York | 69-62 | .527 | .5 |
| Washington | 68-63 | .519 | 1.5 |
Deivi Cruz: Savior?
We never thought we would say this, but Deivi Cruz is a big upgrade for us. His stats aren't good (.301 OBP, .397 SLG, .698 OPS), but they're much better than Cristian Guzman's stats (.235 OBP, .273 SLG, .508 OPS), which are impossibly bad. Cruz's VORP is only 3.8, but that compares very favorably with Guzman's -19.3.
An increase of almost 200 points in OPS is a serious upgrade, and given that the Nationals aren't giving up much, if anything, to get Cruz and given that Cruz is a free agent after this season, this is a good transaction for Jim Bowden. (Yes, we'll compliment Bowden when a compliment is due.)
An increase of almost 200 points in OPS is a serious upgrade, and given that the Nationals aren't giving up much, if anything, to get Cruz and given that Cruz is a free agent after this season, this is a good transaction for Jim Bowden. (Yes, we'll compliment Bowden when a compliment is due.)
A big victory
Virtually all of the remaining series are big series. We're at the point in the season where the Nationals don't have a big margin for error, so they have to play well over five hundred to have a chance of making the playoffs. That means they have to win most series from here on out. That's going to be hard, because all of the National League East teams are above .500, meaning that the Nationals don't have an easy schedule.
Tuesday's game against the Braves--the best team in the National League East--was a big win under some trying circumstances. When John Patterson left the game with "stomach cramps," we'll admit that we were losing confidence fast. Patterson clearly wasn't his normal self--three walks in 2 2/3 innings--but 6 1/3 innings is a lot to ask of the bullpen. And we know from prior experience that being down 2-0 after three puts an undue strain on the Nationals' offense.
But both the bullpen and the offense came through. Jay Bergmann, Hector Carrasco, Gary Majewski, and Chad Cordero shut down the Braves and kept it a low scoring game, which is what the Nationals need to win. A Jose Guillen solo homer in the fourth cut the lead in half. Bergmann singled to open the fifth (can we put this guy in at shortstop?) and scored on a Jose Vidro double. Because we always want to keep it close, Vidro was thrown out trying to stretch the double into a triple. Nick Johnson then doubled, the Braves intentionally walked Guillen, and Preston Wilson singled in Johnson. On the verge of a very big inning, Schneider flied out.
(Excuse this brief interruption from an otherwise upbeat post, but the fifth inning is a good example of how the Nationals squander opportunities for big innings. If Vidro stays at second, he scores on Johnson's double and the inning ends with the Nationals up 4-2 instead of 3-2. We don't like to fault hitters for failing to get a hit in a single at bat because a hitter isn't going to get on base most of the time, but if Schneider can get on base then the bases are loaded or the Nationals are up 4-2 (5-2 if Vidro had been happy with a double). That creates the potential of a HUGE inning because the Nats would have Vinny Castilla and Cristian Guzman coming up. ... Oh, wait a minute. That doesn't work. Castilla and Guzman are punchless and we can't count on them to do much, if anything, in that situation. Nevermind. Back to the post.)
This is the way the Nationals are going to have to win down the stretch--good pitching, some timely hitting, and winning close games. It's a prescription for agony as every game is a nail biter, but the Nationals can do it, and this has the potential to be a very exciting finish.
Tuesday's game against the Braves--the best team in the National League East--was a big win under some trying circumstances. When John Patterson left the game with "stomach cramps," we'll admit that we were losing confidence fast. Patterson clearly wasn't his normal self--three walks in 2 2/3 innings--but 6 1/3 innings is a lot to ask of the bullpen. And we know from prior experience that being down 2-0 after three puts an undue strain on the Nationals' offense.
But both the bullpen and the offense came through. Jay Bergmann, Hector Carrasco, Gary Majewski, and Chad Cordero shut down the Braves and kept it a low scoring game, which is what the Nationals need to win. A Jose Guillen solo homer in the fourth cut the lead in half. Bergmann singled to open the fifth (can we put this guy in at shortstop?) and scored on a Jose Vidro double. Because we always want to keep it close, Vidro was thrown out trying to stretch the double into a triple. Nick Johnson then doubled, the Braves intentionally walked Guillen, and Preston Wilson singled in Johnson. On the verge of a very big inning, Schneider flied out.
(Excuse this brief interruption from an otherwise upbeat post, but the fifth inning is a good example of how the Nationals squander opportunities for big innings. If Vidro stays at second, he scores on Johnson's double and the inning ends with the Nationals up 4-2 instead of 3-2. We don't like to fault hitters for failing to get a hit in a single at bat because a hitter isn't going to get on base most of the time, but if Schneider can get on base then the bases are loaded or the Nationals are up 4-2 (5-2 if Vidro had been happy with a double). That creates the potential of a HUGE inning because the Nats would have Vinny Castilla and Cristian Guzman coming up. ... Oh, wait a minute. That doesn't work. Castilla and Guzman are punchless and we can't count on them to do much, if anything, in that situation. Nevermind. Back to the post.)
This is the way the Nationals are going to have to win down the stretch--good pitching, some timely hitting, and winning close games. It's a prescription for agony as every game is a nail biter, but the Nationals can do it, and this has the potential to be a very exciting finish.
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
You are correct, Sir!
Embarrassing? Yes. But blaming Tom McGraw for the Nationals' anemic hitting is more than a little unfair. We're not wedded to McGraw as the hitting coach, and hitting coaches get fired all the time in situations much like this, but we don't think there's any chance that changing hitting coaches is going to materially improve the team's hitting.
Boswell
Tom Boswell has a great column in today's Post. Alone among most columnists, Boswell has both cheered the team's arrival in Washington and demanded that it stay focused on winning. While many others have been happy just to have a team, Boswell has made clear that a true fan should demand more.
He's fundamentally correct in arguing that the Nationals are still in the race and that their wild card opponents haven't done much to earn the title, and we agree that it's still possible for the Nats to win the race. We, probably like all Nats fans, are still glued to the race and still hope the Nats can come out of their death spiral.
The real problem is that the Washington Nationals aren't a mature organization right now, and a mature organization is more likely to win the race. The team has no direction from ownership, largely because ownership doesn't care much about the team's future. The owner--Major League Baseball--is concerned only with getting the highest price possible for the team in a sale and therefore isn't going to do much to try to win this year or secure the team's future.
The General Manager has to operate in this difficult environment, and he's not doing a very good job of it. If you were trying to build a stable, yet creative, franchise that challenged for the pennant every year, you probably wouldn't hire Jim Bowden. His explosion on Sunday at the team and its players for not hitting and not winning wasn't a sign of a mature GM, especially when you consider that the team is made up mostly of average or below average hitters. It's sort of like an urban planner angrily criticizing the Washington Monument for not being taller.
The combination of these two factors--a disinterested owner and a substandard GM--have prevented the team from improving itself at the trade deadline and down the stretch. The Nationals could have catapulted themselves from a basement franchise into one of the league's premier franchises, but they missed that chance. Now, they're an overachieving team that's no longer overachieving. That's not a good prescription for winning the wild card.
The Nats also don't have much a farm system to call upon down the stretch. Yes, they have Ryan Zimmerman, but he's not likely to do much this year, and they don't have much else. A more mature team would have built up the minor league system over a period of years through trades and the minor league draft, but the Expos depleted their farm system both by calling up young, productive hitters only to trade them away and by losing good management personnel.
The Nationals did have a player they could have brought up to try to plug their gaping hole at shortstop--Rick Short--but they didn't do that. A career minor leaguer, Short was the perfect call-up: he was hitting well, he could play a position at which the Nats needed help, and bringing him up wasn't going to undermine his development. When the alternative is one of the worst hitters in baseball, why not take a chance on Rick Short?
But Boswell's right: the wild card race isn't populated with superb teams this year. All of the teams in the race are flawed, and that's a race the Nationals can win--if they start hitting. In the end, there's no way the Nationals can win the race hitting like they have since the All-Star break. Can they turn it around? Yes; most major league hitters can get hot in a 32-game stretch. It doesn't help, of course, that the GM is telling them that not only aren't they any good, but they might lose their job at any moment.
He's fundamentally correct in arguing that the Nationals are still in the race and that their wild card opponents haven't done much to earn the title, and we agree that it's still possible for the Nats to win the race. We, probably like all Nats fans, are still glued to the race and still hope the Nats can come out of their death spiral.
The real problem is that the Washington Nationals aren't a mature organization right now, and a mature organization is more likely to win the race. The team has no direction from ownership, largely because ownership doesn't care much about the team's future. The owner--Major League Baseball--is concerned only with getting the highest price possible for the team in a sale and therefore isn't going to do much to try to win this year or secure the team's future.
The General Manager has to operate in this difficult environment, and he's not doing a very good job of it. If you were trying to build a stable, yet creative, franchise that challenged for the pennant every year, you probably wouldn't hire Jim Bowden. His explosion on Sunday at the team and its players for not hitting and not winning wasn't a sign of a mature GM, especially when you consider that the team is made up mostly of average or below average hitters. It's sort of like an urban planner angrily criticizing the Washington Monument for not being taller.
The combination of these two factors--a disinterested owner and a substandard GM--have prevented the team from improving itself at the trade deadline and down the stretch. The Nationals could have catapulted themselves from a basement franchise into one of the league's premier franchises, but they missed that chance. Now, they're an overachieving team that's no longer overachieving. That's not a good prescription for winning the wild card.
The Nats also don't have much a farm system to call upon down the stretch. Yes, they have Ryan Zimmerman, but he's not likely to do much this year, and they don't have much else. A more mature team would have built up the minor league system over a period of years through trades and the minor league draft, but the Expos depleted their farm system both by calling up young, productive hitters only to trade them away and by losing good management personnel.
The Nationals did have a player they could have brought up to try to plug their gaping hole at shortstop--Rick Short--but they didn't do that. A career minor leaguer, Short was the perfect call-up: he was hitting well, he could play a position at which the Nats needed help, and bringing him up wasn't going to undermine his development. When the alternative is one of the worst hitters in baseball, why not take a chance on Rick Short?
But Boswell's right: the wild card race isn't populated with superb teams this year. All of the teams in the race are flawed, and that's a race the Nationals can win--if they start hitting. In the end, there's no way the Nationals can win the race hitting like they have since the All-Star break. Can they turn it around? Yes; most major league hitters can get hot in a 32-game stretch. It doesn't help, of course, that the GM is telling them that not only aren't they any good, but they might lose their job at any moment.
Monday, August 29, 2005
Well, what did you expect?
The papers are filled today with the rantings of Jim Bowden. Bowden is understandably upset with the Nationals' meager offense, as we all are, but he seems to think that this is a recent problem. Yes, the Nationals lost 6-0 yesterday to the Cardinals and now haven't scored in the last 21 innings. And, yes, this scoreless streak comes at an inopportune time; it's hard to make the playoffs when you've stopped scoring runs.
But this is not a new phenomenon. Where have you been, Jim, the last couple of months? The Nationals lost their National League East lead, fell out of second place, then third, and then fourth, all because of their pathetic offense. Had the Nationals even an average offense it's very likely that they'd still be a playoff team. Instead, the Nationals have squandered an overachieving first half and a good pitching staff by not putting on the field a team that can consistently drive the ball.
Let's get more specific. The Nationals are last in the National League in virtually EVERY offensive category. They are last in at bats, runs scored, hits, home runs (tied with the Giants), total bases, RBI, batting average, slugging percentage, and OPS. And the Nationals are second to last in OBP. Is it therefore a surprise that the Nationals can't score?
And given their lineup, is it a surprise that the Nationals are this bad offensively? The Nationals START one of the worst offensive players (at least this year) ever to play regularly--Cristian Guzman--and on a daily basis field one of the worst offensive teams in recent memory. Yesterday they played five players (Guzman, Jamey Carroll, Gary Bennett, Vinny Castilla, and Preston Wilson) who wouldn't start for most every team and probably wouldn't even be on the roster of most good teams. These five have VORPs of -19.5, -5.2, -0.4, 9.1, and 7.7, respectively. And another player--Brad Wilkerson--is slumping himself out of the productive player category.
Simply stated, the Nationals don't have the offense of a playoff team. This has been a known problem for months now, but Bowden hasn't done anything about it. He chose not to make any trades near the trade deadline and has done nothing since to improve the offense. Meanwhile, teams like the Yankees are making small, but potentially significant deals to beef up their offense. Where is a good general manager when you need one? As we've said before, the solution to all of this is not to berate the players, but to fire the general manager.
But this is not a new phenomenon. Where have you been, Jim, the last couple of months? The Nationals lost their National League East lead, fell out of second place, then third, and then fourth, all because of their pathetic offense. Had the Nationals even an average offense it's very likely that they'd still be a playoff team. Instead, the Nationals have squandered an overachieving first half and a good pitching staff by not putting on the field a team that can consistently drive the ball.
Let's get more specific. The Nationals are last in the National League in virtually EVERY offensive category. They are last in at bats, runs scored, hits, home runs (tied with the Giants), total bases, RBI, batting average, slugging percentage, and OPS. And the Nationals are second to last in OBP. Is it therefore a surprise that the Nationals can't score?
And given their lineup, is it a surprise that the Nationals are this bad offensively? The Nationals START one of the worst offensive players (at least this year) ever to play regularly--Cristian Guzman--and on a daily basis field one of the worst offensive teams in recent memory. Yesterday they played five players (Guzman, Jamey Carroll, Gary Bennett, Vinny Castilla, and Preston Wilson) who wouldn't start for most every team and probably wouldn't even be on the roster of most good teams. These five have VORPs of -19.5, -5.2, -0.4, 9.1, and 7.7, respectively. And another player--Brad Wilkerson--is slumping himself out of the productive player category.
Simply stated, the Nationals don't have the offense of a playoff team. This has been a known problem for months now, but Bowden hasn't done anything about it. He chose not to make any trades near the trade deadline and has done nothing since to improve the offense. Meanwhile, teams like the Yankees are making small, but potentially significant deals to beef up their offense. Where is a good general manager when you need one? As we've said before, the solution to all of this is not to berate the players, but to fire the general manager.
Sunday, August 28, 2005
Today's Game
Today's game.
We caught a break today. Instead of facing Mark Mulder, who has been light's out since the All Star Break (2.48 ERA), we face Cal Eldred. Now, we like Cal, and he's been good this year in limited action, but he's no Mark Mulder. Then again, neither was Jason Marquis, and we made him look like Roger Clemens.
The Nationals start John Halama, who hasn't given up a run yet as a National. How deep into this game do you think that streak will go?
Offensively, the Nationals will be even weaker than normal. We're starting our Sunday best of Gary Bennett, Jamey Carroll, AND Cristian Guzman. This could be a frightening exhibition of ineptitude. Let's hope the Nationals somehow can muster some offense.
Go Nats!
We caught a break today. Instead of facing Mark Mulder, who has been light's out since the All Star Break (2.48 ERA), we face Cal Eldred. Now, we like Cal, and he's been good this year in limited action, but he's no Mark Mulder. Then again, neither was Jason Marquis, and we made him look like Roger Clemens.
