{"id":2035,"date":"2011-09-03T09:01:43","date_gmt":"2011-09-03T13:01:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=2035"},"modified":"2011-09-25T10:16:30","modified_gmt":"2011-09-25T14:16:30","slug":"what-to-do-with-livan-hernandez","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=2035","title":{"rendered":"What to do with Livan Hernandez?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Is Livan's time in Washington coming to an end? Photo AP\/Tom Gannam via prorumors.com<\/p><\/div>\n

Livan Hernandez<\/strong> holds a special place in the hearts and history of the Washington Nationals.\u00a0 He pitched our first game as a franchise.\u00a0 He’s been our opening day starter four times (including in 2011).\u00a0 And he continues to pitch reasonably well despite a fastball that’s barely good enough for some adult leagues in the area.\u00a0 He’s on an incredibly cheap contract for a veteran of his capabilities ($1M base for 2011<\/a> with some performance bonuses) and you know pretty much what you get from him year-to-year (roughly a .500 record, roughly 9 to 12 wins, a career 4.37 era).\u00a0 From a salary perspective, he’s one of the best FA bargains out there (assuming he ends the season with 8 wins, a FA figure of $125,000 per win is fantastic in an age when teams try to get FA pitching at $1m\/win.\u00a0 See my “Contract value for FA pitcher<\/a>” post from last October, which I’ll update this off season with 2011’s season results and new signings).<\/p>\n

However, in the 2nd half his “mood swings” on the mound have become problematic.\u00a0 His starts<\/a> dating to May 30th he’s as likely to give up 2 runs in 7 innings as he is to give up 6 in 5.\u00a0\u00a0 In my trends his line reads basically good-bad-good-bad-good-bad.\u00a0 In all these games lately where he’s given up a large parcel of runs, it is in fewer than 5 innings pitched, meaning the game is basically out of hand before it is halfway done and the bullpen has to pick up a hefty workload of 4-5 innings each time.\u00a0 The team today has essentially announced that after his Sunday 9\/4 start he’s being shut down for the season<\/a>, in favor of younger pitchers (read, Brad Peacock<\/strong>).<\/p>\n

What should we do with him for 2012?\u00a0 The Nats blogosphere has weighed in on the topic in the recent past, with opinions pro-<\/a> and anti-<\/a> Livan.<\/p>\n

The answer however may have come to the team almost by accident on 8\/30.\u00a0 In a post-game interview<\/a> after beating the Braves, Livan mentioned more or less that:<\/p>\n