The Washington Nationals got a pitching gem from MacKenzie Gore and kind of wasted his 6.0 innings of 1-run baseball in a 1-0 loss. This season starts its mathematical second half with this game against the Angels as the team is back in the Los Angeles area.
For this game, the Nationals have Jake Irvin on the mound. The Angels head into this game at 40-40, and they called a closed door team meeting it was reported this afternoon.
Nats’ manager Dave Martinez needs to get this team onto a winning streak because the team is on a 66-96 pace which is 5-wins behind last year. You have to think that if the Nats don’t win at least 72-games that Martinez won’t return for next year. If he does, then we know that general manager Mike Rizzo accepts failure. Yes, you can deal with losing streaks because that is the short-term downs that should be an outlier of bad luck. The final record is what Rizzo says defines you as a team. The first half failure could certainly be shared from everyone from the players to the coaches to Martinez and Rizzo, and to team ownership.
The Nats have to stop waiting for James Wood home run, and figure out how to score by other means including some small ball. With Jacob Young on first base, he couldn’t be driven in by either CJ Abrams or Wood on Wednesday. You have to find ways to score the first run before you start counting on the second run. One thing about Young is that he turned in a great series in San Diego with throwing out at runner at home on Wednesday, safety squeeze on Tuesday, and two stolen bases. It shows in his rise in WAR that tied him with Luis Garcia Jr. at +0.3, and Young’s OAA lengthened in his team lead at +5.0. Finally, Young looked like the player with so much potential in the 2024 season. He quietly has amassed the 4th highest OBP on the team at .323. Do you know who leads the team? That would be Alex Call at .377.
“They wanted to pick [Gore] up. They were out there grinding. The other guy was pretty good as well. We just couldn’t pick up a couple runs for him.”
— manager Dave Martinez said after Wednesday’s game
Here is the bullpen usage:
Here are your Nats’ WAR leaders with James Wood at +3.3 and MacKenzie Gore at +2.8 followed by CJ Abrams at +2.5.
On defense, the stats are clear as to what his defense is all about. Jacob Young is the team’s OAA leader at +5.0 and Brady House is now on the list at +2.0. James Wood got to a +1.0 on his OAA, and that is a good sign from where he had been early in the season.
One of the newest Nats, Daylen Lile, is already at a -5.0 OAA and that is unsustainable as that is one of the worst marks in baseball if you extrapolated it for a full-season. Luis Garcia Jr. has slumped this season defensively to a -8.0 already — and with CJ Abrams, they combine for -15.0 OAA. That is the worst middle infield in baseball and entirely unacceptable.
Another defensive issue that we have discussed is the positioning of Nathaniel Lowe at first base as he is too often out of position to make a play — and OAA has his chance at success at only 66 percent which must improve. His OAA is at 0.0 now. With as little as Amed Rosario has played on defense, he is at -7.0 OAA this season and the worst on the team. Per Statcast, his defense has cost the Nationals 5-runs. Is his offense good enough to make up that deficit if he plays the field or should he only DH and PH? Keibert Ruiz, per Statcast, has a -8.0 OAA also. The Nationals were supposed to be better on defense. That clearly isn’t the case.
These are your stats leaders on BBRef. There are certainly some surprises on there — good and not so good.
“That [loss] is on us. That’s on the lineup. [Gore] keeps us in almost every game, and we just haven’t been able to score the runs, especially in games like this where it’s one or two. We haven’t been able to scrap them together and get him some more wins. But he’s had our back on the mound. Hopefully in the second half of the year, we can have his.”
— Jacob Young said after Wednesday’s game
The Nats starting pitchers have a combined ERA of 4.40 and 24th best in MLB. You might be surprised at the team just ahead of the Nationals in the rankings. The reliever’s ERA sits at a 5.89 and now the second worst in baseball in ERA.
Here is how the starters rank by ERA:
No. 5 Starter: Trevor Williams 5.65
No. 4 Starter: Michael Soroka 5.06
No. 3 Starter: Mitchell Parker 4.59
No. 2 Starter: Jake Irvin 4.18
No. 1 Starter: MacKenzie Gore 3.09
Washington Nationals vs. Los Angeles Angels
Stadium: Angel Stadium, Anaheim, California
1st Pitch: 9:38 pm EDT
TV: MASN
Radio: 106.7 The Fan radio and via the MLB app; In Spanish on DC 87.7 FM and La Pantera 100.7 FM/1220 AM. On Sirius/XM, tune to Channel 189 for the home broadcast and the road team is online only.
Line-up subject to change (without notice):
- CJ Abrams SS LH
- James Wood LF LH
- Luis Garcia Jr. 2B LH
- Nathaniel Lowe 1B LH
- Josh Bell DH SH
- Brady House 3B RH
- Daylen Lile RF LH
- Riley Adams C RH
- Jacob Young CF RH