The Nationals start John Halama, who hasn't given up a run yet as a National. How deep into this game do you think that streak will go?
Offensively, the Nationals will be even weaker than normal. We're starting our Sunday best of Gary Bennett, Jamey Carroll, AND Cristian Guzman. This could be a frightening exhibition of ineptitude. Let's hope the Nationals somehow can muster some offense.
Go Nats!
Are we trying to win?
If you were trying to get your team into the playoffs and your outfield was manned by players like Marlon Byrd, wouldn't you try to pick up a player like Matt Lawton? Fine, Lawton isn't the answer to all of our problems, but he's got an OPS about 170 points higher than Byrd's, and he's in the last year of his contract, so for about $1.5 million this year you could upgrade your outfield without incurring any long-term obligation. While we were sleeping, the Yankees picked up Lawton for not a lot. Has Jim Bowden thrown in the towel?
We were trying to hit the ball, right?
Was it that Jason Marquis, a pitcher not good enough to be a starter for the St. Louis Cardinals, finally solved all of his pitching problems, or was it that Cristian Guzman is slowly, but surely, working his hitting magic on the rest of the lineup? Or maybe our hitting is getting progressively worse as the season winds down?
Whatever it was, it looked like the Nationals were a Little League World Series team yesterday. Unable to muster any offense, the Nats managed only two hits against a mediocre pitcher who flirted with a perfect game. Marquis gave up only two hits and no walks and had to throw only 91 pitches as he completely shut down the Nationals' anemic offense. It wasn't like Marquis was overpowering--he struck out only three batters in nine innings--but it didn't matter. The Nationals' offensive performance would be shocking if we hadn't seen them do things similar in the very recent past. Sadly, we're all too familiar with the Nats' futility.
We suspect that the Matt White experiment may be over. He gave up four runs in four innings and looked a lot like Ryan Drese. Oh, and we may be beginning to realize why the Yankees dispensed with Mike Stanton--in his last 5 2/3 innings, he's given up four runs. Ouch.
Still, the Nationals have split the first two games, which is a lot better than the alternative against one of the best teams in baseball. Yes, the Cardinals' have a depleted lineup now, but they're still a lot better than the Nats. If the Nationals can somehow pull today's game out of a hat, this will be a nice antidote to the Cincinnati debacle.
Whatever it was, it looked like the Nationals were a Little League World Series team yesterday. Unable to muster any offense, the Nats managed only two hits against a mediocre pitcher who flirted with a perfect game. Marquis gave up only two hits and no walks and had to throw only 91 pitches as he completely shut down the Nationals' anemic offense. It wasn't like Marquis was overpowering--he struck out only three batters in nine innings--but it didn't matter. The Nationals' offensive performance would be shocking if we hadn't seen them do things similar in the very recent past. Sadly, we're all too familiar with the Nats' futility.
We suspect that the Matt White experiment may be over. He gave up four runs in four innings and looked a lot like Ryan Drese. Oh, and we may be beginning to realize why the Yankees dispensed with Mike Stanton--in his last 5 2/3 innings, he's given up four runs. Ouch.
Still, the Nationals have split the first two games, which is a lot better than the alternative against one of the best teams in baseball. Yes, the Cardinals' have a depleted lineup now, but they're still a lot better than the Nats. If the Nationals can somehow pull today's game out of a hat, this will be a nice antidote to the Cincinnati debacle.
Friday, August 26, 2005
The End
Cordero closed it out for his 41st save. 4-1 win. It was a great night to see a game and a great crowd. This place was rockin' tonight, and this town is becoming a great baseball town. Go Nats!
Attendance
The Nationals are over 2 million in attendance this year, and here are over 37,000 people here tonight. That's a great achievement for this new organization, and it shows the promise and the potential this team has.
Keep it up Nats fans!
Pitching change
Loaiza goes out after walking a pinch hitter to open the 8th. He have up one run on 3 hits and 4-5 walks (I think). Great game. Let's hope the Nats can hold it.
Cardinals finally score
They do it on a walk, a ground ball advancing Edmonds to second, and a bloop single to left. Not a bad inning for Loaiza.
Stupid play
With runners on first and second and two outs in the bottom of the sixth, Molina threw behind Brad Wilkerson at first. Wilkerson was out by 5 feet.
Brad--how about paying attention, buddy!
Guzman's travails
Guzman just struck out looking. On an earlier pitch, Suppan threw him a 64 mph breaking ball. That's the way to show respect for the hitter! The fans are really booing Guzman. It's getting ugly for Cristian.
Mowing 'em down
Loaiza is on a roll. He's given up 2 hits and no runs through 6 and looks great.
On another issue, when did Neil Diamond's Sweet Caroline become a stadium song? The Nats play it every game in the middle of the sixth.
He's got a point
Guillen just hit a ball to the top of the wall in center that's gone in almost any other park. He ends up with a triple. Wilson hits a long fly ball to right center that Larry Walker flags down for a back-handed catch. Great play, but Guillen scores.
4-0 Nats after 5.
Between Innings Madness 2
I LOVE the hidden ball game on the scoreboard! I hope that doesn't contradict my earlier post!
A Rally!
Guillen singles to lead off the bottom of the fourth on a dribbler down the first base line that goes foul, but then curves fair. Wilson then doubles Guillen to third. Edmonds makes a nice play to prevent Guillen from scoring by cutting the ball off before it goes to the wall.
Schneider singles hard to Pujols, who is playing in to stop the runner at third from scoring. That ball goes off his wrist and bounces toward the center of the infield. Guillen scores, but Pujols looks like he's hurt. He gets up, but that was a hard shot he took.
First and second and no one out! But Castilla grounds into a double play. Castilla is in our dog house for the way he's played after the first month of the season. You can talk about shortstop, and you're right, of course, but the Nats needs a lot of help at third, too.
Anyway, back to the action. Suppan commits the Cardinal sin by walking Guzman! That's bad, but the Cardinals are OK because Loaiza is up, right? Wrong! He singles up the middle to score Wilson. 3-0 Nats!
Wilkerson walks to load the bases. Vidro is up--another guy in our dog house. He has been really disappointing this year. He's not great, but he should be good. Predictably, he grounds out to end the rally. That's a big run scoring opportunity squandered.
Pitcher's Duel
So Loaiza has settled down, and he's given up only two hits through four innings. The problem is that Suppan also has given up two hits. Neither guy is throwing much harder than 86-87, and Suppan doesn't reach even go that high very much. That's a long way of saying that this probably won't continue.
Between Innings Madness
If you've ever been to a Nats game at RFK, you know that there often are scoreboard games in between innings. Two of them involve animated races, one between 3 bottles of Miller beer bottles and the other between autopia-like cars driven by Washington, Lincoln, and Hamilton. They all follow the same script and they're incredibly repetitive if you've seen them a few times. I can't believe that anyone finds them even remotely entertaining. I'm sure that stuff like this plays in other parks, but can't MLB find better entertainment for fans?
Fight!
As David Eckstein was doubling down the first base line in the third inning, a Cardinals fan sitting next to us was yelling at a guy who sat in front of him. Apparently the guy in front was too tall and was blocking the Cardinals fan's field of vision. I thought there was going to be a fight until I realized that the guy in front is about 6'4" and 250 pounds and the Cardinals fan is about 75 years old.
Crisis averted.
Who says the fences are too far away?
Wilkerson homers to lead it off for the Nats! Then Johnson doubles down the line and Guillen walks. Suppan hasn't thrown the ball over 89 mph yet.
No matter, Preston Wilson grounds into a double play. Where is Coors Field when you need it?!
1-0 Nats after 1.
Whew!
Eckstein singles and Walker walks. That's not a good start for Loaiza, given that Pujols bats third. Albert promptly hits one to the track, but it's just a long out. Edmonds then guys it hard, but right to Johnson, who doubles Walker off of first.
Loaiza looks shaky, but let's hope that he's got it out of his system.
The Crowd
It looks like a big crowd tonight. I guess we can laugh at Peter Angelos and his ilk, all of whom said DC would never support a baseball team,
especially in August.
Why is it, by the way, that the Nationals can't get the whole supply and demand thing down? The lines for Italian sausage dogs and specialty beers are always incredibly long, while the chicken finger line is so short it looks like they're selling the plague.
Tonight's Game
Tonight's game features a good Nationals pitcher (Esteban Loaiza) who has been pretty bad in August and a not-as-good Cardinals pitcher (Jeff Suppan) who has been very good in August. Given that the Cardinals have both Albert Pujols and the best record in baseball and the Nationals don't, we'll go out on a limb and say that the matchup favors the Cardinals.
This is going to be a tough series, and everyone knew it was going to be a tough series. The preferred course would have been to win the series against the lowly Reds to take some of the pressure off of this series. Things didn't work out that way, so now this series has added importance, which isn't good for the Nationals.
I'll be blogging from the game for those who are interested. I hope the posts will be at least mildly interesting! Go Nats!
This is going to be a tough series, and everyone knew it was going to be a tough series. The preferred course would have been to win the series against the lowly Reds to take some of the pressure off of this series. Things didn't work out that way, so now this series has added importance, which isn't good for the Nationals.
I'll be blogging from the game for those who are interested. I hope the posts will be at least mildly interesting! Go Nats!
Dwight Gooden
Today brings very sad news about someone who was once the best pitcher in the game, but who squandered his prodigious talent to drugs. Dwight Gooden turned himself in yesterday after fleeing a DUI stop in Florida. He is being held without bond on a felony charge of fleeing police.
It seems so long ago now, but Dwight Gooden was once baseball's best pitcher. He jumped from A directly to the majors as a 19 year old in 1984 and dominated hitters from the beginning. He won the NL Rookie of the Year, set the rookie record for strikeouts, and was the youngest All Star in the history of the game. He was even better in 1985, leading the league in wins, strikeouts, and ERA.
The Mets had the brilliantly stupid idea of making Gooden less reliant on his fastball beginning in 1986, and he was never again the same dominating pitcher, although he was still very, very good.
What ultimately undid Gooden was his use of drugs. He went into a rehab clinic in 1987 to cure his dependence on cocaine, but it didn't work. Gooden used cocaine off and on through September 1994, when Bud Selig finally suspended him for the rest of the season and all of 1995.
Gooden's talent was something to marvel at, but his career was one of a missed opportunity. His stats tell the story:
He wasn't a very good pitcher after 1994, although he had flashes of glory with the Yankees in 1996.
We hope this arrest is a temporary set-back for Gooden and that he puts himself together quickly. God knows he's had his share of trauma already; the last thing he needs is another bout with addiction.
It seems so long ago now, but Dwight Gooden was once baseball's best pitcher. He jumped from A directly to the majors as a 19 year old in 1984 and dominated hitters from the beginning. He won the NL Rookie of the Year, set the rookie record for strikeouts, and was the youngest All Star in the history of the game. He was even better in 1985, leading the league in wins, strikeouts, and ERA.
The Mets had the brilliantly stupid idea of making Gooden less reliant on his fastball beginning in 1986, and he was never again the same dominating pitcher, although he was still very, very good.
What ultimately undid Gooden was his use of drugs. He went into a rehab clinic in 1987 to cure his dependence on cocaine, but it didn't work. Gooden used cocaine off and on through September 1994, when Bud Selig finally suspended him for the rest of the season and all of 1995.
Gooden's talent was something to marvel at, but his career was one of a missed opportunity. His stats tell the story:
| Year | H/9 | BB/9 | K/9 | HR/9 | ERA |
| 1984 | 6.65 | 3.01 | 11.39 | 0.29 | 2.60 |
| 1985 | 6.44 | 2.24 | 8.72 | 0.42 | 1.53 |
| 1986 | 7.09 | 2.88 | 7.20 | 0.61 | 2.84 |
| 1987 | 8.11 | 2.65 | 7.41 | 0.55 | 3.21 |
| 1988 | 8.77 | 2.07 | 6.34 | 0.29 | 3.19 |
| 1989 | 7.08 | 3.58 | 7.68 | 0.68 | 2.89 |
| 1990 | 8.86 | 2.71 | 8.62 | 0.39 | 3.83 |
| 1991 | 8.76 | 2.65 | 7.11 | 0.57 | 3.60 |
| 1992 | 8.61 | 3.06 | 6.33 | 0.48 | 3.67 |
| 1993 | 8.11 | 2.63 | 6.43 | 0.69 | 3.45 |
| 1994 | 10.02 | 3.27 | 8.72 | 1.96 | 6.31 |
He wasn't a very good pitcher after 1994, although he had flashes of glory with the Yankees in 1996.
We hope this arrest is a temporary set-back for Gooden and that he puts himself together quickly. God knows he's had his share of trauma already; the last thing he needs is another bout with addiction.
Thursday, August 25, 2005
Slip Slidin' Away
Assuming the Mets win (they are ahead with Pedro Martinez on the mound), here are the wild card standings:
The Nationals are in last place in the National League East, which is quite a come down from a pretty lofty position not so long ago. We're still in this thing, but something has got to change quickly to create a new dynamic in the race. If something doesn't change, we're going to be an also ran before too long. Where is Rick Short when you need him?!
| Team | Record | Pct. | GB |
| Philadelphia | 69-59 | .539 | -- |
| Florida | 67-60 | .527 | 1.5 |
| Houston | 67-60 | .527 | 1.5 |
| New York | 67-60 | .527 | 1.5 |
| Washington | 66-61 | .520 | 2.5 |
The Nationals are in last place in the National League East, which is quite a come down from a pretty lofty position not so long ago. We're still in this thing, but something has got to change quickly to create a new dynamic in the race. If something doesn't change, we're going to be an also ran before too long. Where is Rick Short when you need him?!
Wow, those Reds are good!
The Nationals just completed a three-game series against a very good Reds team and, not surprisingly, lost two out of three games. The Reds employed what every good team employs: a combination of good pitching and timely hitting. In fact, although the Reds lost game two, they put up a valiant fight to make it close in the ninth inning. That's the "never say die" spirit that distinguishes good teams like the Reds from teams like the Nationals, right?
What? You say the Reds aren't good? No, that can't be--they manhandled the Nationals! Let me check the record. I'll be right back.
My God, you're right! The Reds stink! They're only 59-68. They're in fourth place in the mediocre Central Division, and they're even worse than Milwaukee. Jeez, what does that say about the Nationals?
I guess it says that the Nationals are pretty mediocre, too. After all, they did make Luke Hudson and Brandon Claussen, who pretty much define the term "mediocre," look like All Stars. And they could barely put together any offense in games one and three.
Huh, maybe my expectations were too high. Maybe we are a .500 team. Maybe we're the Eastern Division equivalent of the Reds.
Well, if that's true, the news isn't all bad. If we're the equivalent of the Reds, we must have hitters like Adam Dunn and Ken Griffey, Jr., right?
What? You say the Reds aren't good? No, that can't be--they manhandled the Nationals! Let me check the record. I'll be right back.
