Nationals Arm Race

The return of Michael Morse has energized the offense. Photo Jacqueline Martin via federalbaseball blog

(Editor note; I attempted to publish this last Friday, then the server immediately went down all weekend.  Wanted to re-post it to get commentary from typical readers.  All numbers below were as of last friday, before the wild 4-game series against Atlanta).

There’s been lots of press this week, and to an extent all season, about Stephen Strasburg‘s innings limit.  Mike Rizzo came out this week and said (paraphrasing) that there’s not a hard-and-fast 160ip limit, but that he will be shut down, and it will be Rizzo’s decision when Strasburg doesn’t pass the “eye test.”

Nats pundits are already discussing this impact on a playoff race, who the replacement may be (with John Lannan getting an early audition during this weekend’s double header), and whether we should flip someone out of our “thinned” farm system for a rental SP like Zack Greinke or Ryan Dempster (I put “thinned” in quotes out of deference to those that don’t share my glass-is-half empty opinion on the state of our farm system right now as posted here earlier this week).

Inarguably, this team will be a worse team without Strasburg.  We’d be weaker in September once he got shut-down and we’d be hampered in a short series without our staff Ace.  I’m not worried about September though; remember last year?  Some teams were fielding 40-man roster specials, with lineups that mostly started the year in AAA.  And I’m not entirely worried about how we’d look in a playoff series, since playoff rotations go 4 deep (meaning whatever question mark we’re throwing out there as a 5th starter in September is in the bullpen in October), and a rotation of Gonzalez, Zimmermann (who, amazingly, is tied for the NL lead in pitcher bWAR right now), Jackson and Detwiler getting the game 4 start is still pretty durn good.

But, here’s some interesting stats that should give you (and anyone in baseball frankly) some pause; this team is positioned to get significantly better from here on out, despite the looming loss of Strasburg and despite the fact that they’re already in first place.  Why?

Because the offense is really starting to heat up.

Here’s some stats to give context: based on the Team Scoring page at baseball-reference.com, here’s the Nats scoring-based records:

• When the Nats score 0,1,2 or 3 runs, they are 14-28, for a .333 W/L percentage. This is pretty common; even last year’s 102-win Philadelphia team rarely won when scoring 3 or fewer runs.
• When the Nats score 4 or more runs?  They are 39-9 this season, a .795 W/L percentage.
• Taking this a step further, when the nats score 5 or more runs, they’re 29-6, a .828 W/L percentage.

(For context, a record of 100-62 equates to a .617 W/L percentage).

Perhaps the above states the obvious; most teams have pretty good records when they score a bunch of runs.   For comparison sake’s, here’s the same analysis for the team with the best record in baseball, the Yankees:

The Yankees and their superior offense leads to a ton of wins once they get above 4-5 runs.  The difference between the Yankees and the Nats is our current ability to win a pretty sizeable number of games when scoring 3 or fewer runs.  This difficulty in winning close games and depending on bashing your way to victory has been a theme for the Yankees for a few years now, and is one of the reasons they have only won one World Series since 2000 despite being in the playoffs nearly every year (only one missed playoff appearance during that span).  They are susceptable to getting shut down by a good rotation in a short series.  But I digress…

Getting back to the theme of this post: Here’s a look at the monthly W/L records for the Nats, along with average Runs scored and Runs Allowed (through July 19th’s game):

Look specifically at the average number of Runs Scored by this team.  It is distinctly trending up; from 3.36 RS/game in April to a massive 4.78 RS/game so far in the month of July.   That’s almost 1 and a half more runs they’re scoring a game right now as compared to April (when their 14-8 record was mostly on the backs of one of the best opening months of starting pitching seen in the Majors since the dead-ball era).

Some reasons for this outburst of runs?

1. Ryan Zimmerman‘s cortisone shot on June 24th: he had a .589 OPS in June (which should have been even worse, but he finished the last week of June on a tear, going 11-32 with 5 extra base hits after getting his shot), but has a blistering 1.280 OPS so far in July.
2. The top of the order stepping it up: Danny Espinosa is hitting .327 in July and Lombardozzi is hitting nearly as well.
3. The resurgence of Roger Bernadina, hitting at a .375 clip so far in July and leading to the DFA of Rick Ankiel (my wife’s favorite player; I havn’t broken the news to her yet).

