Despite playing good eight inning baseball for the sixth straight game, the Nationals drop another after falling on the wrong side of a pitchers duel Wednesday night.

John Lannan and Jair Jurrjens went head-to-head in a game for the ages, both tossing shutouts into the 7^th inning. The Braves bullpen was able to pitch two scoreless more, but Mike Hinckley of the Nats gave up the sole run in the top of the 9^th by walking Kelly Johnson with the bases loaded, giving the Nats yet another loss. 

That is just the way things have fallen for the team in the last week. Crazy instances and aboslute meltdowns in the 9th it seems have become standard for the Nats.

Posted in response to 'Little League Gate - The Truth Comes out'

James:

"As for Great Falls LL, they plan on having a collection box where they are encouraging all families to donate each....no more. Obviously this will not hurt their pockets and is a very reasonable solution. The LL is also doing this not to give money to Dukes, but to show his appreciation of taking time to come out and related to the youngsters. We all know Dukes and most MLB players can afford this, but it is something the community of Great Falls is doing to try to show their good faith. I know they already paid him money to be there but with all of the national attention this story is getting, i believe they feel pressured to make themselves look good."

Thanks James.

Much outrage and well outright mockery have faced the Washington Nationals since they reportedly fined centerfielder Elijah Dukes $500 for being late for pregame warm-ups. An understandable fine usually for a team that is trying to promote professionalism and establish a set of rules, however the reason Dukes was a mere five minutes late was that he was at an opening ceremony for the Great Falls Little League. The Nationals fined Dukes for signing too many autographs.

The media has had a field day with this story. How could the Nats fine Dukes for being nice to kids? He was engaging in charity!

That's the word that keeps bothering me however, charity. Every story I have read has referred to Dukes' actions as charitable work, or community service. But then I read the Washington Nationals website reporting on how the Great Falls Little League wants to pay his late fee, and in that same article I read for the first time that Dukes was paid $500 from the little league for just appearing in the first place.

"It was the league's Opening Day event, for which Dukes was paid $500 to attend, that caused him to be late prompting the fine from Nationals manager Manny Acta, along with a warning that another tardy arrival would earn him a ticket to the Minors."-Nationals.com

I'm not going to get started on how poor the reporting on this issue has been, or how low it is for a Major League baseball player to take money for talking to kids at a little league event. What I am outraged at is that the Media has portrayed Dukes as a victim when the truth is that in the end he will have ended up taking $1001 from children who just want to play baseball.

How many new bats could that buy? How many brand new uniforms or non-shotty team catchers gear could they purchase with that money.  Maybe they could even take a good portion of the league to a Nationals game with that much cash. No, instead $1001 dollars will go to dealing with a situation that Elijah Dukes and the Washington Nationals really should have handled better.

The Facts:

-Elijah Dukes took $500 dollars to talk to children. He then took $501 more from them to cover his ass.

-The Nationals fined Dukes without taking into consideration where he was, or what he was doing.

-Dukes attended the Little League service without informing the Washington Nationals that he was doing unapproved ‘charity' work.

-The Nationals prefer their players to engage in actual charity work in which players do not get paid

-Dukes should have called when he knew he would be late. 

Dave Jagler called it a "Houdini." A good portion of the fans, booing, called it ugly. Whatever it was, Joel Hanrahan recorded his second save in as many days, helping the Nationals along to their 3rd win.

The Nationals placed setup man Joe Biemel on the 15-day disabled list today after he hurt his hip flexor last night. As a result the Nationals will recall reliever Saul Rivera only a day after sending him down to the minors.

The temporary loss of Biemel will be felt immediately for the Nats who have come to rely on him as the only reliable arm in the pen so far in 2009. In eight appearances this year Biemel boasts a 1.23 ERA with four holds.

Rivera had been sent down in a move on Sunday night that was designed to completely reformat the Nationals bullpen. Back in Washington he will have a short timeframe to prove that he deserves to stay there.

