The Nats bench cleared last week in Atlanta, a rarity. Nothing happened. Are they just inert?
Is Matt Williams over his head as a manager, sending runners to their demise and stars such as Ryan Zimmerman to the disabled list in a bizarre quest for a few extra bases with crazy over-aggression? Why send a promising rookie with a 0.00 ERA to the minors just to get a fresh arm for one day? Hyper much?
Is Stephen Strasburg losing his fastball? Every year his velocity drops: 97.6, 96.0, 95.8, 95.2 and 94.0?
Is Wilson Ramos not just unlucky but injury-prone, a player who’ll never stay healthy and be a star? Bryce Harper has made two All-Star teams and 700 commercials. When will he actually have a star year?
Are the Nats pulled muscles, which have put Harper, Jason Werth, Nate McClouth out, and bad starting rotation a bye-product of the Nats anti-Davey boot-camp spring training?
The Nats lead the majors in errors. What happened to back-to-basics?
It’d be easy to go on about this National abomination except the team is actually 9-6, despite tons of injuries, and, according to composite stats, are the fifth-best team in baseball so far this season.
For baseball fans, April is insanely entertaining, but also terrifying. You can justify almost any conclusion based on just enough evidence to seem brilliant by season’s end. Or look like a complete idiot. Of the 10 questions above, all phrased at their nastiest, I bet a couple will be dismally accurate. And all the others nonsense.
The Nationals, after a borderline disgraceful 1-5 showing this month against a Braves team without three-fifths of its starting rotation, should want an opportunity to question questions as quickly as possible. And they have it in the Cardinals, the team that has bothered them almost as much as the Braves the past two seasons and that opened a four-game Thursday night at Nationals Park.
The Nats’ biggest strength has, so far, been their biggest problem; the fifth-worst ERA of any starting rotation in MLB. It’s neutered much of the good work of an improved bullpen with Rafael Soriano (0.00 ERA, 10 strikeout, no walks) owning the first negative Fielder Independent Pitching (-0.28 ERA) I’ve seen. Come on, geeks, does that mean he can take his defense off the field?
Gio Gonzalez, Jordan Zimmermann and Strasburg are the core of the team, better at their jobs than perhaps any everyday player is at his. If they’re not leading the way, there is no parade. Starting Friday, they will be interrogated by the Cardinals. Gio panicked in Game 5 of the 2012 playoffs, and the Cards said so after he lasted just five innings and couldn’t defend a 6-0 lead. On Sunday, trying to avoid a sweep in Atlanta, Gonzalez opened with a walk, a wild throw on a sacrifice bunt and allowed six runs in the first two innings. Cheerful is all very nice; effective in important games is essential.
Zimmermann had such problems with the Cardinals two years ago that he said they might own him. Rosters changed. Without Carlos Beltran and David Freese, do they still? Strasburg’s velocity is worth a mini-fret. But most power pitchers gradually lose some speed through their 20s, and everyone’s velocity is down in April. Besides, with a slider (12 percent of his pitches) added to his curve and changeup, his strikeout percentage is up more than any pitcher in MLB this year (+10.7) to a nutty 36.8 percent of all hitters he faces. If swings and misses measure total stuff, Strasburg is adding pieces, not subtracting.
The well-schooled Cards are also a test for Williams’ base-path aggression. The Nats seldom steal. That’s good; Yadier Molina seldom allows it. Can they run on the other eight Cards, at least judiciously, not “run-’til-they-tag-you” which is not actually a baseball theory and when it fails, not amusing.
Panic is juicy. But because the Nats are on a 97-win pace, let’s ask a couple of questions with rosy spin.
Has any team had better news for its future than the Nats — albeit with April asterisks — with Anthony Rendon breaking out and Danny Espinosa returning; high-ceiling-stuff Aaron Barrett and Blake Treinan lengthening the bullpen; and Zack Walters and Stephen Souza blasting their way up from AAA? Tanner Roark and Taylor Jordan still look like helpful back-end starters. That is, potentially, 50 seasons worth of good team-controlled players.
The Nats excel at acquiring and developing pitchers, like Lucas Giolito, now at AA, but they’ve had to buy hitters like Werth or Adam LaRoche. Except for unavoidably obvious first-round picks Zimmerman and Harper, they haven’t drafted or traded for a durable young star hitter since they arrived here. Out of Rendon (probably), Walters and Souza (maybe) you’ll see at least one perennial Nos. 2-3-4-5 bat. Walters, whom former manager Davey Johnson said would be a star, came for Jason Marquis. Souza was a No. 100 draft pick.
Teams create their own internal season narrative then continue to live it out. Trends in motion tend to stay in motion. Starting on Opening Day when the Nats trailed 5-0 but won and continuing to Wednesday when they trailed 3-0 against Miami star Jose Fernandez after six innings but won, they’ve been a relentless comeback team.
The bullpen has held the fort while a persistent attack patiently probes. The Nats are fourth in baseball in runs per game (5.13) and second in on-base-plus-slugging. Good is easy to miss. Since the day Rick Schu took over as hitting coach last July and relaxed some wrinkled cortexes, Washington has outscored every team in MLB, even St. Louis. Not by much. It’s just 79 games. But maybe it matters.
Baseball has always been the sport that rewards teams with patience and confident slowly-formed judgments. Performance, once established, usually recurs. Short time frames, even 10 percent of a season, where the Nats now are, is just a glimpse. Wait, wait. Let injuries heal. May will bring back Zimmerman, Ramos and the arrival of Doug Fister. What is too improbable to continue probably won’t.
Meantime, the urgent yin to patience’s yang, there’s a game tonight, tonight, tomorrow. The questions, kind and cold, don’t go away. The answers wait, but not forever.