Meanwhile, the rest of the sluggers in the lineup (Harper, LaRoche, and Tyler Moore doing his best effort to prove scouting pundits wrong who thought he couldn’t hack it against MLB pitching) are for the most part churning along and providing pop in front of and behind the 3-4-5 hitters in the order.

And, this offense could only get better when Jayson Werth returns.  Remember; he was quietly having a solid year at the plate, with an .810 OPS and a 121 OPS+.  You insert Werth and suddenly this team is rock solid and full of power from position 2-7.  You’d have to sacrifice Bernadina and Moore to the bench primarily, but they’re great insurance in case Werth’s wrist betrays him.

They’re averaging 4.78 runs a game, and on the season they’re 39-9 when they score 4 or more runs.  That spells a pretty serious run I expect this team to make in the next month and a half, especially against a slate of opponents that are mostly .500 or below.  Right now, sitting at 53-37 they’re on pace for a 95 win season … but, amazing as it is to say it, this team easily has the capability of reaching 100 wins if their offense continues its upward trend.

Will Giolito become the Nats #1 prospect? Photo Eric Dearborn via Win For Teddy blog

I know it seems silly to criticize the team with the best record in the NL, but I thought the question was worth asking, given a couple things I read this week prospects related.  Given the drain of prospects in the last 6 months (through the Gio Gonzalez trade and through graduation to the majors for several of the team’s better prospects), its safe to say that our cupboard is relatively thin right now.  This point was highlighted to me by two recent online articles;

1. ESPN’s Keith Law posted a mid-season review of farm systems on the Rise or Fall (sorry, insider only), and stated the obvious about our system.  His summary: Yes we got Lucas Giolito but it was essentially at the expense of any other high-end talent in the 2012 draft.  And, a lot of our high-end guys are taking significant tumbles on boards due to lack of performance or injury (see later on for a look at our top 10 prospect performances).

2. Baseball America’s Jim Callis posted an updated Midseason top 50 prospects post 2012 draft and included where he’d put the top-end talents drafted (including international signees) in his weekly Ask BA feature on July 16th.   Of note to me was the fact that Washington, even with the signing of the high-end Giolito, does not have a SINGLE player in his mid-season 50.   Luckily for us, our NL East competition didn’t fare too much better, with a grand total of 5 players between our divisional rivals.  This compared to teams like Seattle (5), Kansas City (4), and the rich-keep-getting-richer Rangers with 3 guys likely to become impact players within a year or two.

Why is this a concern if the team is in first place?  Two primary reasons:

1. If you’re not going to matriculate your prospects and depend on them for production, then you need to utilize them in trade to acquire needed talent.  There’s plenty of trade rumors right now mentioning the Nats desires for a starter to cover for Stephen Strasburg‘s innings limit.  But who are we going to trade to acquire said pitcher?   I’d go as far as saying that there’s not one guy on our 2012 top 10 prospect list (not including Harper and Lombardozzi of course) who, at this point in 2012, could be the centerpiece of a marquee acquisition.  Who is trading for our #1 prospect Anthony Rendon right now? 

2. This team has a LOT of money committed to players over the coming years, and won’t be able to depend on hefty production from salary controlled guys forever.  They will need a stream of up-and-coming players to offer cheap alternatives to free agents and players who have become too expensive.  For example; in the year 2016 the team has $47M committed to just THREE players right now, before considering at least that much in arbitration for just Strasburg, Bryce Harper and Jordan Zimmermann.  $47M is nearly the team’s payroll just a few years ago!  Yes we will naturally grow payroll and revenues with success and the renegotiation of the MASN contract, but constructing a 25 man roster is about making choices.  The last thing we want is to see this team become the 2012 Philadelphia Phillies; a bloated, old team with a ton of injuries and the 2nd highest payroll in the league at $175M, but mired in last place.