My God, you're right! The Reds stink! They're only 59-68. They're in fourth place in the mediocre Central Division, and they're even worse than Milwaukee. Jeez, what does that say about the Nationals?
I guess it says that the Nationals are pretty mediocre, too. After all, they did make Luke Hudson and Brandon Claussen, who pretty much define the term "mediocre," look like All Stars. And they could barely put together any offense in games one and three.
Huh, maybe my expectations were too high. Maybe we are a .500 team. Maybe we're the Eastern Division equivalent of the Reds.
Well, if that's true, the news isn't all bad. If we're the equivalent of the Reds, we must have hitters like Adam Dunn and Ken Griffey, Jr., right?
Rick Short
We're coming to a conclusion to which Oleanders came long ago, but the Nationals should call up Rick Short, put him in at shortstop, and improve the team's OPS. If Ryan Zimmerman can be taught to play shortstop, so can Rick Short. You can state all the caveats you want, but a .400 hitter in AAA is worth a shot in the major leagues, especially when the alternative is so horrible.
Watch out for the Mets
On SportsCenter last night Peter Gammons said that although he's still picking the Marlins to win the wild card, he thinks the Mets have a real chance to win it. He cited their starting pitching, their youth, their "energy," and some young players--David Wright, Jose Reyes, and Carlos Beltran--who he said can carry the offense in September.
This morning on Mike & Mike on ESPN Radio, Tim Kurkjian said essentially the same thing.
The Mets' OPS in August is 100 points higher than the Nationals', and their expected winning percentage (based on their runs scored-runs allowed differential) is 72-54. In fact, the National League East would look like this if every team was performing as expected:
We obviously can't expect the Mets to win the race just because they have a good runs scored-runs allowed differential, but this data does suggest that Gammons and Kurkjian might be on to something. The Mets play each of their division rivals twice more and play St. Louis once, so their remaining schedule isn't the easiest in baseball, but we'll probably have to be talking a lot more about the Mets during the stretch drive than we have so far this season.
This morning on Mike & Mike on ESPN Radio, Tim Kurkjian said essentially the same thing.
The Mets' OPS in August is 100 points higher than the Nationals', and their expected winning percentage (based on their runs scored-runs allowed differential) is 72-54. In fact, the National League East would look like this if every team was performing as expected:
| Team | W | L | GB |
| Atlanta | 74 | 53 | --- |
| New York | 72 | 54 | 1.5 |
| Florida | 67 | 59 | 6.5 |
| Philadelphia | 66 | 62 | 8.5 |
| Washington | 62 | 64 | 11.5 |
We obviously can't expect the Mets to win the race just because they have a good runs scored-runs allowed differential, but this data does suggest that Gammons and Kurkjian might be on to something. The Mets play each of their division rivals twice more and play St. Louis once, so their remaining schedule isn't the easiest in baseball, but we'll probably have to be talking a lot more about the Mets during the stretch drive than we have so far this season.
Thanks, we'll take a few more of those
The Nationals finally got a combination of good pitching and timely hitting last night in their 5-3 victory over the Reds. John Patterson was once again the star, pitching eight scoreless innings before giving up two runs in the ninth. Chad Cordero closed out the game to post his 40th save. But it was the Nationals' timely hitting that gave Patterson enough runs for the win.
Through the first four innings it didn't look like the game would turn out that way. The Nationals squandered opportunities in the first, second, and fourth innings, leaving four runners in scoring position in the first four innings. Jose Guillen's homer in the bottom of the fifth gave the Nationals a 2-1 lead in what looked like another one-run game.
Patterson admitted that the pressure of pitching in so many one-run games was getting to him. Today's Post quotes him as saying: "That's accumulated stress. Pitching in all those one-run games over a period of four or five months, it can wear on you. It can wear on you physically, and it can wear on you mentally." Having given up a run in top of the fourth to give up a one-run lead, Patterson knew that he couldn't give up another run once the Nationals were ahead 2-1. Patterson said he "nearly cracked." That's not good.
Thankfully, the Nationals "exploded" for three runs in the bottom of the seventh to take a 5-1 lead. From there it looked like Patterson was cruising. Through eight innings he had given up one run on eight hits and struck out eight while walking only one. It was another dominating performance for a pitcher who has blossomed this year into one of the league's best.
One might have expected Frank Robinson to pull Patterson in the ninth given that he had thrown 102 pitches. But Robinson hasn't been shy about letting Patterson climb the pitch count to close out a game. Unfortunately, Patteson gave up a double and a homer in the ninth to make the game close. That Cordero guy sure came in handy.
Attempting to cure up the confusion we created when we first posted this message, we'll eliminate the confusing narrative and just post the current wild card standings. Thanks, Basil, for catching our mistake. Sometimes we're too lazy!
Through the first four innings it didn't look like the game would turn out that way. The Nationals squandered opportunities in the first, second, and fourth innings, leaving four runners in scoring position in the first four innings. Jose Guillen's homer in the bottom of the fifth gave the Nationals a 2-1 lead in what looked like another one-run game.
Patterson admitted that the pressure of pitching in so many one-run games was getting to him. Today's Post quotes him as saying: "That's accumulated stress. Pitching in all those one-run games over a period of four or five months, it can wear on you. It can wear on you physically, and it can wear on you mentally." Having given up a run in top of the fourth to give up a one-run lead, Patterson knew that he couldn't give up another run once the Nationals were ahead 2-1. Patterson said he "nearly cracked." That's not good.
Thankfully, the Nationals "exploded" for three runs in the bottom of the seventh to take a 5-1 lead. From there it looked like Patterson was cruising. Through eight innings he had given up one run on eight hits and struck out eight while walking only one. It was another dominating performance for a pitcher who has blossomed this year into one of the league's best.
One might have expected Frank Robinson to pull Patterson in the ninth given that he had thrown 102 pitches. But Robinson hasn't been shy about letting Patterson climb the pitch count to close out a game. Unfortunately, Patteson gave up a double and a homer in the ninth to make the game close. That Cordero guy sure came in handy.
Attempting to cure up the confusion we created when we first posted this message, we'll eliminate the confusing narrative and just post the current wild card standings. Thanks, Basil, for catching our mistake. Sometimes we're too lazy!
| Team | Record | Pct. | GB |
| Philadelphia | 69-59 | .539 | -- |
| Houston | 67-60 | .527 | 1.5 |
| Washington | 66-60 | .524 | 2 |
| Florida | 66-60 | .524 | 2 |
| New York | 6660 | .524 | 2 |
Wednesday, August 24, 2005
Tonight's Game
Question: what's the record for highest number of consecutive innings in which a team leaves a runner in scoring position?
We may break the record tonight.
We may break the record tonight.
Pitching Woes
We're not altogether upset that Ryan Drese probably won't be pitching for a while. It's not like Drese was was an anchor of the staff or even a productive pitcher. It is too bad that the staff doesn't have the kind of depth that would have permitted Frank Robinson to demote Drese (or Tony Armas, for that matter) long ago, but there's not a lot we can do about that now.
John Halama will hopefully be an upgrade over Drese or at least a serviceable replacement, and Travis Hughes will likely be an acceptable middle reliever for a time. Hughes' stats in AAA (2-4, 12 saves, 2.65 ERA in 49 appearances) suggest as much.
The bigger issue is that the pitching staff that had been the driver of this team doesn't look so hot now. Hernandez, Drese, and Loaiza have August ERAs of 7.89, 7.04, and 4.16, respectively, and the consistency that characterized the starting pitching is now gone. With this team's dismal hitting, there is no way that we'll make the playoffs without top notch pitching down the stretch. The injuries will likely put more strain on the pitchers, and that's not going to help the cause, even if Drese and Armas weren't lighting the world on fire.
John Halama will hopefully be an upgrade over Drese or at least a serviceable replacement, and Travis Hughes will likely be an acceptable middle reliever for a time. Hughes' stats in AAA (2-4, 12 saves, 2.65 ERA in 49 appearances) suggest as much.
The bigger issue is that the pitching staff that had been the driver of this team doesn't look so hot now. Hernandez, Drese, and Loaiza have August ERAs of 7.89, 7.04, and 4.16, respectively, and the consistency that characterized the starting pitching is now gone. With this team's dismal hitting, there is no way that we'll make the playoffs without top notch pitching down the stretch. The injuries will likely put more strain on the pitchers, and that's not going to help the cause, even if Drese and Armas weren't lighting the world on fire.
A little honesty would be nice
Quotes from Jim Bowden:
"I get a big kick out of some people saying, 'This team overachieved in the first half.' I got to tell you, this team underachieved. When I look at the batting averages and the production of some of these guys, I think they underachieved in the first half. I'm expecting better production in the second half than we saw in the first half." July 25, 2005.
"Our goal is to win the division, win the playoffs and win the World Series. Anything short of that is a failure." July 25, 2005.
"Look around this locker room. These are the guys we are going to war with. ... What's different about the first half? ... We've got the same people here. ... Why can't we do it?" July 29, 2005.
When the Nationals were winning Bowden made these statements to convince people that he was the architect of the team. As the trade deadline neared Bowden made these statements to convince people that his failure to make a deal was no big deal. Now that the Nationals are losing, Bowden is criticizing the players.
We suspect that were he to be honest Bowden would admit that he was handed a team that overachieved in the first half and that he couldn't make a significant deal that would lock in an owner to a particular strategy that he or she hadn't approved.
Instead of being bombastic and self-aggrandizing, we would prefer that Bowden be honest with fans. How about saying "Listen, there really isn't a whole lot I can do until we get an owner, so I'm going to try to leverage the pieces we already have and hope that it's enough to get us into the playoffs." The fans would be a lot more understanding of an honest Jim Bowden than they would a dissembling Jim Bowden.
"I get a big kick out of some people saying, 'This team overachieved in the first half.' I got to tell you, this team underachieved. When I look at the batting averages and the production of some of these guys, I think they underachieved in the first half. I'm expecting better production in the second half than we saw in the first half." July 25, 2005.
"Our goal is to win the division, win the playoffs and win the World Series. Anything short of that is a failure." July 25, 2005.
"Look around this locker room. These are the guys we are going to war with. ... What's different about the first half? ... We've got the same people here. ... Why can't we do it?" July 29, 2005.
When the Nationals were winning Bowden made these statements to convince people that he was the architect of the team. As the trade deadline neared Bowden made these statements to convince people that his failure to make a deal was no big deal. Now that the Nationals are losing, Bowden is criticizing the players.
We suspect that were he to be honest Bowden would admit that he was handed a team that overachieved in the first half and that he couldn't make a significant deal that would lock in an owner to a particular strategy that he or she hadn't approved.
Instead of being bombastic and self-aggrandizing, we would prefer that Bowden be honest with fans. How about saying "Listen, there really isn't a whole lot I can do until we get an owner, so I'm going to try to leverage the pieces we already have and hope that it's enough to get us into the playoffs." The fans would be a lot more understanding of an honest Jim Bowden than they would a dissembling Jim Bowden.
Not Ready For Prime Time
In the midst of a playoff race, when every game has significant meaning and teams are fighting fiercely for one post-season spot, the Nationals are playing like they don't care. Uninspired pitching and anemic hitting now characterize this team most nights, as players like Livan Hernandez and Jose Guillen who were leaders in the first half of a team on a mission now can't help the team when it needs their help most. This team, which in the first half looked like a machine built from disparate but supportive parts, now looks like a collection of mostly average players who wouldn't have much of a role on the league's best teams.
Last night Tony Armas pitched like a high school pitcher. We're told that he has shoulder problems, and he probably does, but Armas has been living on borrowed time for a while. There's only so many times a pitcher can give up two hits per inning and still win. Last night Armas' luck ran out, and he was hammered by one of the league's worst teams for four runs in the third inning.
The Nationals' hitters were unable to mount any serious comeback, managing only four hits in seven innings against Luke Hudson, one of baseball's worst starting pitchers. Prior to last night, Hudson had walked more batters than he had struck out, but against the Nationals he struck out seven and didn't walk a batter. The Nationals are becoming a team that can cure most pitchers' problems in a hurry.
We are watching a .500 team. In the first half of the season we got used to winning streaks, solid performances, and first place, but those days are long gone. What we have seen in the second half is a team coming back to earth because, ultimately, it can't escape the fact that it allows at least as many runs as it scores. We need to get used to this.
Last night Tony Armas pitched like a high school pitcher. We're told that he has shoulder problems, and he probably does, but Armas has been living on borrowed time for a while. There's only so many times a pitcher can give up two hits per inning and still win. Last night Armas' luck ran out, and he was hammered by one of the league's worst teams for four runs in the third inning.
The Nationals' hitters were unable to mount any serious comeback, managing only four hits in seven innings against Luke Hudson, one of baseball's worst starting pitchers. Prior to last night, Hudson had walked more batters than he had struck out, but against the Nationals he struck out seven and didn't walk a batter. The Nationals are becoming a team that can cure most pitchers' problems in a hurry.
We are watching a .500 team. In the first half of the season we got used to winning streaks, solid performances, and first place, but those days are long gone. What we have seen in the second half is a team coming back to earth because, ultimately, it can't escape the fact that it allows at least as many runs as it scores. We need to get used to this.
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
Tonight's Game
Oleanders has a good post on the pitching matchup in today's game. We are not enamored with Tony Armas (4.29 ERA), but even we would have to assume from the ERAs that the matchup with Luke Hudson (7.35 ERA) favors the Nationals. Not so fast, says Oleanders, and we find their logic to be pretty convincing. We still think that Armas has the edge, but it's not by much.
Given that the Reds have the hitting edge, what looks like an easy game could be much harder than we expect.
The Nationals have been a .500 team in August (one game below, actually), and they have to start winning series if they're going to be the wild card team in the National League. If Armas can pitch well enough for the Nats to win tonight, the rest of the series looks pretty good (Patterson and Hernandez pitch the last two games).
We think that what we just did is called looking ahead, and the Nationals clearly haven't earned the right to do that. Let's just hope that Armas finds a way to pitch another productive game. Go Nats!
Given that the Reds have the hitting edge, what looks like an easy game could be much harder than we expect.
The Nationals have been a .500 team in August (one game below, actually), and they have to start winning series if they're going to be the wild card team in the National League. If Armas can pitch well enough for the Nats to win tonight, the rest of the series looks pretty good (Patterson and Hernandez pitch the last two games).
We think that what we just did is called looking ahead, and the Nationals clearly haven't earned the right to do that. Let's just hope that Armas finds a way to pitch another productive game. Go Nats!