It was the game many Washington Nationals fans circled on their calendar before the season began, the day prized prospect Jordan Zimmerman would make his Major League debut as the teams 5^th starter.

Maybe now the team can finally get their season started with.

The 22 year old pitched six strong innings scattering six hits and only allowed two earned runs, both coming off a mistake pitch in the rain to Matt Diaz which resulted in a two run homer.

Lets be honest here, Saul Rivera has been bad in 2009. In 6 games (7 IP) he has allowed 10 ER, and has only had 2 scoreless outings. His ERA is at 12.27, and his WHIP is a whopping 2.58.

Ok he’s been worse than bad.

But that’s not the point. The point is its been seven innings pitched. His performance Sunday afternoon when the team needed him most was disappointing to say the least, and it probably will cause many Nats fans to say that they don’t need a bigger sample size to see that he just plain sucked.

They’re right, he did suck. But over the last three seasons this is how un-sucky Saul Rivera has been for a bad ball club that needed a lot of work in the bullpen.

2005- 54 G, 9 HLD, 60 IP, 3.43 ERA
2006- 85 G, 19HLD, 93 IP, 3.68 ERA
2007- 76 G, 17HLD, 84 IP, 3.96 ERA

I’ll take those 237 IP and judge them over his last 7 IP any day. The truth is Rivera has been the most consistent reliever in Washington Nationals franchise history. His ability to eat up innings successfully for a bad club has a broader impact that can ever be measured with stats as he saved the arms of many who probably would have just made situations worse.

The worst part about the whole situation is that Rivera would have been a Major Leaguer still today had Manny Acta not put Rivera in a situation to fail. Some pitchers just do not have the mentality to be closers, and Rivera is one of them. This can be noted by the fact that he has converted 0/7 saves in the last two years, and only 4/11 in his career.

The real question should be, why didn’t Manny Acta know this?

Fixing the ‘Incompetence’ of the bullpen  

Three consecutive losses in the 9^th inning was the boiling point for acting general manager Mike Rizzo as he sent four major leaguers to Syracuse Sunday night. Following the sweep by the Marlins, Saul Rivera, Steven Shell, Will Ledezma, and catcher Josh Bard were all optioned for assignment.

To replace them the club called up today’s starting pitcher, Jordan Zimmermann, and relief pitchers Kip Wells, Garret Mock, and Jason Bergmann.

Rizzo had seen enough from his bullpen. “The incompetence of the bullpen was drawn to a head today. It got to a point where it wasn’t fair to the fans and it wasn’t fair to the rest of the team, the starting pitchers, too, to go status quo.”

Harsh.

Lets take a look at our new pen:

Kip Wells- Wells turns 30 tomorrow, and has 10 years of major league experience under hisbelt. Drafted 18^th overall by Chicago (AL) back in 1998, it didn’t take long for Wells to break into the big leagues with 7 starts in 1999. Throughout his career he has had moderate success as a starter, with his best two seasons coming in 2002 and 2003 in Pittsburgh where he won 12 and 10 games with a 3.58 and 3.42 ERA respectively. The wheels soon fell off for wells after that and he has been struggling to find consistent major league time. In his last stay with Colorado he pitched 27.1 innings with a 5.71 ERA.

Jason Bergmann- You all remember Bergmann, he started the season last year as a member of the Nationals rotation and had early struggles. The Nats were hoping he’d improve upon his solid 2007 where at the age of 25 he had a 4.45 ERA with 86 K’s in 115 innings. Instead he only regressed, putting up a 5.09 ERA in 139.2. Bergmann has the ability to get MLB hitters out, its only a matter of harnessing it. In June and July of last year he we started 9 games and had an ERA of 3.85.

Garret Mock-Mock is probably the most logical choice for the bullpen at this time. At only the age of 26 he’s bounced around a good deal, only busting into the majors last season for Washington. When he was there however he posted good numbers pitching 41 innings with a 4.17 ERA and 10.1 K/9 ratio. Mock has good enough stuff that he has been listed as a fringe prospect since being drafted in 2004, and in 2006 was listed by Baseball America as their  # 7 overall.

