The Nationals are extremely dramatic, and their performance swings are exhausting, but they are lovable anyway, and this is a run-on sentence to designed to communicate that and that they did some things this week.
Tag Archives: Jayson Werth
Nats Power Rankings: May 15
Welcome back to the latest in a series, in which we review the previous week in Nationals baseball and power rank the players and events 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.
Little Nats Fan Asks Rizzo to Re-Sign Bryce, Werth
The chance to see adorable letters written by small baseball fans in hopes of persuading their favorite teams’ general managers to do their bidding is one of the best things about the advent of social media. (Though, it was not as cute when a kid asked the Giants to sign Mark Melancon. Never forget.) It’s a modern day Dear Abigail, but with more desperation.
Saturday afternoon, little Natalie spoke for all Nats fans when her mom posted a picture of a letter she sent to Nationals GM Mike Rizzo, asking him to pull out all the stops to sign Bryce Harper and Jayson Werth. She even slipped him a 20 (plus one) to make it happen.
Continue Reading Little Nats Fan Asks Rizzo to Re-Sign Bryce, Werth
A New Nats Specialty: Revenge
Mike Rizzo might have a new strategy when marketing to potential free agents. “Have you been treated poorly by your current, team? Well, you might want to consider joining the Washington Nationals!” This week, Matt Wieters walked off his former club. Through the first three games of the contrived “MASN Cup,” which carries about as much weight as the Mystics Attendance Banners, Wieters has put together a sparkling .385/.429/.462 slash-line. He is carrying on what has become a fine Washington Nationals Tradition: beating your former club in fun and torturous ways.
How Many MVP Candidates Do the Nats Have?
Even though it’s only a little over a month into the season, baseball analysts love trying to predict who is going to have an MVP-caliber season or who might win the MVP in the fall. And yes, I occasionally take part in these activities. Usually, I’d take a look at all of the best players in the National League and try to pick four or five who have the best shot at riding their good seasons to the end and at bringing home some hardware. Last year, I had some pretty good predictions. (In my top five, I had Daniel Murphy, Kris Bryant, Anthony Rizzo, Nolan Arenado, and Corey Seager, who all finished in the top five in MVP voting.) But this year I can’t even pick through the Nats. With so many players currently having torrid seasons, I’m going to look at potential MVP candidates on the Nationals instead of looking at potential MVP candidates in the National League.
Off-the-Field Recap: Disabled List Daze
It was a week like any other week. Max Scherzer took another no-hitter into the sixth inning, the Nationals played sub-par games against the Orioles, the Washington Capitals were eliminated in the second round… But from beyond the DL, Adam Eaton led the charge to break up the monotony that led to off-field highlights of the week.
Scherzer Fights Boos with Boos in Philly
At Nats Park, boos are usually reserved for Metro closing announcements, postgame press conferences, Jose Tabata, and politicians. Citizens Bank Park is much more liberal in its application of such heckling. Jayson Werth is a consistent recipient of those boos, and Max Scherzer, apparently a varsity booleader back in the day, delights in contributing.
Nats Power Rankings: May 8
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.
The Adam Eaton Hole
As Adam Eaton lay sprawled on the dirt past first base at Nationals Park Friday night, it didn’t just feel like the air was let out of the budding Nationals comeback or out of the lungs of the 34,000 plus revved up in the stands. Instead, it felt like the air had escaped from the entire young, promising season. Continue Reading The Adam Eaton Hole
Nerding Out on the Nats
There was some big news in the world of baseball nerds this week. While you were probably distracted by this series in Colorado, with scores looking more like football games than baseball games, MLB released a whole bunch of fun new Statcast based tools via Baseball Savant. Statcast, as you have likely heard by now, is the new radar based tracking system installed in every MLB stadium.
This system tracks all the movements on the baseball field, from positioning of defenders to launch angle of batted balls to the rotation of a thrown ball. If you have heard terms like “catch probability” or “exit velocity,” you have Statcast to thank. It’s a new system that has lots of potential to teach us new and exciting things about the game. For now, though, it’s mostly a cool new tool to play with. With that in mind, what do these new tools have to tell us about the Nationals?