Bad Hitting
Want a graphic representation of how badly the Nationals' offense has been? Try comparative tables of the Nationals' and Reds' starting lineups during the month of August:
The Nationals have two hitters with an OPS greater than .800; the Reds have six. The Reds don't have any hitters with an OPS less than .700, the Nationals have two, including one with an OPS less than .600. It's hard to make the playoffs when you're hitting like the Nationals are this month.
| Player | AB | OBP | SLG | OPS |
| Schneider | 33 | .487 | .697 | 1.184 |
| Wilson | 64 | .403 | .594 | .997 |
| Guillen | 58 | .311 | .466 | .777 |
| Castilla | 61 | .294 | .475 | .770 |
| Vidro | 75 | .338 | .427 | .764 |
| Johnson | 71 | .321 | .437 | .758 |
| Wilkerson | 61 | .271 | .361 | .632 |
| Guzman | 54 | .255 | .315 | .569 |
| Player | AB | OBP | SLG | OPS |
| Casey | 64 | .451 | .656 | 1.107 |
| Griffey | 73 | .392 | .658 | 1.050 |
| Aurilia | 49 | .411 | .510 | .921 |
| Dunn | 60 | .434 | .467 | .901 |
| Kearns | 64 | .329 | .516 | .844 |
| LaRue | 46 | .400 | .435 | .835 |
| Encarnacion | 53 | .281 | .491 | .771 |
| Lopez | 68 | .325 | .412 | .737 |
The Nationals have two hitters with an OPS greater than .800; the Reds have six. The Reds don't have any hitters with an OPS less than .700, the Nationals have two, including one with an OPS less than .600. It's hard to make the playoffs when you're hitting like the Nationals are this month.
Wild Card Standings
Philadelphia lost, but Houston, Florida, and New York won last night. Houston has retaken the wild card lead, the Nats are now fourth, and the Mets are back in the race. Here are the standings:
| Team | Record | Pct. | GB |
| Houston | 67-58 | .536 | -- |
| Philadelphia | 67-59 | .532 | .5 |
| Florida | 66-58 | .532 | .5 |
| Washington | 65-59 | .524 | 1.5 |
| New York | 64-60 | .516 | 2.5 |
Tony Tavares, Omar Minaya, & Peter Angelos: Enemies of the People
Our post on the very small numbers of young National League hitters in whom it would make sense to invest very large sums of money reminded us that the Nationals (i.e., the Expos) recently had a player who would have been on that list. He was one of the league's most feared hitters and excelled in almost every facet of the game. Here are his stats in 2002 and 2003:
His VORP for 2003 was down, but only because he suffered an injury; his OPS continued to be among the best in baseball. What's more, at 27 he was in his prime and was likely to remain a dominant player for a long time. He was the kind of player that organizations build around, and he was one of the very few players in whom it made sense to invest a lot of money.
His name was Vladimir Guerrero. He was in the last year of his contract with the Expos in 2003, and the Expos had a chance to sign him to a long-term contract beginning with the 2004 season. The problem was that the Expos were owned by Major League Baseball. MLB had appointed team President Tony Tavares and General Manager Omar Minaya, but the team was really run by Bud Selig as a surrogate for the other 29 teams in the league.
Tavares, Minaya, and Selig were all saying the right things. Selig said that Tavares and Minaya could sign Guerrero if they thought that made sense for the team: "That's a decision that Frank [Robinson] and Omar and Tony have to make. I don't think anything precludes that." Selig stated flatly that Tavares would not need MLB's approval to sign Guerrero to a $15 million per year contract.
It was fine for Selig to say that, but as long as the Expos were owned by MLB it would be very difficult for the league to approve the Expos outbidding another team because that team was a part-owner of the Expos. The conflicts of interest were obvious, and there is no doubt that they undermined the team's efforts to sign one of the best players in the game.
The way out of those conflicts was to sell the team and move them to another city, and the obvious destination was Washington, D.C. But Peter Angelos refused to consent to a move to D.C. and was able to convince Selig that he could make life very difficult for the league if they tried. Selig's efforts to avoid identifying Angelos as the impediment were comical: "It isn't that easy. There are all kinds of stadium problems and ALL KINDS OF SITUATIONS" that forced baseball to postpone selling and moving the team. Right.
It was that delay that prevented the Expos from signing Guerrero. In Washington, the team has tens of millions more dollars to spend than it had in Montreal, and with that money it easily could have signed Guerrero to the contract he signed in Anaheim.
But even the delay should not have prevented Tavares and Minaya from signing Guerrero. You don't get the opportunity to sign a franchise player like that to a long-term contract very often. And missing an opportunity like that is a mistake that will have a long and lasting effect on a team.
Tavares and Minaya should have insisted on signing Guerrero and should have outbid the Angels, whose acquisition of Guerrero is one of the best signings in recent memory. If it was true that MLB would have permitted the Expos to sign Guerrero, they should have signed him. And if it wasn't true, Tavares and Minaya should have found out that it wasn't true. Why didn't they do that? Perhaps because they were thinking about future employment opportunities.
| Year | OBP | SLG | OPS | VORP |
| 2002 | .417 | .593 | 1.010 | 86.6 |
| 2003 | .426 | .586 | 1.012 | 48.7 |
His VORP for 2003 was down, but only because he suffered an injury; his OPS continued to be among the best in baseball. What's more, at 27 he was in his prime and was likely to remain a dominant player for a long time. He was the kind of player that organizations build around, and he was one of the very few players in whom it made sense to invest a lot of money.
His name was Vladimir Guerrero. He was in the last year of his contract with the Expos in 2003, and the Expos had a chance to sign him to a long-term contract beginning with the 2004 season. The problem was that the Expos were owned by Major League Baseball. MLB had appointed team President Tony Tavares and General Manager Omar Minaya, but the team was really run by Bud Selig as a surrogate for the other 29 teams in the league.
Tavares, Minaya, and Selig were all saying the right things. Selig said that Tavares and Minaya could sign Guerrero if they thought that made sense for the team: "That's a decision that Frank [Robinson] and Omar and Tony have to make. I don't think anything precludes that." Selig stated flatly that Tavares would not need MLB's approval to sign Guerrero to a $15 million per year contract.
It was fine for Selig to say that, but as long as the Expos were owned by MLB it would be very difficult for the league to approve the Expos outbidding another team because that team was a part-owner of the Expos. The conflicts of interest were obvious, and there is no doubt that they undermined the team's efforts to sign one of the best players in the game.
The way out of those conflicts was to sell the team and move them to another city, and the obvious destination was Washington, D.C. But Peter Angelos refused to consent to a move to D.C. and was able to convince Selig that he could make life very difficult for the league if they tried. Selig's efforts to avoid identifying Angelos as the impediment were comical: "It isn't that easy. There are all kinds of stadium problems and ALL KINDS OF SITUATIONS" that forced baseball to postpone selling and moving the team. Right.
It was that delay that prevented the Expos from signing Guerrero. In Washington, the team has tens of millions more dollars to spend than it had in Montreal, and with that money it easily could have signed Guerrero to the contract he signed in Anaheim.
But even the delay should not have prevented Tavares and Minaya from signing Guerrero. You don't get the opportunity to sign a franchise player like that to a long-term contract very often. And missing an opportunity like that is a mistake that will have a long and lasting effect on a team.
Tavares and Minaya should have insisted on signing Guerrero and should have outbid the Angels, whose acquisition of Guerrero is one of the best signings in recent memory. If it was true that MLB would have permitted the Expos to sign Guerrero, they should have signed him. And if it wasn't true, Tavares and Minaya should have found out that it wasn't true. Why didn't they do that? Perhaps because they were thinking about future employment opportunities.
Monday, August 22, 2005
Bowden Follies
A friend couldn't find this post and asked us to repost it. Sorry to those who read it already in early July.
Via baseball-reference.com, the player most similar to Cristian Guzman is Pat Meares, shortstop for the Minnesota Twins and Pittsburgh Pirates from 1993 to 2001. Meares' career stats (.299 OBP, .374 SLG, .673 OPS) are strikingly similar to Guzman's (.303 OBP, .382 SLG, .685 OPS).
Would you pay Pat Meares $16.8 million over four years, the money the Nationals are paying to Guzman? You might if your name is Cam Bonifay. Bonifay was the Pirates GM who signed Meares to a four-year, $15 million contract extension in May 1999. It was one of the disastrous contracts that saddled the Pirates with below-average players and crushing debt for years, and it was one of the contracts that got Bonifay fired.
In retrospect, no one would sign that contract.
Well, almost no one. Jim Bowden signed Guzman, a player whose stats are nearly identical to Meares', to a nearly identical contract.
Via baseball-reference.com, the player most similar to Cristian Guzman is Pat Meares, shortstop for the Minnesota Twins and Pittsburgh Pirates from 1993 to 2001. Meares' career stats (.299 OBP, .374 SLG, .673 OPS) are strikingly similar to Guzman's (.303 OBP, .382 SLG, .685 OPS).
Would you pay Pat Meares $16.8 million over four years, the money the Nationals are paying to Guzman? You might if your name is Cam Bonifay. Bonifay was the Pirates GM who signed Meares to a four-year, $15 million contract extension in May 1999. It was one of the disastrous contracts that saddled the Pirates with below-average players and crushing debt for years, and it was one of the contracts that got Bonifay fired.
In retrospect, no one would sign that contract.
Well, almost no one. Jim Bowden signed Guzman, a player whose stats are nearly identical to Meares', to a nearly identical contract.
Well, that was a good inning!
From the Elias Sports Bureau, via espn.com:
"Kris Benson lasted only two-thirds of an inning at Shea Stadium, but that was long enough for the Nationals to collect six runs on eight hits against him. Benson became only the second starting pitcher in the last 37 years to be removed from a game in the top of the first inning after allowing at least eight hits.
Since the advent of divisional play in 1969, the only other starting pitcher to allow at least eight hits in a home game in which he pitched less than an inning was the Cardinals' Brady Raggio on May 15, 1998. Raggio lasted two-thirds of an inning while allowing seven runs on nine hits to the Marlins."
"Kris Benson lasted only two-thirds of an inning at Shea Stadium, but that was long enough for the Nationals to collect six runs on eight hits against him. Benson became only the second starting pitcher in the last 37 years to be removed from a game in the top of the first inning after allowing at least eight hits.
Since the advent of divisional play in 1969, the only other starting pitcher to allow at least eight hits in a home game in which he pitched less than an inning was the Cardinals' Brady Raggio on May 15, 1998. Raggio lasted two-thirds of an inning while allowing seven runs on nine hits to the Marlins."
Homer Happy
Parade Magazine had an interesting article on Sunday regarding a home run database kept by David Vincent. Vincent is a member of the Society for American Baseball Research and the Nationals' official scorer. His database maintains information on every home run ever hit. Vincent apparently can call up in an instant incredibly detailed and obscure information, like who is the oldest player ever to hit a homer (Julio Franco), what was the latest-inning home run ever hit (25th, by Harold Baines), and who are the teammates with the longest last names ever to hit back-to-back home runs (Juan Encarnacion and Frank Catalanotto).
Here is some information on Nationals' related home runs:
- Frank Robinson has hit the most home runs on Mother's Day--9
- Vinny Castilla is tied with Reggie Jackson and George Foster for the most home runs hit on Friday the 13th--6.
Castilla will have to wait until next year to have the most home runs hit on Mother's day--there isn't another Friday the 13th this season. Will he have a chance to set the "record" as a National?
Here is some information on Nationals' related home runs:
- Frank Robinson has hit the most home runs on Mother's Day--9
- Vinny Castilla is tied with Reggie Jackson and George Foster for the most home runs hit on Friday the 13th--6.
Castilla will have to wait until next year to have the most home runs hit on Mother's day--there isn't another Friday the 13th this season. Will he have a chance to set the "record" as a National?
Who would you take?
I was talking with a friend this weekend about baseball. We were lamenting the state of the offense of our teams--the Nationals and the Dodgers. I was criticizing the Nationals' management for not being more aggressive in pursuing some top hitters, and I followed that by expressing a hope that the Nationals would pursue some top players in the offseason, including through free agency. He then asked, "Who would you take? If you got into a bidding war with the Yankees, for which free agents would you spend top money?" By top money, we mean $13-$15 million. We were limiting our discussion to players in the National League.
I rattled off a few names, but the conversation got me to thinking more particularly about the subject. Set forth below are the names of the National League hitters that we believe, were they available, the Nationals should pursue in free agency, even if that means paying top money. This is not a list of players who will be available, but a list of players who we would pursue if they were available. All of these players are relatively young because we're assuming that the Nationals wouldn't give a long term contract to an aging player. The list therefore doesn't include Barry Bonds, Bobby Abreu, etc. We're not saying that the Nationals should go after players like that, but we are saying that a long-term contract for them at the highest price probably doesn't make sense. (We'll post a list of American League hitters later.)
There are a couple of interesting things about this list. First, it's short--there are only six players on it--which makes sense because there shouldn't be a lot of hitters on which you'd spend top money. Second, it does not include Jason Bay. Before you spit out your Diet Coke at even the mention of Jason Bay in the same breath as Albert Pujols, let us show you his stats:
That's pretty impressive production, but we have some doubt about whether Bay will be able to keep it up, at least at this level.
We find this list to be sobering, because it shows how limited are the opportunities to buy top and predictable production from young players. The list makes clear that if the Nationals are to improve their offense for the long term, they're going to have to do it by focusing their free agent dollars on the best players and by developing young talent.
I rattled off a few names, but the conversation got me to thinking more particularly about the subject. Set forth below are the names of the National League hitters that we believe, were they available, the Nationals should pursue in free agency, even if that means paying top money. This is not a list of players who will be available, but a list of players who we would pursue if they were available. All of these players are relatively young because we're assuming that the Nationals wouldn't give a long term contract to an aging player. The list therefore doesn't include Barry Bonds, Bobby Abreu, etc. We're not saying that the Nationals should go after players like that, but we are saying that a long-term contract for them at the highest price probably doesn't make sense. (We'll post a list of American League hitters later.)
| Player | Pos | OPB | SLG | OPS | VORP |
| Derrek Lee | 1B | .426 | .671 | 1.097 | 83.9 |
| Albert Pujols | 1B | .430 | .622 | 1.052 | 79.7 |
| Miguel Cabrera | LF | .397 | .591 | .988 | 66.7 |
| Morgan Ensberg | 3B | .390 | .587 | .977 | 56.3 |
| Adam Dunn | LF | .396 | .577 | .973 | 53 |
| Andruw Jones | CF | .362 | .593 | .955 | 52.3 |
There are a couple of interesting things about this list. First, it's short--there are only six players on it--which makes sense because there shouldn't be a lot of hitters on which you'd spend top money. Second, it does not include Jason Bay. Before you spit out your Diet Coke at even the mention of Jason Bay in the same breath as Albert Pujols, let us show you his stats:
| Player | Pos | OPB | SLG | OPS | VORP |
| Jason Bay | LF | .400 | .572 | .972 | 66.3 |
That's pretty impressive production, but we have some doubt about whether Bay will be able to keep it up, at least at this level.
We find this list to be sobering, because it shows how limited are the opportunities to buy top and predictable production from young players. The list makes clear that if the Nationals are to improve their offense for the long term, they're going to have to do it by focusing their free agent dollars on the best players and by developing young talent.
Weekend Games
The Nationals won yesterday to avoid being swept by the Mets in a series they badly needed to win. The Nats scored six runs in the first inning, led by Ryan Church's double and single, and the game was over almost before it started. Well, that's not exactly true, given that some of the Nationals' starting pitchers, Loaiza included, have been giving up runs in bunches lately.