And....Zimmerman Inks Extension

Nationals third basemen Ryan Zimmerman officially agreed to a five year contract extension with the club for $45 million.

Nine million dollars a year is  a lot for a guy that has had trouble being consistent and healthy the last few years. The Nationals however are placing their eggs in his basket hoping that he can be the guy who takes the club to the next level as he develops.

The basic idea is that each team needs a franchise  player, one who they groomed from the draft and will hit macho home runs and make the girls swoon. I guess that’s Zimms job now, but he’s getting paid enough to do it.

We’ve discussed on The Nats Blog if he’s worth it or not, here’s another opinion. 

On Yahoo Sports Big League Stew:
“We wrote earlier about the team’s disorganization causing embarrassment to the city and it’s fans. We’re making headlines again. Yesterday we were both on the front-page of several publications mocking not our teams 1-10 record but our complete inability to run a competent organization right now…. Really, though, it should come as no surprise since it involves a Nationals franchise that has bumbled its way through the entire spring.

I mean, first there was the draft pick who falsified his age, which led to a bonus-skimming controversy that caused Jim Bowden to resign his position as general manager.

Then there were moments like the Nats' team president going on Philadelphia radio to invite Phillies fans down to Washington to fill the stadium, the introduction of weird ballpark statues that were not only historically incorrect, but panned by the Washington Post (though I like them) and — my favorite — Adam Dunn and Ryan Zimmerman taking the field on Friday night while wearing jerseys that read "NATINALS"."

A similar story made the YardBarker Morning Bark mocking the NATINALS gap:
“Notice anything strange about this picture? A typo in a media guide, on a blog or website, or in a program is one thing. But how does the front of a jersey reading "NATINALS" get by the seamstress, equipment manager and the players that put it on?”

Bloguins own Fantasy Hurler talks about the Nats inability to get through a ninth inning: 
“So after Joel Hanrahan blew saves in back-to-back games, the Nationals turned to Saul Rivera to close out yesterday's game ... and he promptly blew it. Three blown saves in three straight games! Kudos to you, Washington Baseball Club. My guess is the Nats haven't yet given up on Hanrahan as their closer. They probably put Rivera in for the ninth because they didn't want to overwork an already-struggling Hanrahan. Sure, Rivera could have perhaps stolen the job with a neat-and-tidy 1-2-3 inning. But instead he bought himself a ticket back to the minors. (He was optioned back to Triple-A after the game.) Oh, Washington, what are we going to do with you”

Say it aint so.

The Nats again received an excellent performance from a starting pitcher only to have their lead squandered in the late innings. Regaining the lead going into the top of the 9^th, it seemed all but destiny that the Nats had to win, if only for redemption.

The two previous nights the Nationals had a 9^th inning lead after a well played ball game. However both nights would see the same fate, a ninth inning collapse by Nats closer Joel Hanrahan and an eventual extra innings loss.

Unfortunately for the Nats it was the same old song.

In the top of the 9^th Sunday afternoon Saul Rivera, not Joel Hanrahan came in to close it out for D.C. Whether this was a result of the Nats closer pitching two consecutive nights, or a sign of him losing his job, was not clear. Regardless it was Rivera’s turn to show what he could do when the heat was on. The righty responded by immediately walking arguably the fastest player in the Majors.

Good start.

Rivera then allowed a double to the gap allowing the speedy Bonifacio to score from first to tie it up. Rivera then struck out the dangerous Hanley Ramirez, intentionally walked Ross Gload, and struck out the power hitting Uggla. Then with two outs the wheels fell off. The spot starter walked last nights hero Jeremy Hermida to load the bases, and then surrendered a double to Friday’s hero Cody Ross, clearing the bases. After a scoreless bottom of the 9^th, the Marlins won 7-4.

The win gave the Marlins the sweep, their third consecutive come from behind victory, and their third consecutive win when trailing going into the ninth inning. At this point you have to wonder, do the Marlins feel good about themselves? Or bad for us?