The 2017 season has been one of many surprises, both good and bad. The Nationals have been absolutely decimated by injuries, but a few not-so-big names have stepped ably into their place. At 73-47, the Nationals are on a 99-win pace and hold a comfortable 14-game division lead. But if they hadn’t had their major injuries, would they be on a 106-win pace? Or if their bench hadn’t stepped up, would they be on their way to 87 wins? Let’s break down all these surprises and see if we can’t figure out the impact they’ve had on this team.
Tag Archives: Jayson Werth
Two Months to See Who’s In and Who’s Out
There are 53 games left in the regular season. Fifty-three games to get through until the games really matter. Fifty-three games for some guys to get healthy, some to get hurt, and others to either play their way on or off the playoff roster.
Nats vs. Cubs: Who’s Got the Advantage?
With about two more months to go until the regular season ends, and with the postseason picture becoming more clear, it’s become obvious that unless something changes drastically, the Nats are going to play the winner of the NL Central in the playoffs. And right now, it’s looking like that team is going to be the Cubs (unless the Brewers can fulfill my chaos-fueled wishes and unseat the Cubs).
The Left Field Circus: Washington’s Interesting Depth Position
I’d like to start by apologizing for writing this piece one week ago — I didn’t intend for Max and the Nationals to actually try to test how replaceable Scherzer actually is… I have not had good luck with these sorts of posts: On June 8th, I opined that the bullpen was no longer awful. Over the next six days, the pen gave up 18 earned runs. On April 27th, I wrote about how to organize Trea Turner and Adam Eaton at the top of the order. Three days later, Eaton collapsed at first base with a torn ACL. This, of course, doesn’t actually mean anything. Just in case, however, do not be surprised if you see me writing about the Cubs and Dodgers later in the year. I’m a team player, after all.
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The Definitive Nationals Replaceability Rankings
If you follow the Washington Nationals closely, you know that the Lerners, owners of the franchise, and General Manager Mike Rizzo have put together a “stars and scrubs” team for the past few years. They designed it to have the majority of the payroll tied up in elite (and marketable) players with minimal money put into depth. It is hard to say it is not working, considering that after nearly 100 games the Nationals have somewhere between three and five MVP candidates and a double-digit lead in the division. With a plethora of injuries testing the limits of that thin depth, stakeholders all over are wondering if they will be able to hold up to losses to key players. With that said, here is a look at the replaceability of key players within the Nationals organization.
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The Nats Best Free Agent Signing
The Washington Nationals aren’t known for making big free agent signings. Most of their big acquisitions are made via trade or extensions to internal players, with a few notable exceptions. After the latest outstanding start by Max Scherzer, I started to think about the Nats’ best free agent signing to date. There were three obvious candidates: Scherzer, Jayson Werth, and Daniel Murphy. So, I put a poll in the (Twitter) field, and Scherzer was the landslide winner.
I wanted to take some time to breakdown the arguments for and the (few) arguments against each, and then I’ll share my pick for the team’s best free agent signing.
Nats Power Rankings: June 19
Welcome back to the latest in a series, in which we review the previous week in Nationals baseball and power rank the players according to their performance. This is an extremely unserious exercise; at no point should it ever be confused with actual baseball analysis. Don’t worry, I will do my best to make sure that is obvious. Without further ado: your Washington Nationals, ranked according to power.
Off-the-Field Recap: The Nationals Do Things
There are two major takeaways from the Nationals this week: 1. They are very good at playing baseball on the western half of the United States. And 2. They are very good at keeping things interesting off the field.
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Off-the-Field Recap: Jose Marmolejos Is In This One
There’s nothing quite like narrowly escaping a sweep by the Atlanta Braves to really put life, love, liberty, and the Washington Nationals off-field happenings into perspective.
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Re-Sign Jayson Werth
The Golden Age of Washington Nationals baseball began in the winter of 2010. Out of the blue and in the dead of night, the Nats gave their first one-hundred million dollar contract to Jayson Werth. The words “potentially burdensome” were used in the first paragraph of Adam Kilgore’s write-up to describe the 7 year, $126M deal in the Washington Post. Everyone expects now, as they expected then, that Werth’s tenure with the club will end when that contract comes to an end at the end of the season.