For context of this discussion, here’s a list of Baseball America’s top 10 prospects for this team for 2011 and 2012 (compiled after the Gonzalez trade), and a status of where they are as of now:

That’s 2 guys who are starters in the Majors, 3 traded for Gonzalez, 4 guys on long term DL stints and Eury Perez with his meager .667 OPS in AA, in his 6th pro season.  How about 2012’s list?

2012’s list includes 4 major injury concerns, two guys under-performing (Hood and Taylor), and two guys matriculated to the majors.  The two players putting up good statistical seasons may come with astericks though; Alex Meyer was compiling his stats in low-A, going against guys 2-3 years younger than himself.  His promotion to High-A was overdue and should be telling, to determine if his future lays as a dominant 12-6 starter or a high-leverage reliever.  Brian Goodwin’s excellent season is a great sign of things to come … but again, in Low-A.  I know he was a Juco signee, but he’s 21 now, turning 22 in November and is the same age as college juniors getting drafted now.  If he continues to produce upon promotion to better competition, I’ll feel better.

Now, I know there’s guys in our system who are coming back from injuries (i.e. Nathan Karns), or who are putting up good numbers despite being lower draft picks (i.e. Matt Skole, Cameron Selik, Danny Rosenbaum), and we have some guys who we acquired through trades and who are having surprisingly good seasons in the minors (i.e., Zach Walters, Ryan Perry and Corey Brown) but are these kinds of players going to step up and either be a) next year’s top prospects or b) eventual productive major leaguers?  I know we all love Rosenbaum for example, but most scouts think he’s a marginal prospect at best (and his lack of inclusion on our top 10 lists reinforces that notion).

This sudden lack of depth was one of the reasons I wasn’t the biggest fan of drafting Giolito.  With the new draft rules and specific limits on bonuses, combined with the significant injury issues we’ve had with high end draftees Rendon and Purke in 2011’s draft, I thought the team should have gone the safer route.  Yes I’m sure Mike Rizzo did a ton of due diligence and was confident in Giolito’s long term health.  But missing on three first rounders (or in Purke’s case, a first round talent given a significant bonus and a 40-man deal) could lead to a significant hole in player development for this team right at a time a couple of years from now when they desperately need a MLB-minimum impact guy.

Gonzalez gets a very deserving NL All-Star selection. Photo unknown via WP.com

(Note: i’m copying a large chunk of 2011’s version of this post to give a running history of the Nats all-stars later on below).

MLB announced the 2012 all-star rosters and the Nats, for the first time in their history in Washington, have 3 representatives.  Here’s a discussion:

2012

• Nationals All-Star representatives: Stephen Strasburg, Gio Gonzalez, Ian Desmond
• Possible Snubs: Adam LaRoche, Bryce Harper, Craig Stammen
• Narrative: The two starters Strasburg and Gonzalez were the obvious candidates, and my personal prediction was that they’d be the only two candidates selected.  The inclusion of Desmond is a surprise, but also a testament to how far he’s come as a player in 2012.  I entered the season figuring that Desmond would be closer to a demotion than the all-star team, and his power from the short stop position has been a huge shot in the arm to our challenged offense.  LaRoche has had a fantastic come back season but fared little shot against better, more well-known NL first basemen so his non-inclusion is not too surprising.  Stammen has been our best bullpen arm, but like LaRoche fared little chance of getting selected during a year when the Nats had two deserving starters.  Lastly Mr. Harper; he wasn’t on the ballot so fared little shot of being included, but has been put on the “last man in” ballot, up against a series of established veterans and future hall of famers.  We’ll see if celebrity wins out.  Before his slump the last two weeks he was clearly among the best hitters in the league despite his age.

(Editors Note: Harper was subsequently added on 7/7/12 to replace the injured Giancarlo Stanton).

Coincidentally, I thought Matt Kemp‘s decision to go public with his snub of Harper for the home run derby was both short sighted and disappointing.  If I was Bud Selig, I’d take the opportunity to make this year’s derby the most watched mid-season baseball event ever by forcing the inclusion of both Harper and uber-rookie Mike Trout.  Ask yourself this: 1) do you bother to watch the home run derby now?  And 2) if Harper and Trout were in it, would you watch this year’s version?  For me, even as an avid baseball fan I don’t bother to watch the event and wasn’t planning on it this year … but with these two guys in, it’d be must-see TV.  I hate it when Baseball misses such an obvious chance to showcase players and take advantage of the prevailing storylines of the season; it seems to happen year after year.