Speaking of giving up runs in bunches, Livan Hernandez was simply awful on Saturday. The Nationals really needed to win on Saturday, and for the second time recently Hernandez was not able to come through. He gave up eight runs in two innings and looked horrible. Amazingly, the Nationals came back to tie the game with two runs in the ninth, only to lose the game in the tenth when Gary Majewski gave up two walks and a single.
The Nationals lost two of three to the Mets, and are now treading water in the wild card race. The good news is that they have started to score runs in some games, the bad news is that they can't seem to score runs when they're pitching is great and find it hard to get adequate pitching when they score a lot of runs. Going .500 is a good way out of the playoff picture, and the Nationals are 9-10 in August so far.
As of now, this is what the playoff picture looks like:
That the Nationals are in the race at all is a minor miracle and a reminder that had they a bit more offense they would be running away with this thing. Instead, they're playing like there isn't a lot of urgency to the race. There is one bright spot for the future though: if Ryan Church starts hitting again, the Nationals' chances are markedly better. Instead of having two weak hitting outfielders (Brad Wilkerson and Preston Wilson), the Nationals would have only one. Let's hope that Church's great game yesterday is a sign of things to come.
Speaking of giving up runs in bunches, Livan Hernandez was simply awful on Saturday. The Nationals really needed to win on Saturday, and for the second time recently Hernandez was not able to come through. He gave up eight runs in two innings and looked horrible. Amazingly, the Nationals came back to tie the game with two runs in the ninth, only to lose the game in the tenth when Gary Majewski gave up two walks and a single.
The Nationals lost two of three to the Mets, and are now treading water in the wild card race. The good news is that they have started to score runs in some games, the bad news is that they can't seem to score runs when they're pitching is great and find it hard to get adequate pitching when they score a lot of runs. Going .500 is a good way out of the playoff picture, and the Nationals are 9-10 in August so far.
As of now, this is what the playoff picture looks like:
| Team | Record | Pct. | GB |
| Phillies | 67-58 | .536 | -- |
| Astros | 66-58 | .532 | .5 |
| Marlins | 65-58 | .528 | 1 |
| Nationals | 65-59 | .524 | 1.5 |
That the Nationals are in the race at all is a minor miracle and a reminder that had they a bit more offense they would be running away with this thing. Instead, they're playing like there isn't a lot of urgency to the race. There is one bright spot for the future though: if Ryan Church starts hitting again, the Nationals' chances are markedly better. Instead of having two weak hitting outfielders (Brad Wilkerson and Preston Wilson), the Nationals would have only one. Let's hope that Church's great game yesterday is a sign of things to come.
Friday, August 19, 2005
"Pitching, pitching, pitching"
Those were the immortal words of Jim Bowden weeks before the July 31 trade deadline. At the time the Nationals were one of the best pitching teams and one of the worst hitting teams in baseball. So, any rational person would say let's build on our strength and ignore our weakness, right? Well, maybe not a rational person, but Jim Bowden definitely would. And, in fact, he did. Those words are among the strongest reasons why the first act of the new ownership should be to fire Jim Bowden.
We are seeing now the consequences of Bowden's inability to improve the Nationals' offense. It should come as no surprise that it's hard for one of the worst hitting teams in baseball to get into the playoffs. When your hitting is that bad you lose games like the Nationals lost tonight. Behind another brilliant pitching performance by John Patterson, the Nationals lost 1-0. They were once again completely incapable of mustering any offense in a game that was critical for their playoff chances. And the Nationals once again could not score a runner (Cristian Guzman this time) from third with only one out. Brad Wilkerson, whose continuing decline is one of the most troubling aspects of the Nationals' offense, struck out, and Jose Vidro flied out to center as Guzman watched helplessly from third. A team that can't score runners from third with less than two outs doesn't deserve to be in the playoffs.
Jae Seo pitched well tonight for the Mets, allowing no runs over eight innings. But this game was more about the Nationals' bad bats than Seo's good arm. The Nationals can make a lot of pitchers look good, many of whom are average or journeyman players. Until the Nationals improve their offense, pitchers like Seo will relish the opportunity to pitch against them.
If this post sounds depressing, that's because we're depressed. Only teams like the Yankees, Red Sox, Cardinals, and a few others can assume each year that they'll either be in or challenging to be in the playoffs every year. Opportunities to make the playoffs don't come around very often, and we find it deeply disappointing that the team's management hasn't done more to capitalize on this opportunity. Instead, management is wasting great pitching performances like we saw from John Patterson tonight. He is arguably the eighth best pitcher in baseball, and yet all he has to show for it is a record of 7-4. That's bad news for Patterson, but it's a tragedy for the Nationals, who need more than seven wins from their best pitcher to make the playoffs.
We are seeing now the consequences of Bowden's inability to improve the Nationals' offense. It should come as no surprise that it's hard for one of the worst hitting teams in baseball to get into the playoffs. When your hitting is that bad you lose games like the Nationals lost tonight. Behind another brilliant pitching performance by John Patterson, the Nationals lost 1-0. They were once again completely incapable of mustering any offense in a game that was critical for their playoff chances. And the Nationals once again could not score a runner (Cristian Guzman this time) from third with only one out. Brad Wilkerson, whose continuing decline is one of the most troubling aspects of the Nationals' offense, struck out, and Jose Vidro flied out to center as Guzman watched helplessly from third. A team that can't score runners from third with less than two outs doesn't deserve to be in the playoffs.
Jae Seo pitched well tonight for the Mets, allowing no runs over eight innings. But this game was more about the Nationals' bad bats than Seo's good arm. The Nationals can make a lot of pitchers look good, many of whom are average or journeyman players. Until the Nationals improve their offense, pitchers like Seo will relish the opportunity to pitch against them.
If this post sounds depressing, that's because we're depressed. Only teams like the Yankees, Red Sox, Cardinals, and a few others can assume each year that they'll either be in or challenging to be in the playoffs every year. Opportunities to make the playoffs don't come around very often, and we find it deeply disappointing that the team's management hasn't done more to capitalize on this opportunity. Instead, management is wasting great pitching performances like we saw from John Patterson tonight. He is arguably the eighth best pitcher in baseball, and yet all he has to show for it is a record of 7-4. That's bad news for Patterson, but it's a tragedy for the Nationals, who need more than seven wins from their best pitcher to make the playoffs.
Tonight's Game
Tonight's game.
This could be a good pitching matchup. The Nationals start their best pitcher--John Patterson--and the Mets start Jae Seo--a 28 year old pitcher who, like Patterson, may have finally figured out this major league baseball stuff. Seo hasn't pitched a lot of innings this year, but he's been very effective. Here's a comparison between tonight's starters:
Patterson has the clear edge given that he's a more dominant pitcher and Seo's innings sample size is so small, but it's not like Seo is facing the '27 Yankees. He's facing a lineup that can go cold faster than Dippin' Dots being flash frozen. (That stuff is good, by the way--cookies and cream, try them.)
The Nationals will start what may be their best lineup at this point of the season, meaning that Cristian Guzman isn't starting. Let's hope they hit like they did in the first game in Philly.
Carlos Beltran starts tonight for the Mets. This is his second start since that awful face-to-face collision with Mike Cameron. Beltran was 1-2 with two walks in his first game back, so he appears to be at full strength.
With our best pitcher on the mound, this is a game we really need to win. Go Nats!
This could be a good pitching matchup. The Nationals start their best pitcher--John Patterson--and the Mets start Jae Seo--a 28 year old pitcher who, like Patterson, may have finally figured out this major league baseball stuff. Seo hasn't pitched a lot of innings this year, but he's been very effective. Here's a comparison between tonight's starters:
| Pitcher | IP | H/9 | BB/9 | K/9 | HR/9 | ERA | VORP |
| Patterson | 149.33 | 7.31 | 2.89 | 8.53 | .58 | 2.37 | 49.4 |
| Seo | 33.33 | 5.13 | 1.35 | 6.48 | .81 | 1.35 | 16 |
Patterson has the clear edge given that he's a more dominant pitcher and Seo's innings sample size is so small, but it's not like Seo is facing the '27 Yankees. He's facing a lineup that can go cold faster than Dippin' Dots being flash frozen. (That stuff is good, by the way--cookies and cream, try them.)
The Nationals will start what may be their best lineup at this point of the season, meaning that Cristian Guzman isn't starting. Let's hope they hit like they did in the first game in Philly.
Carlos Beltran starts tonight for the Mets. This is his second start since that awful face-to-face collision with Mike Cameron. Beltran was 1-2 with two walks in his first game back, so he appears to be at full strength.
With our best pitcher on the mound, this is a game we really need to win. Go Nats!
Coming soon to a ballpark near you
You can't reach any conclusions based on this, but Les Carpenter's article today suggests that Ryan Zimmerman is a great kid. Let's hope that Jim Bowden doesn't set him back a few years.
Gus Frerotte Memorial Injury Department
Does anyone remember when Gus Frerotte head butted a concrete wall and suffered a concussion? Well, this isn't the same, but it's close. Hector Carrasco "was unavailable for Thursday's day-night doubleheader because he leaped and ran into the outfield wall during batting practice Wednesday, injuring his right shoulder."
We hate to ask this, but what was Carrasco doing crashing into the outfield wall during BATTING PRACTICE?! Does he really need to be told that his job is not making leaping catches against the outfield wall?
The good news is that the X-rays were negative, and he's listed as day-to-day.
We hate to ask this, but what was Carrasco doing crashing into the outfield wall during BATTING PRACTICE?! Does he really need to be told that his job is not making leaping catches against the outfield wall?
The good news is that the X-rays were negative, and he's listed as day-to-day.
Three Days Rest
With John Halama pitching tonight, the Nationals needed another pitcher to start Sunday's game against the Mets. The lucky candidate? Esteban Loaiza. This means that Loaiza will throw on only three days rest. Any bets on how he'll do?
Thank God for the rare 8th inning rally!
Going into the eighth inning of the second game of today's doubleheader, things looked pretty bleak. The Nationals had lost the first game 2-1, and were down in the second game 4-3. In six more outs the Phillies would sweep the doubleheader and go 1.5 games ahead of the Nationals in the wild card race. After winning the first game of the series, the Nationals would have lost the final three and missed a golden opportunity to remain only .5 game from the wild card lead.
Ryan Drese once again was ineffective. He gave up four runs in four innings, and his ERA rose to 5.78. Luckily, John Halama (in his first appearance as a National) and Luis Ayala held the Phillies scoreless until the eighth and kept the Nationals close. But close doesn't mean a whole lot for this team lately, and with the team reverting back to its low-scoring offense, it didn't look like the Nationals could come back.
Yes, things looked bleak, but that was before Preston Wilson stepped to the plate. Preston Wilson? You mean the guy who was supposed to save the Nationals' offense but has emerged as a fourth outfielder? Yeah, that guy. With one out and Jose Guillen on second, Wilson singled to left to score Guillen, and Wilson went to second on the throw home.
Things still looked a little bleak, given that the game was tied 4-4 and the Nationals haven't been able to score runs late in games. But that was before Carlos Baerga stepped to the plate. Carlos Baerga? You mean the guy who is barely a major leaguer, the guy who runs like he's doing calisthenics? Yeah, that guy. Baerga singled to center to score Wilson, and the score was 5-4.
And just like that a day that seemed lost was all of a sudden a potential turning point and point to make a stand. By winning the second game of the day, the Nationals stayed within .5 game of the Phillies in the wild card race. And with another Houston loss, the race looks like this:
The Nationals are still in this thing, and if they can find a way around Ryan Drese maybe they can win it!
Ryan Drese once again was ineffective. He gave up four runs in four innings, and his ERA rose to 5.78. Luckily, John Halama (in his first appearance as a National) and Luis Ayala held the Phillies scoreless until the eighth and kept the Nationals close. But close doesn't mean a whole lot for this team lately, and with the team reverting back to its low-scoring offense, it didn't look like the Nationals could come back.
Yes, things looked bleak, but that was before Preston Wilson stepped to the plate. Preston Wilson? You mean the guy who was supposed to save the Nationals' offense but has emerged as a fourth outfielder? Yeah, that guy. With one out and Jose Guillen on second, Wilson singled to left to score Guillen, and Wilson went to second on the throw home.
Things still looked a little bleak, given that the game was tied 4-4 and the Nationals haven't been able to score runs late in games. But that was before Carlos Baerga stepped to the plate. Carlos Baerga? You mean the guy who is barely a major leaguer, the guy who runs like he's doing calisthenics? Yeah, that guy. Baerga singled to center to score Wilson, and the score was 5-4.
And just like that a day that seemed lost was all of a sudden a potential turning point and point to make a stand. By winning the second game of the day, the Nationals stayed within .5 game of the Phillies in the wild card race. And with another Houston loss, the race looks like this:
| Team | Record | Pct. | GB |
| Phillies | 65-57 | .533 | -- |
| Nationals | 64-57 | .529 | .5 |
| Astros | 64-57 | .529 | .5 |
| Marlins | 63-57 | .525 | 1 |
The Nationals are still in this thing, and if they can find a way around Ryan Drese maybe they can win it!
Thursday, August 18, 2005
Today's First Game
Today's first game.
Here are batting averages of the last four hitters in today's lineup: .242, .231, .190, .143. Not good.
Here are batting averages of the last four hitters in today's lineup: .242, .231, .190, .143. Not good.
John Halama
The Nationals will call up John Halama to start Sunday's game against the Mets. Ryan Drese was supposed to start that game after pitching on Tuesday in Philadelphia, but the Tuesday game was postponed until Thursday because of rain. Drese will now pitch that make-up game, which will be the second game in Thursday's doubleheader.
We'd love to think that Halama will pitch well enough to take Ryan Drese's spot in the rotation, but we're not optimistic. He's pitched well in limited Triple-A action since the Nationals acquired him on August 5; he's given up one earned run in eight innings. But his sub-par performance with Boston earlier this year--in 30 games he had a 1-1 record and a 6.18 ERA--led the Red Sox to designate him for assignment on July 26. Can Halama shake off the troubles he had in Boston? Maybe, but let's not hold our breath. Hopefully he can be productive enough to pitch effectively out of the bullpen.
By the way, the Nationals sent down Brandon Watson to make room for Halama. So much for that great new bat in the outfield.
We'd love to think that Halama will pitch well enough to take Ryan Drese's spot in the rotation, but we're not optimistic. He's pitched well in limited Triple-A action since the Nationals acquired him on August 5; he's given up one earned run in eight innings. But his sub-par performance with Boston earlier this year--in 30 games he had a 1-1 record and a 6.18 ERA--led the Red Sox to designate him for assignment on July 26. Can Halama shake off the troubles he had in Boston? Maybe, but let's not hold our breath. Hopefully he can be productive enough to pitch effectively out of the bullpen.
By the way, the Nationals sent down Brandon Watson to make room for Halama. So much for that great new bat in the outfield.
Do you listen to yourself talk?
Jim Bowden has become downright embarrassing.
