{"id":12191,"date":"2016-05-09T09:05:47","date_gmt":"2016-05-09T13:05:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=12191"},"modified":"2016-05-09T09:05:47","modified_gmt":"2016-05-09T13:05:47","slug":"yes-they-got-swept-by-the-cubs-but","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=12191","title":{"rendered":"Yes they got swept by the Cubs but&#8230;"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_9503\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/HarperBryce-openingday2013-homerun-swing-unk-via-fansided.com_.jpg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-9503\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-9503\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-9503\" src=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/HarperBryce-openingday2013-homerun-swing-unk-via-fansided.com_-300x227.jpg\" alt=\"Here's something Harper didn't do a lot of this past series: swing.  Photo via fansided.com\" width=\"300\" height=\"227\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/HarperBryce-openingday2013-homerun-swing-unk-via-fansided.com_-300x227.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/HarperBryce-openingday2013-homerun-swing-unk-via-fansided.com_.jpg 650w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-9503\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Here&#8217;s something Harper didn&#8217;t do a lot of this past series: swing. Photo via fansided.com<\/p><\/div>\n<p>So, even though the team just got swept in a 4-game set, I&#8217;m not really that concerned.\u00a0 Why?<\/p>\n<p>Well, first, the Cubs are fantastic, and I thought one win out of four would have been a good, expected result.\u00a0 The Cubs missed <strong>Strasburg<\/strong>, our best guy (even if he&#8217;s not the &#8220;Ace&#8221; thanks to <strong>Scherzer<\/strong>&#8216;s contract) while we stood up to the Cubs&#8217; Ace <strong>Arrieta<\/strong>.\u00a0 The Nats scored a bunch of runs against a good team and on other days may have gotten a win or two.\u00a0 Am I right?<\/p>\n<p>Game by Game:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Thurs: Lose 5-2: <strong>Joe Ross<\/strong> gives up 2 in 6 but the Nats muster just 3 hits against <strong>Kyle Hendricks<\/strong>.\u00a0 Don&#8217;t deserve to win when you only get 3 hits.<\/li>\n<li>Fri: Lose 8-6 in a game that really wasn&#8217;t that close: <strong>Max Scherzer<\/strong> gives up four homers, which is just crazy unlucky for him based on his typical FB\/HR averages.\u00a0 Nats make the scoreline respectable by getting into the Cubs bullpen for four runs late.\u00a0 Don&#8217;t deserve to win when your starter gives up 4 dingers.<\/li>\n<li>Sat: Lose 8-5 when <strong>Gio Gonzalez<\/strong> can&#8217;t get through the Cubs&#8217; 3-4-5 hitters a third time.\u00a0 Nats bullpen doesn&#8217;t do its job.\u00a0 I kinda question the pitching management here honestly; is <strong>Solis<\/strong> the right guy to go to there?\u00a0 Is it a smart move to let your #5 starter attempt to go through the heart of the other team&#8217;s order in a hitter&#8217;s park?\u00a0 If you want to go lefty, why not go with your veteran <strong>Oliver Perez<\/strong> or your fireballer <strong>Felipe Rivero<\/strong> instead of a guy who was in Syracuse last week?\u00a0 I guess its because Rivero got blitzed thursday night.\u00a0\u00a0 Instead Rivero comes in during garbage time and manages to load the bases and leak yet another run.<\/li>\n<li>Sun: Lose 4-3 in extras after chasing the best pitcher in the game and squandering a fantastic outing from <strong>Tanner Roark<\/strong>.\u00a0 Again, a leaky bullpen, this time in the same guy Perez that I thought was a better option than Solis the day before.\u00a0 But the story of this game was the astounding batting lines of <strong>Bryce Harper<\/strong> (7 plate appearances, 6 walks and a HBP) and <strong>Ryan Zimmerman <\/strong>(a major league record 14 runners left on base).\u00a0 The team in total left 21 runners on base and went 1-19 with RISP on the day. One for NINETEEN!\u00a0 Zimmerman hit a couple balls well on the night, but none when it counted.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Total score of the series: Cubs 25, Nats 16.\u00a0 Lot of runs on the bullpen.\u00a0 Zero of our lefty relievers really stepped up.\u00a0 Both our 8th inning guys couldn&#8217;t shut anyone down.\u00a0 And clearly nobody respects anyone else in the lineup besides Harper.<\/p>\n<p>Anyway; before I get all gloom and doom, the Nats just finished their hardest road trip of the year 5-5, when prior to the season I would have been happy with them going 3-7.\u00a0 Thanks to sweeps in St. Louis and surprising series win in KC, i&#8217;ve still got them projected to win 95 games right now (easy math: team goes .500 against the rest of the league and interleague, plays .600 ball in their division).<\/p>\n<p>Now &#8230; if they get swept in New York&#8230;.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>So, even though the team just got swept in a 4-game set, I&#8217;m not really that concerned.\u00a0 Why? Well, first, the Cubs are fantastic, and I thought one win out of four would have been a good, expected result.\u00a0 The Cubs missed Strasburg, our best guy (even if he&#8217;s not the &#8220;Ace&#8221; thanks to Scherzer&#8216;s [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[164,2237,385,2329,2691,2912,1037,78,36,19,38,77],"class_list":["post-12191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-natsgeneral","tag-bryce-harper","tag-felipe-rivero","tag-gio-gonzalez","tag-jake-arrieta","tag-joe-ross","tag-kyle-hendricks","tag-max-scherzer","tag-oliver-perez","tag-ryan-zimmerman","tag-sammy-solis","tag-stephen-strasburg","tag-tanner-roark"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12191","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12191"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12191\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12194,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12191\/revisions\/12194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}