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Off-Field Recap: A Month of Kit Swapping, Catch Having, and Board Game Cheating

2016 Articles 1 Comment

The Nationals have been busy this last month: sweeping the Cardinals for the first time since 2007, making history with a 20-strikeout complete game, and winning a series against division rival New York Mets. All this, and the Nationals still found time to check out the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum and force Dan Kolko to wear pink sunglasses.

1. Dusty Baker set up a visit with the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum during the Kansas City series on May 3. Jose Lobaton, Blake Treinen, Shawn Kelley, Sammy Solis, Bryce Harper, and Gio Gonzalez all tagged along with their skipper. The well documented tour was chronicled by the museum president’s twitter account as well as the Instagram accounts of Lobaton, Gonzalez, and Harper.

Visitando el museo de béisbol de la liga de negros

A photo posted by Jose (@joselobaton59) on


2. Jayson Werth has been stuck with a bad reputation for having poor media and fan relations for quite awhile — an undeserved reputation to anyone who has been paying attention. Werth gave MASN’s Dan Kolko another genuine and unguarded postgame interview on June 29 after the first game of the St. Louis Cardinals series, in which he regaled Kolko with the story of how he made friends with three little Royals fans. Werth also tells Kolko, “I was sittin’ around talkin with a lot of family friends from here, we were talking last night… about my career and I was just thinking, ‘I’m not ready for it to be over.’ I wanna play for a long time, so today was a good indication.” It was great. Watch it.

3. On May 5, Nationals bench coach Chris Speier gave us all a simple, yet wonderful gift: Dan Kolko rocking awful, gaudy sunglasses that were probably made for a small child. Per Chelsea Janes’ tweet and at Speier’s own request, Kolko must keep the sunglasses on in the clubhouse, too. Not to worry Dan, I am positive Corey Hart would think this whole thing is really cool.

4. Max Scherzer crafted a 20 strikeout game, sitting down his former Detroit Tigers teammates, including Miguel Cabrera and Victor Martinez. Look, there were a lot of tweets that put the joy of the game Scherzer pitched in perspective, but none were better than a congrats from another member of the 20K club, Kerry Wood himself.

5. Bryce Harper, favorite baseball player to everyone except liars and Mets fans, gave sports radio hosts something they couldn’t possibly spin as a negative when he was spotted handing a jar of money to a homeless woman before the team bus pulled out of Wrigley Field on May 11.

6. Bryce Harper has found himself a running mate as he continues to campaign to Make Baseball Fun Again. On May 9, in an interview with ESPN The Magazine, Yasiel Puig proclaimed Harper to be his idol, and then, later in the month, sported a Dodger blue “Make Baseball Fun Again” hat in a postgame interview. Cincinnati Reds Joey Votto also hopped on the Harper bandwagon. Remember when Votto said Harper should “be a baseball player” after he didn’t run to first when he got drilled by a pitch in the back last season? It turns out even fake, baseball politicians flip-flop.

7. On May 16, Bryce Harper made an appearance on Jimmy Fallon’s talk show, along with Fallon’s other guests Gigi Hadid and Andy Samberg. The four took part in a rousing round of Catchphrase. (Catchphrase basically works like the game show Pyramid; the players are partnered up and try to get their teammate to guess the word or phrase they’re given using verbal clues. The players are timed in 1:30 rounds.) Harper proved that his chronic will to win extends from the baseball field, as he — generously speaking — bent the rules to put Fallon and himself in the win column. Bryce’s brother Bryan Harper confirmed via twitter that Bryce’s “eagerness to win” has always affected family game nights.

8. Max Scherzer made kid’s life on May 19 before the Nationals pummeled Matt Harvey in a 9-1 win. Scherzer had a catch with a little Mets fan named Joe in the LF stands, filling the the hearts of fans everywhere. None more so than that of Joe, who ended the video by walking toward his dad saying, “I’m not throwing this ball away, there’s no way.” The day before, Bryce Harper had given up his bat for a Nationals fan who had Wilson Ramos’ bat taken away after it flew into the stands. Harper offered up one of his game-ready bats — a worthy prize for any fan bold enough to brave Citi Field.



9. Bryce Harper hugs people a lot, and it is always adorable. But, this hug … this hug may be the best one yet. It has a lot of Dan Uggla embraces to compete with, but that Bryce went out of his way to initiate said hug out of nowhere may put it ahead of the rest. `

Harper’s hug with Jordan Zimmermann (even though it’s more like Harper hanging onto Zimmermann as if he never wants him to leave again) on the second game of the Nats series against the Tigers during batting practice was also adorable.

10. Mets fans are fun because they’re the only people that don’t put up much of a fight in a “who loves Bryce Harper more” competition. Despite the upside, 400 plus orange and blue people inhabiting section 140 in Nats Park on May 24 turned out to be less than enjoyable. The “Harvey” chants coming from section 140 in the beginning of the game, though, eventually turned into Harvey taunts from the home crowd.

11. The U.S men’s soccer team was in Florida during the week of May 21, and so were the Nationals. Tim Ream, Tim Howard, and Brad Guzan all stopped by the Nationals game versus the Marlins and swapped jerseys and bats with Bryce Harper, Daniel Murphy, and Dusty Baker. The exchange starts at the two minute mark and it’s pretty cool.

The completely objective Tweets of the Month:

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About Author

Mina Dunn

I watched the Orioles until I was ten when I realized that (most) fans at RFK didn’t shout letters during the National Anthem. I’m a Public Relations and Economics major at VCU, the associate managing editor at TNB, and a sports columnist for a student newspaper. Be my friend on Twitter dot com: @maddc8.

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1 Comment

  1. Andrew Flax Reply
    May 27, 2016 at 8:53 pm

    follow @andrewflaxtnb

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