For a trip down Memory lane, here’s the Nationals all stars by year and talk about their selection, whether they were deserving, and who got snubbed each year.

2005

• Nationals All-Star representatives: Livan Hernandez, Chad Cordero
• Possible Snubs: Nick Johnson, John Patterson.
• Narrative: The Nats went into the All Star break surprisingly in first place, having run to a 50-31 record by the halfway point.  Should a first place team have gotten more than just two representatives?  Perhaps.  But the team was filled with non-stars and played far over its head to go 50-31 (as evidenced by the reverse 31-50 record the rest of the way).

2006

• Nationals All-Star representatives: Alfonso Soriano
• Possible Snubs: Nick Johnson, Ryan Zimmerman
• Narrative: Soriano made the team as an elected starter, the only time the Nats have had such an honor.  Our pitching staff took massive steps backwards and no starter came even close to meriting a spot.  Cordero was good but not lights out as he had been in 2005.  Soriano’s 40-40 season is a poster child for “contract year” production and he has failed to come close to such production since.  The team was poor and getting worse.  Johnson had a career year but got overshadowed by bigger, better first basemen in the league (a recurring theme for our first basemen over the years).

2007

• Nationals All-Star representatives: Dmitri Young
• Possible Snubs: Ryan Zimmerman, Shawn Hill (though I wouldn’t argue for either)
• Narrative: Young gets a deserved all-star appearance en route to comeback player of the year.  Zimmerman played a full season but didn’t dominate.  Our rotation featured 6 primary starters, none of whom are still in the league now, though Hill showed flashes of dominance throughout the year.

2008

• Nationals All-Star representatives: Cristian Guzman
  
• Possible Snubs: Jon Rauch
• Narrative: The first of two “hitting rock-bottom” seasons for the team; no one really merited selection.  Zimmerman was coming off of hamate-bone surgery in November 2007 and the team was more or less awful across the board.  Rauch performed ably after Cordero went down with season-ending (and basically career-ending) shoulder surgery.   Guzman’s selection a great example of why one-per-team rules don’t make any sense.  Guzman ended up playing far longer than he deserved in the game itself by virtue of the 15-inning affair.

2009

• Nationals All-Star representatives: Ryan Zimmerman
• Possible Snubs: Adam Dunn
• Narrative: The addition of Dunn and Willingham to the lineup gave Zimmerman the protection he never had, and he produced with his career-best season.  His first and deserved all-star appearance en-route to a 33 homer season.  Dunn continued his monster homer totals with little all-star recognition.

2010

• Nationals All-Star representatives: Matt Capps
  
• Possible Snubs: Adam Dunn, Josh Willingham, Ryan Zimmerman, Steven Strasburg
• Narrative: Capps was clearly deserving, having a breakout season as a closer after his off-season non-tender from the Pirates.  The 3-4-5 hitters Zimmerman-Dunn-Willingham all had dominant offensive seasons as the team improved markedly from its 103-loss season.  But perhaps the surprise non-inclusion was Strasburg, who despite only having a few starts as of the all-star break was already the talk of baseball.  I think MLB missed a great PR opportunity to name him to the team to give him the exposure that the rest of the national media expected.  But in the end, Capps was a deserving candidate and I can’t argue that our hitters did anything special enough to merit inclusion.

2011

• Nationals All-Star representatives: Tyler Clippard
• Possible Snubs: Danny Espinosa, Michael Morse, Drew Storen, Jordan Zimmermann
• Narrative: While Clippard was (arguably) the Nats best and most important reliever, I think Zimmermann was a more rightful choice.  He was 10th in the league in ERA at the time of the selections and has put in a series of dominant performances.  Meanwhile Espinosa is on pace for a 28homer season and almost a certain Rookie-of-the-Year award (though a precipitous fall-off in the 2nd half cost him any realistic shot at the ROY), and perhaps both players are just too young to be known around the league.  Lastly Morse is certainly known and he merited a spot in the “last man in” vote sponsored by MLB (though he fared little chance against popular players in this last-man-in voting).