This is from mlb.com:
"Top prospect: Bowden had hoped that he wouldn't bring up third baseman Ryan Zimmerman to the big leagues until next season, but Bowden hinted after Wednesday's game that Zimmerman may be up soon.
In fact, Bowden instructed his Minor League people to play Zimmerman at shortstop on a daily basis for Double-A Harrisburg starting Wednesday night against Bowie.
'I would like to avoid bringing him up, but we are in a pennant race. And when you are in a pennant race that is this close, and it's going to make you better, you have to do what's right for the team,' Bowden said.
'He has the ability to play both short and third. It protects us at both positions as we head into September. He is a very special defensive player, with great hands and a good arm. He is going to hit and hit for power. He's probably going to be rushed to the big leagues, but that's life.'"
If it's true that "you have to do what's right for the team," why didn't Bowden make any trades at the trade deadline? He said then that he didn't want to trade players like Zimmerman because he wanted to protect the team's investment in him. Then why is he rushing him to the majors? And why is he asking Zimmerman to play not one, but two positions, one of which--shortstop--he hasn't been playing in the minors? Doesn't Bowden think that setting up a young player to fail is going to undermine the team's investment in him?
Brian at Nationals Farm Authority has addressed this issue before and says it far better than we ever could:
"While I don't necessarily disagree with the concept of seeing what is down on the farm, Bowden's statements are all bluster that don't put the long term interests of the Nationals at the forefront.
Specifically with regards to Dutch Zimmerman.
Zimmerman is not ready for the majors at this point. He may be ready defensively, but he's not there with the bat ... yet. Zimmerman is the future 3B for the Nationals, but make no mistake, he's not Alex Rodriguez or Ken Griffey Jr or Albert Pujols or even Miguel Cabrera with the bat. Those 4 guys were quickly promoted to the majors at ages ranging from 19 to 21 primarily because they were ready with the bat (and in Griffey's case, the glove as well). Zimmerman is only 21 and entering his first extended experience with wood bats as a professional against professional pitchers. He needs to time to become comfortable with the bat and ideally turn his doubles power into something more accustomed to a corner IF spot. He's not going to do that against major league pitchers who tend to eat young hitters alive. The last thing you want to do is mess with Dutch's development when it is not necessary.
Additionally, why would you want to start his arbitration clock so soon after drafting him? If he comes to the major leagues this year, he enters free agency at 27/28 years old. Traditionally, the prime of a player's career. Waiting one year might not seem like alot right now, but it certainly will pay dividends 4-5 years down the road when the Nationals can control Dutch's contract at a time when he should be entering the best part of his career."
This is from mlb.com:
"Top prospect: Bowden had hoped that he wouldn't bring up third baseman Ryan Zimmerman to the big leagues until next season, but Bowden hinted after Wednesday's game that Zimmerman may be up soon.
In fact, Bowden instructed his Minor League people to play Zimmerman at shortstop on a daily basis for Double-A Harrisburg starting Wednesday night against Bowie.
'I would like to avoid bringing him up, but we are in a pennant race. And when you are in a pennant race that is this close, and it's going to make you better, you have to do what's right for the team,' Bowden said.
'He has the ability to play both short and third. It protects us at both positions as we head into September. He is a very special defensive player, with great hands and a good arm. He is going to hit and hit for power. He's probably going to be rushed to the big leagues, but that's life.'"
If it's true that "you have to do what's right for the team," why didn't Bowden make any trades at the trade deadline? He said then that he didn't want to trade players like Zimmerman because he wanted to protect the team's investment in him. Then why is he rushing him to the majors? And why is he asking Zimmerman to play not one, but two positions, one of which--shortstop--he hasn't been playing in the minors? Doesn't Bowden think that setting up a young player to fail is going to undermine the team's investment in him?
Brian at Nationals Farm Authority has addressed this issue before and says it far better than we ever could:
"While I don't necessarily disagree with the concept of seeing what is down on the farm, Bowden's statements are all bluster that don't put the long term interests of the Nationals at the forefront.
Specifically with regards to Dutch Zimmerman.
Zimmerman is not ready for the majors at this point. He may be ready defensively, but he's not there with the bat ... yet. Zimmerman is the future 3B for the Nationals, but make no mistake, he's not Alex Rodriguez or Ken Griffey Jr or Albert Pujols or even Miguel Cabrera with the bat. Those 4 guys were quickly promoted to the majors at ages ranging from 19 to 21 primarily because they were ready with the bat (and in Griffey's case, the glove as well). Zimmerman is only 21 and entering his first extended experience with wood bats as a professional against professional pitchers. He needs to time to become comfortable with the bat and ideally turn his doubles power into something more accustomed to a corner IF spot. He's not going to do that against major league pitchers who tend to eat young hitters alive. The last thing you want to do is mess with Dutch's development when it is not necessary.
Additionally, why would you want to start his arbitration clock so soon after drafting him? If he comes to the major leagues this year, he enters free agency at 27/28 years old. Traditionally, the prime of a player's career. Waiting one year might not seem like alot right now, but it certainly will pay dividends 4-5 years down the road when the Nationals can control Dutch's contract at a time when he should be entering the best part of his career."
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
A Blown Opportunity
On a night when they had the chance to take sole possession of first place in the National League wild card race, the Nationals failed to take advantage of the opportunity. The Houston Astros lost 4-2, meaning that a win would give the Nationals a one-half game lead in the wild card race. But poor starting pitching and poor hitting, especially in key situations, doomed the Nationals in a game they could have won. Playoff teams can't afford to lose games like this, and the Nationals may regret this loss come the end of September in a race that may be very close. They may also regret it tomorrow, because had they won tonight all they had to win the series was split a double header tomorrow. Now, they have to sweep the double header to accomplish the same feat, which will be difficult given that they'll be starting their two weakest starting pitchers.
Tonight's pitching matchup on paper favored the Nationals, but they don't play the game on paper, they play it on a field. Esteban Loaiza was in trouble from the beginning and clearly didn't have his best stuff. Jimmy Rollins and Kenny Lofton singled to lead off the game, and Chase Utley hit a sacrifice fly that scored Rollins from third. Brad Wilkerson threw wildly to home, and Lofton advanced to second. That would prove to be a costly mistake, because Lofton scored from second on Pat Burrell's double. Would Lofton have scored from first? Maybe, but that's not a question we should be having to answer in a game of this magnitude.
The Nationals tied the game in the top of third on a Vinny Castilla homer and a Jose Vidro single, which drove in Cristian Guzman, who had doubled and moved to third on Loaiza's bunt.
Unfortunately, the Phillies came right back to score two runs. Rollins singled and Loften doubled him to third. After Utley grounded out, Bobby Abreu doubled in both Rollins and Loften. You can argue that the Nationals should have walked Abreu to load the bases to set up an inning ending double play with the right-handed hitting Burrell coming up, and we wouldn't say you were wrong. Of course, Burrell had already doubled off of Loaiza, so you need to be careful with this argument. In any event, Frank Robinson chose to pitch to Abreu and Loaiza chose to challenge Abreu and at least one of those decisions was a mistake.
It looked like the Phillies might blow the game open in the sixth when they loaded the bases with two outs. Luis Ayala replaced Loaiza and, thankfully, struck out Jason Michaels.
The Nationals then had the chance to tie the game in the top of the seventh. Preston Wilson singled off Ryan Madsen and moved to third on Brian Schneider's ground rule double. Castilla then hit a sacrifice fly that scored Wilson and advanced Schneider to third. The Nationals now had Schneider at third with one out, and all they had to do was hit a fly ball to score him. The problem in these situations is that the Nationals don't have much of a bench. Of course, the Nationals could have acquired some bench help with some trades before the trade deadline, but that's another story. In any event, Carlos Baerga, batting for Guzman, popped out to third, and Ryan Church, batting for Ayala, grounded out to second.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, was the game, because the Nationals went out one, two, three in the eighth and when down in order after Jose Guillen singled to open the ninth.
Philadelphia, not Washington, is now in first place in the wild card race, which looks like this:
Tonight's pitching matchup on paper favored the Nationals, but they don't play the game on paper, they play it on a field. Esteban Loaiza was in trouble from the beginning and clearly didn't have his best stuff. Jimmy Rollins and Kenny Lofton singled to lead off the game, and Chase Utley hit a sacrifice fly that scored Rollins from third. Brad Wilkerson threw wildly to home, and Lofton advanced to second. That would prove to be a costly mistake, because Lofton scored from second on Pat Burrell's double. Would Lofton have scored from first? Maybe, but that's not a question we should be having to answer in a game of this magnitude.
The Nationals tied the game in the top of third on a Vinny Castilla homer and a Jose Vidro single, which drove in Cristian Guzman, who had doubled and moved to third on Loaiza's bunt.
Unfortunately, the Phillies came right back to score two runs. Rollins singled and Loften doubled him to third. After Utley grounded out, Bobby Abreu doubled in both Rollins and Loften. You can argue that the Nationals should have walked Abreu to load the bases to set up an inning ending double play with the right-handed hitting Burrell coming up, and we wouldn't say you were wrong. Of course, Burrell had already doubled off of Loaiza, so you need to be careful with this argument. In any event, Frank Robinson chose to pitch to Abreu and Loaiza chose to challenge Abreu and at least one of those decisions was a mistake.
It looked like the Phillies might blow the game open in the sixth when they loaded the bases with two outs. Luis Ayala replaced Loaiza and, thankfully, struck out Jason Michaels.
The Nationals then had the chance to tie the game in the top of the seventh. Preston Wilson singled off Ryan Madsen and moved to third on Brian Schneider's ground rule double. Castilla then hit a sacrifice fly that scored Wilson and advanced Schneider to third. The Nationals now had Schneider at third with one out, and all they had to do was hit a fly ball to score him. The problem in these situations is that the Nationals don't have much of a bench. Of course, the Nationals could have acquired some bench help with some trades before the trade deadline, but that's another story. In any event, Carlos Baerga, batting for Guzman, popped out to third, and Ryan Church, batting for Ayala, grounded out to second.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, was the game, because the Nationals went out one, two, three in the eighth and when down in order after Jose Guillen singled to open the ninth.
Philadelphia, not Washington, is now in first place in the wild card race, which looks like this:
| Team | Record | Pct. | GB |
| Astros | 64-56 | .533 | -- |
| Phillies | 64-56 | .533 | -- |
| Nationals | 63-56 | .529 | .5 |
| Marlins | 62-57 | .521 | 1.5 |
Tonight's Game
Tonight's game.
Tonight's pitching matchup heavily favors the Nationals. Ranked by VORP, Esteban Loaiza is the 23rd best pitcher in the majors this year, and Jon Lieber is the 210th. Lieber can run hot and cold, so let's hope he's cold tonight.
It looks like Frank Robinson's criticism of Cristian Guzman wasn't disqualifying, because Guzman starts tonight at shortstop. Preston Wilson bats 5th and Brian Schneider 6th, so Vinny Castilla, Guzman, and Loaiza make up the lost last third of the lineup. That's an OPS of .695, .497, and .495 in the last three positions. Interesting, isn't it, that the pitcher's OPS is about the same as the OPS of the 8th place hitter, whose OPS is dramatically worse that the OPS of the 7th place hitter, whose OPS is terrible. That's not the lineup of a good hitting team, and it probably means a lot of stalled rallies. That's a real problem because the Nats don't hit a lot of home runs and therefore have to get most of their runs via sustained rallies. Let's hope for a surge in power tonight!
Tonight's pitching matchup heavily favors the Nationals. Ranked by VORP, Esteban Loaiza is the 23rd best pitcher in the majors this year, and Jon Lieber is the 210th. Lieber can run hot and cold, so let's hope he's cold tonight.
It looks like Frank Robinson's criticism of Cristian Guzman wasn't disqualifying, because Guzman starts tonight at shortstop. Preston Wilson bats 5th and Brian Schneider 6th, so Vinny Castilla, Guzman, and Loaiza make up the lost last third of the lineup. That's an OPS of .695, .497, and .495 in the last three positions. Interesting, isn't it, that the pitcher's OPS is about the same as the OPS of the 8th place hitter, whose OPS is dramatically worse that the OPS of the 7th place hitter, whose OPS is terrible. That's not the lineup of a good hitting team, and it probably means a lot of stalled rallies. That's a real problem because the Nats don't hit a lot of home runs and therefore have to get most of their runs via sustained rallies. Let's hope for a surge in power tonight!
Runs Scored-Runs Allowed
Although it's frequently maligned, one of the best indicators of a team's success is the runs scored-runs allowed differential. That is, a team that allows as many runs as it scores is going to be a .500 team. Only teams that score substantially more runs than they allow will be successful in the long term.
It's possible to beat the house for a time--as the Nationals did in the first half--but eventually the house will win. And, in fact, the Nationals were headed very quickly to .500 status after they were swept by San Diego over a week ago. After a phenomenal first half, they were then 58-53, only five games above .500.
Since then, the Nationals have rebounded. Why? As we said, the Nationals had no hope of improving by reducing their runs scored. Rather, the only path upward was to score more runs, and that's exactly what the Nats have done. Since being swept by San Diego, the Nationals have a runs scored-runs allowed differential of +17, and their differential translates to a 162 game record of 120-42. That compares quite nicely with the Nationals expected record, which is based on the runs scored-runs allowed differential for the entire season to date, of 58-60. In other words, the Nationals have improved their differential substantially during this recent win streak.
Can the Nationals keep it up? They would have been in a much better position had they traded for more offense, but, although there is a chance they'll pick up a productive player via waivers, we have to assume that this is the team they'll have during the stretch drive. The Nationals are going to need a lot of their players to get or stay hot from here, including some players, like Brad Wilkerson, Preston Wilson, Jose Vidro, and Vinny Castilla, who haven't been lighting the world on fire. In other words, the odds are probably against them, but it's possible.
It's possible to beat the house for a time--as the Nationals did in the first half--but eventually the house will win. And, in fact, the Nationals were headed very quickly to .500 status after they were swept by San Diego over a week ago. After a phenomenal first half, they were then 58-53, only five games above .500.
Since then, the Nationals have rebounded. Why? As we said, the Nationals had no hope of improving by reducing their runs scored. Rather, the only path upward was to score more runs, and that's exactly what the Nats have done. Since being swept by San Diego, the Nationals have a runs scored-runs allowed differential of +17, and their differential translates to a 162 game record of 120-42. That compares quite nicely with the Nationals expected record, which is based on the runs scored-runs allowed differential for the entire season to date, of 58-60. In other words, the Nationals have improved their differential substantially during this recent win streak.
Can the Nationals keep it up? They would have been in a much better position had they traded for more offense, but, although there is a chance they'll pick up a productive player via waivers, we have to assume that this is the team they'll have during the stretch drive. The Nationals are going to need a lot of their players to get or stay hot from here, including some players, like Brad Wilkerson, Preston Wilson, Jose Vidro, and Vinny Castilla, who haven't been lighting the world on fire. In other words, the odds are probably against them, but it's possible.
Yeah, about those deals...
The Nationals signed Vinny Castilla from the Rockies and Cristian Guzman from the Twins. Neither is doing particularly well this year. Oh, why be so courteous, they both stink!
Out of 27 third basemen in all of baseball with 300 or more at bats, Castilla ranks 23rd. Out of 28 shortstops in all of baseball with 300 or more at bats, Guzman ranks 28th. That's not a whole lot of production from the left side of the infield.
Nationals Farm Authority looked at the players the Rockies and Twins drafted with the picks the Nationals surrendered. Brian rightly raises caveats with this analysis, but the Twins' pick looks to be performing quite well in rookie ball. It will interesting--and perhaps painful--to track the progress of these picks through the minors.
| Player | OBP | SLG | OPS | VORP |
| Castilla | .313 | .381 | .694 | 4.9 |
| Guzman | .227 | .266 | .493 | -20.6 |
Out of 27 third basemen in all of baseball with 300 or more at bats, Castilla ranks 23rd. Out of 28 shortstops in all of baseball with 300 or more at bats, Guzman ranks 28th. That's not a whole lot of production from the left side of the infield.
Nationals Farm Authority looked at the players the Rockies and Twins drafted with the picks the Nationals surrendered. Brian rightly raises caveats with this analysis, but the Twins' pick looks to be performing quite well in rookie ball. It will interesting--and perhaps painful--to track the progress of these picks through the minors.
Another reason why the rain was good
Rocket has another reason why the rainout was actually a good thing and why tonight's game is so important: if the Nationals can win tonight, and as we'll point out later today the pitching matchup favors them, that would force the Phillies to sweep the Thursday doubleheader just to split the series. Ryan Drese will be pitching one of those doubleheader games, so the Nats won't be bringing their best pitchers to the party, but sweeping a doubleheader is difficult, and if the Nats can win tonight and avoid the sweep they will have taken three out of four in a critical series.
Did Robinson actually criticize Guzman?
Frank Robinson has been very careful not to criticize Cristian Guzman too much during Guzman's baseball meltdown this season. But on Tuesday Robinson finally recognized the obvious. In particular, Robinson criticized Guzman's defense, which has been awful recently.
Could it be that Robinson will finally think rationally when deciding who to start at shortstop?
Could it be that Robinson will finally think rationally when deciding who to start at shortstop?
Thank God for the rain!
The rain in Philly caused a postponement of the second game of the series, but Houston and Florida lost, so the wild card standings look like this:
The Nationals are tantalizingly close to the wild card lead, but we doubt they would have taken the lead had Ryan Drese continued to pitch tonight. The Phillies were leading 1-0 after their first three hitters singled, and they had men on first and third with one out when play was halted. Given the way Drese has pitched recently, we're confident that that wasn't the last run the Phillies would have scored on Drese. In other words, the rain may have come at a very opportune time.
The teams will play a double header on Thursday to make up the game, and Drese will pitch the second game, so he'll have the opportunity then to throw more gas on the fire. Until then, perhaps Esteban Loaiza and Tony Armas can put together a couple of wins that vault the Nats into first place in the wild card race.
| Team | Record | Pct. | GB |
| Astros | 64-55 | .538 | -- |
| Nationals | 63-55 | .534 | .5 |
| Phillies | 63-56 | .529 | 1 |
| Marlins | 61-57 | .517 | 2.5 |
The Nationals are tantalizingly close to the wild card lead, but we doubt they would have taken the lead had Ryan Drese continued to pitch tonight. The Phillies were leading 1-0 after their first three hitters singled, and they had men on first and third with one out when play was halted. Given the way Drese has pitched recently, we're confident that that wasn't the last run the Phillies would have scored on Drese. In other words, the rain may have come at a very opportune time.
The teams will play a double header on Thursday to make up the game, and Drese will pitch the second game, so he'll have the opportunity then to throw more gas on the fire. Until then, perhaps Esteban Loaiza and Tony Armas can put together a couple of wins that vault the Nats into first place in the wild card race.
Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Tonight's Game
Tonight's game.
This is not a great pitching matchup for the Nationals. Ryan Drese, who has had trouble getting anyone out, goes against Cory Lidle, whose VORP is 8.7 compared to Drese's 1.3. On the other hand, Lidle isn't great, and his ERA--4.61--shows that he can be very hittable. If the Nationals continue to hit the ball the way they have in the past four games, they should do well. On the other hand, if they revert to past practices, well...
The Nationals are once against starting Cristian Guzman, we guess for defense. Wait a minute, Guzman's been awful lately on defense, right? So, then, we don't understand; why are we starting Guzman?
This is not a great pitching matchup for the Nationals. Ryan Drese, who has had trouble getting anyone out, goes against Cory Lidle, whose VORP is 8.7 compared to Drese's 1.3. On the other hand, Lidle isn't great, and his ERA--4.61--shows that he can be very hittable. If the Nationals continue to hit the ball the way they have in the past four games, they should do well. On the other hand, if they revert to past practices, well...
The Nationals are once against starting Cristian Guzman, we guess for defense. Wait a minute, Guzman's been awful lately on defense, right? So, then, we don't understand; why are we starting Guzman?
The problem with the wild card
We admit that we weren't early proponents of the wild card "innovation." We feared that it would undermine the importance of the divisional races and dilute the one thing that distinguishes baseball from other sports: the 162 game season is a great means to determine the best teams in the game. The wild card permits teams who didn't distinguish themselves as champions in the regular season to get into the playoffs, and once in the playoffs they could win the World Series because the characteristics that are necessary for victory in the playoffs are not necessarily the same as those that are necessary for victory in the divisional races.
Some of those worries were well founded, others were not, but before you attack us we'll concede that we've been converted: the wild card is a net positive for baseball and has generated increased interest in the playoff races.
But here's one problem with the wild card race that we didn't anticipate: as the wild card teams near the end of the season, the schedule isn't necessarily related to the wild card race and may do nothing to build interest in that race. The regular season schedule is built exclusively on the divisional race; as the season ends, teams play most of their games against their division opponents. When the divisional race is close, this schedule helps build interest in that race. But the schedule is largely irrelevant to the wild card race when a team like the Braves or the Cardinals has locked up that race and the wild card teams aren't in the same division.
The Nationals, Phillies, and Marlins are all in the race this year, so the fact that the schedule has them playing each other is a good thing. But the scheduling problem we've identified is on prominent display this year: the two teams at the top of the wild card race--the Nationals and the Astros--WILL NOT PLAY EACH OTHER AS THE RACE INTENSIFIES! What kind of stretch drive is that?!
We realize that there is no way to build a wild card race into the schedule because you're never really sure who will be in the race as the season ends. But, as fans, we can say this of the schedule and the race between the Nationals and the Astros: IT SUCKS!
Some of those worries were well founded, others were not, but before you attack us we'll concede that we've been converted: the wild card is a net positive for baseball and has generated increased interest in the playoff races.
But here's one problem with the wild card race that we didn't anticipate: as the wild card teams near the end of the season, the schedule isn't necessarily related to the wild card race and may do nothing to build interest in that race. The regular season schedule is built exclusively on the divisional race; as the season ends, teams play most of their games against their division opponents. When the divisional race is close, this schedule helps build interest in that race. But the schedule is largely irrelevant to the wild card race when a team like the Braves or the Cardinals has locked up that race and the wild card teams aren't in the same division.
The Nationals, Phillies, and Marlins are all in the race this year, so the fact that the schedule has them playing each other is a good thing. But the scheduling problem we've identified is on prominent display this year: the two teams at the top of the wild card race--the Nationals and the Astros--WILL NOT PLAY EACH OTHER AS THE RACE INTENSIFIES! What kind of stretch drive is that?!
We realize that there is no way to build a wild card race into the schedule because you're never really sure who will be in the race as the season ends. But, as fans, we can say this of the schedule and the race between the Nationals and the Astros: IT SUCKS!
Monday, August 15, 2005
Four
The Nationals won their fourth game in a row behind Livan Hernandez' strong pitching performance and an offensive outburst that isn't often seen when the Nats are playing outside of Colorado. The Nationals are now 1/2 game ahead of Philadelphia in the wild card race and are in the midst of their longest win streak since the beginning of July.
Livan Hernandez was everything he was advertised to be tonight. After the Nationals staked him to a 3-0 lead, he got into trouble in the first inning by loading the bases with one out. When Pat Burrell singled in two runs, things were beginning to look grim. But Hernandez struck out Ryan Howard and induced David Bell to ground out to third. From there it was all Hernandez, who allowed only three hits and four baserunners over the next seven innings. The Phillies never got a man past first and were utterly powerless to muster any offense against Livan. Amazingly, Hernandez threw 33 pitches in the first inning, but only 80 over the next seven.
Meanwhile, the Nationals continued to pound the ball as if they were in Colorado. Preston Wilson hit two home runs and drove in four, and Nick Johnson and Brian Schneider each hit solo home runs. Johnson and Wilson hit home runs in the first to give the Nationals a 3-0 lead, and Wilson hit another two-run homer in the fifth to make it 5-2. The Phillies protested that a fan had reached out into the field of play to touch Wilson's fifth inning homer, but the umpires rejected the challenge. It was another double-digit hit night (10) for the Nationals, as they once again seemed to abandon the play for one run style that had plagued them for so long.
Frank Robinson brought in Chad Cordero to close out the ninth even though it wasn't a save situation. Robinson may wanted to do anything to keep this momentum going, and we don't blame him one bit for that. Cordero gave up one run, but it was unearned after Cristian Guzman committed yet another error. Winning can mask weaknesses, but Guzman has been exposed as a minor league player for too long for people not to notice now.
This was a huge win for the Nationals and a great way to start the series. With Ryan Drese pitching tomorrow night, this was really a game that the Nats had to win.
Assuming that the Astros win tonight--they're beating the Cubs 11-4 in the seventh--the wild card race looks like this:
Livan Hernandez was everything he was advertised to be tonight. After the Nationals staked him to a 3-0 lead, he got into trouble in the first inning by loading the bases with one out. When Pat Burrell singled in two runs, things were beginning to look grim. But Hernandez struck out Ryan Howard and induced David Bell to ground out to third. From there it was all Hernandez, who allowed only three hits and four baserunners over the next seven innings. The Phillies never got a man past first and were utterly powerless to muster any offense against Livan. Amazingly, Hernandez threw 33 pitches in the first inning, but only 80 over the next seven.
Meanwhile, the Nationals continued to pound the ball as if they were in Colorado. Preston Wilson hit two home runs and drove in four, and Nick Johnson and Brian Schneider each hit solo home runs. Johnson and Wilson hit home runs in the first to give the Nationals a 3-0 lead, and Wilson hit another two-run homer in the fifth to make it 5-2. The Phillies protested that a fan had reached out into the field of play to touch Wilson's fifth inning homer, but the umpires rejected the challenge. It was another double-digit hit night (10) for the Nationals, as they once again seemed to abandon the play for one run style that had plagued them for so long.
Frank Robinson brought in Chad Cordero to close out the ninth even though it wasn't a save situation. Robinson may wanted to do anything to keep this momentum going, and we don't blame him one bit for that. Cordero gave up one run, but it was unearned after Cristian Guzman committed yet another error. Winning can mask weaknesses, but Guzman has been exposed as a minor league player for too long for people not to notice now.
This was a huge win for the Nationals and a great way to start the series. With Ryan Drese pitching tomorrow night, this was really a game that the Nats had to win.
Assuming that the Astros win tonight--they're beating the Cubs 11-4 in the seventh--the wild card race looks like this:
| Team | Record | Pct. | GB |
| Astros | 64-54 | .542 | -- |
| Nationals | 63-55 | .534 | 1 |
| Phillies | 63-56 | .529 | 1.5 |
| Marlins | 61-56 | .521 | 2.5 |
Tonight's Game
Tonight's game.
It's hard to overestimate the importance of this series. The Nationals are on something of a roll, and they would put some serious distance between themselves and Philly in the wild card race if they can win three out of these four games. That's no easy task, especially because they will be playing in Philly. On the other hand, if they lose the series, they may go a long way toward putting an insurmountable distance between themselves and both the Astros and the Phillies. Other than that, of course, this series is no big deal.
This is a pretty even pitching matchup. Livan Hernandez sports a VORP of 36.8, while Bret Myers' VORP is 33.9. Livan really needs to step up the challenge tonight. He wasn't able to do that in his last start, and he's been incredibly volatile recently, but this is a means for him to put all of that behind him.
The Nats start Cristian Guzman and Preston Wilson tonight. It will be interesting to see whether they can hit in Philadelphia the way they hit in Colorado. Indeed, it will be interesting to see whether the entire Nationals' lineup can even come close to the offensive attack they mounted in Coors Field. We won't be holding our breath, but all the Nationals need to do is a fraction of what they did in Colorado for them to be successful in Philly.
Go Nats!
It's hard to overestimate the importance of this series. The Nationals are on something of a roll, and they would put some serious distance between themselves and Philly in the wild card race if they can win three out of these four games. That's no easy task, especially because they will be playing in Philly. On the other hand, if they lose the series, they may go a long way toward putting an insurmountable distance between themselves and both the Astros and the Phillies. Other than that, of course, this series is no big deal.
This is a pretty even pitching matchup. Livan Hernandez sports a VORP of 36.8, while Bret Myers' VORP is 33.9. Livan really needs to step up the challenge tonight. He wasn't able to do that in his last start, and he's been incredibly volatile recently, but this is a means for him to put all of that behind him.
The Nats start Cristian Guzman and Preston Wilson tonight. It will be interesting to see whether they can hit in Philadelphia the way they hit in Colorado. Indeed, it will be interesting to see whether the entire Nationals' lineup can even come close to the offensive attack they mounted in Coors Field. We won't be holding our breath, but all the Nationals need to do is a fraction of what they did in Colorado for them to be successful in Philly.
Go Nats!
The Wild Card Race--the Marlins, cont'd
On Friday we compared the Nationals' and Marlins' position players. Today we'll compare their pitching staffs.
WASHINGTON
FLORIDA
The Marlins have a core of very good young pitchers. Willis, Burnett, and Beckett all are top flight pitchers who should be with the Marlins for a very long time. We say "should" because they all may not be there for long; for salary reasons the Marlins tried to deal Burnett before the trade deadline. Brian Moehler has been effective as a fourth starter, and in a limited showing Jason Vargas has been good so far. That's a very good starting five, assuming that Vargas can continue to be effective.
The Marlins' bullpen has some significant weaknesses. They have an effective closer--Todd Jones--and a fairly effective set-up man--Guillermo Mota, but they don't have a whole lot of depth in the bullpen. Indeed, it's pretty hard to pull together from their roster a list of four middle relievers you'd want for the long term. As you can see from some of those statistics, the Marlins have to shudder when they turn the ball over to the relief core in the sixth and seventh innings.
As a set, the Marlin's starters are better than the Nationals' because of the comparison of the fourth and fifth starters. Tony Armas and Ryan Drese are not as good as Moehler and Vargas, although, again, we're making some assumptions about Vargas given his limited appearances to date.
The teams' closers are both good, and it's hard to pick one over the other.