Joel Peralta tips his cap in mock respect after getting tossed for having "an excess of pine tar" in his glove. Photo Patrick McDermott/Getty Images via bleacherreport

While watching the Nats game tonight, the broadcast team of Bob Carpenter and JP Santangelo posted the following quote (as referenced in several of the beat reporters columns earlier today):

“Just looking down the road, if I’m a major league player that may happen to want to come to play for the Nationals in the future, I might think twice about it, under the circumstances,” Maddon said before Wednesday’s game. “Because this is a guy, this is one of their former children here that had really performed well and all of sudden he’s going to come back to this town and they’re going to rat on him based on some insider information.”

The MASN broadcast team also relayed a follow-up to this quote, mentioning that a beat reporter that they had not “seen before” asked Joe Maddon a very probing, intelligent question.  As transcribed from the MASN broadcast:

“Well, your guy was the one who was caught.  A lot of people are talking about the fact that you’re trying to deflect the blame to the to the other team across the diamond.”

Maddon apparently blew off the question, didn’t ask it and challenged the questioner whether or not he covered baseball on a regular basis.  These quotes somewhat disappointed me; I have a lot of respect for Maddon by virtue of stories about him in Jonah Keri‘s excellent book “The Extra 2%,” about the rise of Tampa Bay.  Perhaps he’s indeed trying to deflect blame and control the story.  But I think Maddon does the exact same thing, if he’s in the same situation.

Last night’s gamesmanship was probably unnecessary, but a move that you have to make in the right situation.  Yes the Nats probably were aware of the fact that Peralta had a tendency to overdo the pine tar, by virtue of his playing for our team a couple years ago.  Was last night an odd time to cash in that particular chip?  The team was losing, but the game was close, and Peralta is clearly a great asset out of the Rays bullpen.  In fact, it surprised me to see the team not pursue signing Peralta after his excellent 2010 season for us.

Perhaps the message was meant more for Peralta; who knows what type of departure he had from the team.  But you would have to think that if the team still respected him as a player, instead of trying to get him ejected perhaps Davey Johnson would have taken the same route that Tony LaRussa did in the 2006 world series, when hurler Kenny Rogers clearly had pine tar all over his throwing hand, a fact that became clear when the high definition cameras caught him throwing in the first inning.

The fact is, when its hot out and you’re sweating, getting a grip on the baseball can be very difficult.  I certainly use pine tar heavily when I play to get an extra grip on the bat.  I have certainly played with pitchers who had a secret stash of pine tar “hidden” within their glove in order to get an extra snap on the curve.  Is this a violation of baseball’s rules?  Of course it’s against the stated rules.  The question is whether it is as egregious a transgression as (say) stealing signs or sneaking a peak at the catcher’s signs.

Much like a football player moving teams and taking along insider information on formations and trade secrets, inside information either brought to or left with teams can put managers in a tough situation.  Billy Martin was well aware of George Brett‘s proclivity to over-tar his bat, and he waited until a key game situation (i.e., a go-ahead homer) to cash in that particular chip.  Clearly Johnson made the decision to use the information he had on hand, last night in a key late-inning situation.

What do you guys think?  Bush league move?  Good use of information?

As most Nats fans know by now, the team took a big risk and drafted prep RHP Lucas Giolito in the first round despite his having suffered a sprained Ulnar Collateral Ligament (that of Tommy John surgery fame) this spring.   Most pundits have stated the obvious; this is a high risk, high reward pick for sure.  Baseball America loves the pick, as did the notoriously prickly Keith Law.

The team left two rather big names on the board by making this pick, namely Chris Stratton and Devin Marrero.  Marrero’s stock has dropped considerably this season after mashing his first two years in college, while Stratton’s stock has risen mightily and seemed to fit Mike Rizzo‘s typical MO for drafting; big powerful college arms that are close to the majors.