Where the Nationals outclass the Marlins is in their middle relievers. The Nationals have a depth to their bullpen that the Marlins just don't have. For that reason, we'd call the comparison between the two teams' pitching staffs pretty close, with the Marlins perhaps having a slight edge because of the strength of their fourth and fifth starters.
Given that the Marlins have the better hitting lineup, we'd have to say that they have the better team, although it's a lot closer than one would have thought going into the season. We're a little puzzled as to why the Marlins aren't doing better this season given their very good young talent. Perhaps it's because the talent is young, but the Marlins should have challenged the Braves for the title this year. Despite their relative mediocrity this season, this is a team that should be very good for a very long time.
WASHINGTON
| Pitcher | H/9 | BB/9 | K/9 | HR/9 | VORP |
| Patterson | 7.14 | 2.92 | 8.71 | 0.61 | 45.60 |
| Hernandez | 9.82 | 3.15 | 5.39 | 0.61 | 36.80 |
| Loaiza | 9.14 | 2.30 | 6.78 | 0.83 | 34.40 |
| Armas | 8.08 | 4.24 | 4.93 | 1.28 | 13.70 |
| Drese | 9.86 | 3.40 | 3.88 | 0.32 | 1.20 |
| Ayala | 9.98 | 1.69 | 4.64 | 0.84 | 16.90 |
| Majewski | 9.00 | 4.00 | 4.83 | 0.17 | 13.60 |
| Carrasco | 6.99 | 3.88 | 5.63 | 0.97 | 14.90 |
| Eischen | 9.45 | 4.05 | 7.65 | 0.00 | 3.50 |
| Stanton | 10.80 | 1.35 | 2.70 | 0.00 | 3.20 |
| Cordero | 6.68 | 1.89 | 7.40 | 0.58 | 24.60 |
FLORIDA
| Pitcher | H/9 | BB/9 | K/9 | HR/9 | VORP |
| Willis | 8.25 | 1.91 | 6.50 | 0.38 | 49.00 |
| Burnett | 7.69 | 3.18 | 8.04 | 0.52 | 34.30 |
| Beckett | 7.32 | 2.76 | 8.22 | 0.62 | 29.30 |
| Moehler | 10.58 | 2.51 | 4.95 | 0.61 | 28.70 |
| Vargas | 5.56 | 3.97 | 7.54 | 0.00 | 7.30 |
| Mecir | 8.54 | 2.54 | 6.92 | 0.46 | 8.30 |
| de los Santos | 10.23 | 4.91 | 6.55 | 1.64 | -1.30 |
| Messinger | 8.22 | 8.22 | 5.28 | 0.59 | 2.50 |
| Mota | 8.82 | 4.14 | 7.74 | 0.72 | 4.10 |
| Kensing | 17.47 | 4.76 | 6.35 | 3.18 | -3.50 |
| Jones | 6.10 | 2.09 | 7.32 | 0.17 | 24.20 |
The Marlins have a core of very good young pitchers. Willis, Burnett, and Beckett all are top flight pitchers who should be with the Marlins for a very long time. We say "should" because they all may not be there for long; for salary reasons the Marlins tried to deal Burnett before the trade deadline. Brian Moehler has been effective as a fourth starter, and in a limited showing Jason Vargas has been good so far. That's a very good starting five, assuming that Vargas can continue to be effective.
The Marlins' bullpen has some significant weaknesses. They have an effective closer--Todd Jones--and a fairly effective set-up man--Guillermo Mota, but they don't have a whole lot of depth in the bullpen. Indeed, it's pretty hard to pull together from their roster a list of four middle relievers you'd want for the long term. As you can see from some of those statistics, the Marlins have to shudder when they turn the ball over to the relief core in the sixth and seventh innings.
As a set, the Marlin's starters are better than the Nationals' because of the comparison of the fourth and fifth starters. Tony Armas and Ryan Drese are not as good as Moehler and Vargas, although, again, we're making some assumptions about Vargas given his limited appearances to date.
The teams' closers are both good, and it's hard to pick one over the other.
Where the Nationals outclass the Marlins is in their middle relievers. The Nationals have a depth to their bullpen that the Marlins just don't have. For that reason, we'd call the comparison between the two teams' pitching staffs pretty close, with the Marlins perhaps having a slight edge because of the strength of their fourth and fifth starters.
Given that the Marlins have the better hitting lineup, we'd have to say that they have the better team, although it's a lot closer than one would have thought going into the season. We're a little puzzled as to why the Marlins aren't doing better this season given their very good young talent. Perhaps it's because the talent is young, but the Marlins should have challenged the Braves for the title this year. Despite their relative mediocrity this season, this is a team that should be very good for a very long time.
The schedule from here
The three teams at the top of the wild card race are Washington, Houston, and Philadelphia. Let's look at the schedules to see who will have the easier time of it.
The Nationals have 45 games left, 25 of which are at home. If the Nationals win those games at the same rate they've won their home and away games to date, they would win 15 of their home games and 9 of their road games and would end up with a record of 86-76. Of the Nationals' remaining games, 13 are against teams who would be in the playoffs if the season ended today and 36 are against teams who currently have a record better than .500.
The Astros have 45 games left, 24 of which are at home. If they win at the same rate they've won their home and away games to date, they would win 16 of their home games and 8 of their road games and would end up with a record of 87-75. Of the Astros' remaining games, 8 are against teams who would be in the playoffs if the season ended today and 12 are against teams who currently have a record better than .500. The Astros have an easier schedule from here because most of their remaining games are against teams in the Central Division, which is much weaker than the East.
The Phillies have 44 games left, 20 of which are at home. If the Phillies win those games at the same rate they've won their home and away games to date, they would win 12 of their home games and 11 of their road games and would end up with a record of 86-76. Of the Phillies' remaining games, 10 are against teams who would be in the playoffs if the season ended today and 32 are against teams who currently have a record better than .500.
So, if the remainder of the season goes like this, the final wild card standings would be:
Now, that's a close race! That means that almost anything is possible from here. Yes, the Astros have the easier record, but the Nationals are definitely in this thing. To use the words of one of our loyal readers, this series against the Phillies is HUGE!
UPDATE: Mr. Collins points out that we forgot about San Diego in calculating the number of remaining games against playoff teams. We've corrected the numbers for the Nationals and Astros accordingly. Thanks for the good catch!
The Nationals have 45 games left, 25 of which are at home. If the Nationals win those games at the same rate they've won their home and away games to date, they would win 15 of their home games and 9 of their road games and would end up with a record of 86-76. Of the Nationals' remaining games, 13 are against teams who would be in the playoffs if the season ended today and 36 are against teams who currently have a record better than .500.
The Astros have 45 games left, 24 of which are at home. If they win at the same rate they've won their home and away games to date, they would win 16 of their home games and 8 of their road games and would end up with a record of 87-75. Of the Astros' remaining games, 8 are against teams who would be in the playoffs if the season ended today and 12 are against teams who currently have a record better than .500. The Astros have an easier schedule from here because most of their remaining games are against teams in the Central Division, which is much weaker than the East.
The Phillies have 44 games left, 20 of which are at home. If the Phillies win those games at the same rate they've won their home and away games to date, they would win 12 of their home games and 11 of their road games and would end up with a record of 86-76. Of the Phillies' remaining games, 10 are against teams who would be in the playoffs if the season ended today and 32 are against teams who currently have a record better than .500.
So, if the remainder of the season goes like this, the final wild card standings would be:
| Team | Record | Pct. | GB |
| Astros | 87-75 | .537 | -- |
| Nationals | 86-76 | .531 | 1 |
| Phillies | 86-76 | .531 | 1 |
Now, that's a close race! That means that almost anything is possible from here. Yes, the Astros have the easier record, but the Nationals are definitely in this thing. To use the words of one of our loyal readers, this series against the Phillies is HUGE!
UPDATE: Mr. Collins points out that we forgot about San Diego in calculating the number of remaining games against playoff teams. We've corrected the numbers for the Nationals and Astros accordingly. Thanks for the good catch!
Sunday, August 14, 2005
Momentum
John Patterson nearly did the impossible--throw a second consecutive shut out in Coors Field. Had Vinny Castilla not misplayed a ground ball in the eighth, Patterson would have had a shut out through eight innings. Coming off the Nationals' shut out yesterday, that would have been quite a feat. As it was, the Nationals won 9-2 to sweep the Rockies and move within one game of Houston in the wild card race.
Patterson was brilliant. He gave up nine hits and walked two, which in Coors Field is a great performance over eight innings. The Rockies once again were unable to take advantage of their opportunities, which were not nearly as numerous as yesterday. In the third the Rockies had the bases loaded and in the sixth had men on first and second, each time with only one out. But in both innings Patterson induced an inning-ending double play/
While Patterson was shutting down the Rockies, the Nationals' hitters once again were having their way with Coors Field. They scored nine runs on ten hits, and scored more runs in the fifth inning--five--than they've scored in all but a few games over the last 45 days. Nick Johnson hit a three-run homer and Jose Guillen hit a solo shot in the fifth, thereby all but ending the game for the Rockies. Jose Vidro was three for four, so let's hope he's getting hot again.
Amazingly, the Nationals' starting pitchers had an ERA of 0.89 in the three-game series. You can say all you want about the poor quality of the Rockies' hitters, but that is superior performance in such a hitter-friendly park.
The Nationals now go to Philadelphia for a three-game series. It's imperative that they maintain this momentum and take that series. If they do that, they'll be back in the playoff race in a very serious way.
Patterson was brilliant. He gave up nine hits and walked two, which in Coors Field is a great performance over eight innings. The Rockies once again were unable to take advantage of their opportunities, which were not nearly as numerous as yesterday. In the third the Rockies had the bases loaded and in the sixth had men on first and second, each time with only one out. But in both innings Patterson induced an inning-ending double play/
While Patterson was shutting down the Rockies, the Nationals' hitters once again were having their way with Coors Field. They scored nine runs on ten hits, and scored more runs in the fifth inning--five--than they've scored in all but a few games over the last 45 days. Nick Johnson hit a three-run homer and Jose Guillen hit a solo shot in the fifth, thereby all but ending the game for the Rockies. Jose Vidro was three for four, so let's hope he's getting hot again.
Amazingly, the Nationals' starting pitchers had an ERA of 0.89 in the three-game series. You can say all you want about the poor quality of the Rockies' hitters, but that is superior performance in such a hitter-friendly park.
The Nationals now go to Philadelphia for a three-game series. It's imperative that they maintain this momentum and take that series. If they do that, they'll be back in the playoff race in a very serious way.
Today's Game
Today's game.
The Nationals could sweep this series if John Patterson pitches well today. He faces a bad team and is opposed by Jose Acevedo, who sports a 5.85 ERA. In other words, the match-up favors Patterson. It will be interesting to see how he responds, because his curve ball and slider will likely not work as well in Coors Field as they do elsewhere. Instead, Patterson will have to rely on his fast ball and a change up.
Guzman starts at short, Bennett at catcher, and Wilson in center, meaning that the Nationals aren't fielding their best lineup. Let's hope it's enough.
The Nationals could sweep this series if John Patterson pitches well today. He faces a bad team and is opposed by Jose Acevedo, who sports a 5.85 ERA. In other words, the match-up favors Patterson. It will be interesting to see how he responds, because his curve ball and slider will likely not work as well in Coors Field as they do elsewhere. Instead, Patterson will have to rely on his fast ball and a change up.
Guzman starts at short, Bennett at catcher, and Wilson in center, meaning that the Nationals aren't fielding their best lineup. Let's hope it's enough.
The (Not Very Good) Outfield
The Post reports that Frank Robinson is trying to juggle five outfielders in three positions and some of his outfielders--Brad Wilkerson in particular--aren't happy. Let's look at the five candidates.
The Nationals don't have a premier hitter in their outfield the way the Braves--Andruw Jones--or Marlins--Miguel Cabrera--or a lot of other teams do. One of the first orders of business for the new owner and new GM next year will be to upgrade the outfield.
In any event, there are three clear frontrunners for the three positions--Guillen, Church, and Wilkerson. Wilson is a distant fourth and should be a fourth outfielder. Watson doesn't have enough at bats for a meaningful evaluation, but we continue to believe that he should be playing every day in the minors.
The cause of the problem seems to be Preston Wilson. Although his stats clearly suggest that he should be sitting, Frank Robinson isn't ready to reach that conclusion. Here's what Barry Svrluga reports:
"Statistically, Wilson would seem to be the man who would be left out. Since arriving in a trade with Colorado on July 13, he has struck out 33 times in 92 at-bats, and is hitting .251. Though Robinson earlier in the week hinted Watson would take Wilson's place, he didn't sound inclined to make that move Saturday.
'You're going to get a guy, and in less than a month, you're going to give up on him?' Robinson said, though he conceded that Wilson hasn't made the offense better. 'The numbers speak for themselves.'"
Robinson needs to realize that we have a lot more than a month's worth of data as a basis for this decision. Wilson's road stats while he was in Colorado this year (his home stats would skew the analysis because Coors Field is an extreme hitter's park) were terrible: .280 OBP, .411 SLG, .691 OPS. In other words, there's no reason to believe that his stats as a National are an aberration or reflect a slump. No, Wilson just isn't that good anymore.
| Player | OBP | SLG | OPS | VORP |
| Guillen | .345 | .505 | .850 | 28.5 |
| Church | .354 | .484 | .838 | 16.6 |
| Wilkerson | .354 | .418 | .772 | 16.4 |
| Wilson | .337 | .409 | .746 | 2.6 |
| Watson | .267 | .462 | .729 | -0.8 |
The Nationals don't have a premier hitter in their outfield the way the Braves--Andruw Jones--or Marlins--Miguel Cabrera--or a lot of other teams do. One of the first orders of business for the new owner and new GM next year will be to upgrade the outfield.
In any event, there are three clear frontrunners for the three positions--Guillen, Church, and Wilkerson. Wilson is a distant fourth and should be a fourth outfielder. Watson doesn't have enough at bats for a meaningful evaluation, but we continue to believe that he should be playing every day in the minors.
The cause of the problem seems to be Preston Wilson. Although his stats clearly suggest that he should be sitting, Frank Robinson isn't ready to reach that conclusion. Here's what Barry Svrluga reports:
"Statistically, Wilson would seem to be the man who would be left out. Since arriving in a trade with Colorado on July 13, he has struck out 33 times in 92 at-bats, and is hitting .251. Though Robinson earlier in the week hinted Watson would take Wilson's place, he didn't sound inclined to make that move Saturday.
'You're going to get a guy, and in less than a month, you're going to give up on him?' Robinson said, though he conceded that Wilson hasn't made the offense better. 'The numbers speak for themselves.'"
Robinson needs to realize that we have a lot more than a month's worth of data as a basis for this decision. Wilson's road stats while he was in Colorado this year (his home stats would skew the analysis because Coors Field is an extreme hitter's park) were terrible: .280 OBP, .411 SLG, .691 OPS. In other words, there's no reason to believe that his stats as a National are an aberration or reflect a slump. No, Wilson just isn't that good anymore.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