Here’s the question; was this TOO much of a risk?  Anthony Rendon fell to us in 2011 after being the consensus 1-1 pick in his draft class for nearly two years after suffering multiple injuries in college.  And it didn’t take him but about a week of professional games before suffering yet another leg injury, one that (depending on who you ask) seems set to sideline him for the entirety of the 2012 pro season (with the off-chance of returning for the Arizona Fall League).  Meanwhile the team took an even bigger gamble on Matthew Purke, a lefty starter with shoulder concerns in college that have continued into the pros (he was kept in extended spring training for nearly 2 months, having only recently made his pro debut in low-A, where he promptly got hammered).  Small sample sizes, I know.  But stats are stats.

Giolito, if healthy, was in the mix for 1-1.  As was Purke.  As was Rendon.  All three fell because of injury concerns.  So clearly these are top-end talents, each individually worth the risk.  But all three within two draft classes?

There seem to be two common mantras in baseball drafting; You don’t draft for need, and Get the Best Player Available.  Right now the Nats need hitting, both at the MLB level and throughout its farm system.  Maybe the team didn’t like what it saw out of Marrero, or maybe the team is convinced that Giolito’s injury was nothing major and feels like they got a massive steal as the best player on the board at #16 overall.  Fair enough; i’m certainly not privy to Rizzo’s interviews or Giolito’s medical records.  But if none of these three guys pan out, the Nats are looking at a pretty gaping draft hole rising through its system within a few years.

Agree?  Disagree?

Got word this morning that the team is optioning the ineffective Ryan Perry back to AAA and bringing up veteran minor league FA signing Mike Gonzalez to take his place.  Luke Erickson notes the fact that 40-man member Atahualpa Severino was bypassed for this move, despite not requiring a subsequent 40-man roster move (the team transfered Drew Storen to the 60-day DL to make room).

This is the latest in a flurry of additions to the 40-man roster necessitated by a freak rash of injuries, and eventually will make for some rather difficult roster moves after the season is over.  As it stands right now, the team is now technically sitting at 45 guys on the 40-man roster (40 active or 15-day DL, 5 on the 60-day DL), meaning that at a minimum after the season 5 guys are going to have to make way.  Yes we have some free agents that will come off the books, but you generally need to operate your 40-man roster with some room to maneuver, especially considering some of the big prospect names that are going to be Rule-5 eligible this coming off-season (just to name a few; Danny Rosenbaum, Jeff Kobernus and Destin Hood).

Makes you wonder how the team feels about the two Major League contracts they handed out last draft?  Anthony Rendon is injured and likeout out for the season (again)  Matthew Purke only just got out of extended spring training to record his first start in Low-A.

Anyway; the real problem is the carnage that is likely to occur when the team has to designate a number of these mid-season additions.  Because as we designate them we run the risk of losing them to waiver claims.  I don’t think Carlos Maldonado is necessarily at risk, but certainly we didn’t need to expose someone like Sandy Leon or Corey Brown until absolutely necessary.

It makes you wonder if prior additions who are continually getting passed over for non 40-man candidates are either targets to get cut or were mistakes to begin with.  Why no Severino?  How about Carlos Rivera?  How long before the team summarily cuts Xavier Nady and his .500 OPS?

Adam Jones is on fire in 2012 and seems set to sign a long-term extension. Photo unknown via BaltimoreSportsReport.com

Interesting rumor that surfaced today: MASN’s Roch Kubatko tweeted that the Nats offered four players over the winter for centerfielder Adam Jones.  Those four players reportedly were John Lannan, Steve Lombardozzi, Drew Storen and an unnamed “center fielder.”  You’d have to guess the CF was lower-end, certainly not Eury Perez or Brian Goodwin (I’m not even sure we CAN trade Goodwin yet; there’s a set amount of time that has to pass before you can trade recently drafted guys).  The only other two starting CFs in the minors right now are Michael Taylor (our high-A center fielder) and AAA’s Corey Brown.   If I had to guess it would have been Brown, given his removal from the 40-man and his general struggles.

No time-frame was offered for this proposed trade; was it before or after the team swung the Gio Gonzalez deal?  If this was before, you wonder if we end up making the Gonzalez deal (probably; there’s no overlap in players and we’d have really needed another starter).  If this was after, perhaps it indicates how little the organization thought of Lannan even before the events of spring unfolded.

The articles make it seem that this would have been disastrous for the O’s: Lannan is stinking it up in AAA and Storen is hurt.  Its hard not to agree.  But I’d look at it another way; this would have been three 25-man roster guys plus a 4th OF (assuming it was Brown) who looks like he’s turning it around.  I think Lannan is a serviceable 5th starter in this league and just got caught in a numbers game out of spring, and that he’s better than he’s pitching in AAA.  At the time of this deal we wouldn’t have known that Lombardozzi would have this hot start; we only knew that he was young and seemed over-matched last September.

A concern in this story to me is the mention of Storen in the talks.  This is now the 2nd or 3rd time we’ve seen his name mentioned as being trade bait (one other that comes to mind was the proposed Zack Greinke trade.  At some point Storen is going to stop being the team player he clearly is now and become jaded, knowing that his front office is actively trying to get rid of him.

Nonetheless: Jones for that clutch of players seems like it is a steal for the Nats in hindsight.  If this deal had been swung, we’d certainly have a different look to the offense, but would be struggling with some serious depth holes right now (as if we aren’t already).

Thoughts?

Espinosa is still great in the field ... but struggling at the plate. Photo AP via mlb.com

I’m not the only one tolling this bell right now.  Nats beat reporters Dave Nichols posted today on the same topic.  Despite being annointed the starting 2nd baseman, and for a while last year while Ian Desmond struggled serving as the shortstop in waiting, Danny Espinosa is really struggling to start off 2012.   He’s posting a 49 OPS+ right now, with a .188 batting average and (as Nichols points out), an alarming number of strikeouts.

Meanwhile, Steve Lombardozzi is more than ably filling in defensively at 3rd but is a natural 2nd baseman and is getting on base at a .383 clip.  He’s also batting nearly .300 (two 0-fers in Los Angeles dropped his BA below the .300 margin).  Sounds to me like a prototypical lead-off hitter, doesn’t it?

I’ve often used this mantra when complaining about Roger Bernadina‘s continued presence on the lineup: after more than 900 MLB plate appearances, isn’t it safe to say we know what his performance will be?  Well, Espinosa now has nearly as many PAs as Bernadina and seems regressing by the day.  His OPS+ is still decent for his career on account of his 21 homers last season.  But he’s only hit one so far this year and as a result the slugging component of his OPS and OPS+ has drug him down to below replacement level.

Most have noticed his severly bad switch-hitter splits from 2011; clear evidence that he may consider giving up switch hitting and just batting from the right-side.  Of course, its awful hard to do that after you’ve been switch hitting your entire life.

With our #3 and #4 hitters on the DL, and with the team ranked in the bottom 3 in MLB in most offensive categories right now … how long before the team makes a move and benches Espinosa in favor of Lombardozzi?  I like Espinosa; have always defended him.  And after watching Lombardozzi look absolutely lost at the plate last fall, I never thought i’d be saying this so quickly.  But he looks good, Espinosa does not, and the team needs to give itself the best chance to win and score runs.  They can’t win games 3-2 every night.

Harper knows he's ready; is the Media? Photo GQ magazine Mar 2012

As the rest of the free world now knows, Bryce Harper has gotten called up to give the incredibly weakened Nats lineup some potential offense.  Sometimes moves can be planned and orchestrated (such as keeping Stephen Strasburg in the minors in 2010 past the super-2 deadline), and sometimes your hand is called.  With Michael Morse out indefinitely, and with the most fragile $100m player this side of Carl Crawford (aka, F.O.T.F. Ryan Zimmerman) heading to the DL yet again, this team suddenly is without 55-60 homers and 200 RBIs in the middle of its order.

So, we’ll roll the dice with the 19-yr old Harper.

But, should the team really have called up a much more mature, much more MLB-ready member of the Syracuse Chiefs?  A guy who is currently putting up this line in AAA: .278/.354/.556 with 6 homers in 20 games?  A guy who has hit 30+ homers in two successive seasons, at two successive levels of the minors and is currently on a pace for more than 40 in AAA?  Yes I’m talking about Tyler Moore, a 16th round draft pick who has come out of nowhere to become (arguably) this team’s 3rd best hitting prospect in the minors today.

Yes, I know he’s a 1B primarily, and he’s just started taking reps in LF.  But after watching Xavier Nady lumber towards balls in LF and watching Mark DeRosa turn routine RF fly balls into adventures, how much worse could it be to stick him out there instead and juggle Harper with Werth and Ankiel in CF and RF (matchup dependent)?  Scouts and pundits have routinely discounted Moore’s abilities, and Mike Rizzo‘s scouting trip last week apparently made his mind up for him, so perhaps there’s a method to his madness.  Maybe Moore really isn’t an OF option despite his LF experiments.  We’re not watching him game in and game out, just typing out blog posts from our dining room table.

Either way, the Nats should get at least a more competent batter in the line-up.  If Harper comes up and starts blasting the ball all the better.

Opening day is always so much fun.  Except when you are running late, try driving to the stadium, and literally drive around for an hour trying to find a place to park.  I’ve never seen the areas around the stadium THAT jammed, with no parking available in any lot for any price.  We ended up illegally parked off of Delaware ave and somehow didn’t get a parking ticket.  My guess is that the meter maids got carpel tunnel syndrome from writing so many tickets for out of towners that they had to go home before reaching the neighborhood where my car was parked.  We saw the jets from 395, we heard the fireworks while driving past the McDonalds on South Capitol, and arrived in time to see the Nats bat in the bottom of the 2nd.  Lesson learned; never never try to drive to opening day again.

Anyway.

Gio Gonzalez looked fabulous; 7ip, 2 hits, 7 punchouts and zero walks.  He works fast, his four seamer hopped and his curve (at least from the side) looks amazing.  He made Joey Votto, Cincinnati’s best hitter, look just foolish, punching him out twice.  Gonzalez continues a trend of Washington’s 3 best starters pitching 7 complete with room to spare (Gonzalez sat at 97 pitches through 7 complete but had 7-8-9 coming up, meaning that Clippard had a relatively easy hold, but more importantly meaning that, were it later in the season, Gonzalez easily could have extended himself to get through the 8th).

Too bad Gonzalez’s Win was spoiled by the 2nd and 3rd defensive gaffes from Ryan Zimmerman on the afternoon.  He had a fielding error earlier in the game (compounded by throwing the ball away) that didn’t end up factoring into the game, but his defense in the 9th was very questionable.

Baseball 101: if you’re nursing a close lead in the 9th inning, what do you tell your fielders?  NO DOUBLES.  That means your 1st and 3rd basemen guard the line and your outfielders play deep.  You can absorb a single but you don’t allow someone into scoring position.  So what happens in the top of the 9th?  Scott Rolen doubles down the line past Zimmerman to get into scoring position.  Zimmerman was so far off the line he didn’t even dive after the ball.   What he heck was he doing?

Then, after a walk to load the bases Zimmerman plays Ryan Ludwick at least even with the bag, perhaps even further in, apparently guarding against the bunt.  Ok: I guess I can understand that play to a certain extent … except that Ludwick is a power hitter and the Reds were 2 runs down at that point.  Dusty Baker isn’t playing for a suicide squeeze, he’s playing for a gapper to score two runs.  To make matters worse, Ludwick gets down 1-2, and Zimmerman STILL doesn’t return to double play depth.  Ludwick, who was a far shot to bunt in the first place, certainly isn’t bunting with 2 strikes down 2 runs in the 9th!  So what happens?  Ludwick hits a routine grounder to Zimmerman, who gets eaten up because he’s playing right on the grass and the ball takes a weird hop.  If Zimmerman plays at normal depth, that’s a game ending double play ball at best, a force out at 3rd for the 2nd out at worst.

Do you blame his positioning on Zimmerman or the dugout?  Probably the latter, but Zimmerman has been playing long enough and is a good enough fielder that he should have known what to do.  I hope he buys Gonzalez dinner for costing him a Win (not to mention Lidge for the blown-save).  In the end the Nats get the W … but as I was driving away from the stadium it wouldn’t have surprised me in the least to see the team demoralizingly drop that game after controlling it the entire day.