The Washington Nationals looked as good as you can look on Saturday and Sunday in a polar opposite to how bad they looked on Thursday and Friday. What the Nats need to do is bottle up what they did against the Giants yesterday and future Hall-of-Famer, Justin Verlander, who they torched for five earnies in 5.0 innings.
The Nationals only have 14 series remaining this year with an even split between road/home series right now. And only this series in Kansas City and an early September series in Chicago against the Cubs are against teams not on the East coast.
Tonight is the second start for Cade Cavalli this season, and the Nats hope is that he can throw another scoreless outing like he did last week — and maybe go past the 5th inning. The good news is that yesterday’s blowout allowed almost every reliever to rest except PJ Poulin, Clayton Beeter, and Cole Henry. Every reliever should be available tonight except Henry and possibly Shinnosuke Ogasawara who threw 50-pitches on Friday. Also of note, this is the 3rd consecutive game that Robert Hassell III has not started. Instead, it will be Daylen Lile starting in right field again.
“That’s [MacKenzie Gore]. That’s what you get from a No. 1, and that’s who he is. It was awesome to see him come back — and perform the way he normally does.”
— Miguel Cairo said after yesterday’s game
The bullpen usage looks like this:
Here are your Nats’ WAR leaders with James Wood at +3.0, CJ Abrams at +2.8, MacKenzie Gore at +2.7. Add those up, and you get a total of +8.5 WAR. The issue is the large gap between those players and the next tier.
On defense, the OAA stats showed some improvement with a good defensive game yesterday. Jacob Young leads the team at +11, and CJ Abrams is on the opposite end at -10. That is actually quite the improvement over last year’s -18 for Abrams who is on pace to finish at -14.
These are your stats leaders on BBRef. There are certainly some surprises on there — good and not so good. The issue is the consistency on this team.
“This is what we’re preaching. This is what we are talking about — pick your teammates up.”
— Cairo said after yesterday’s game
The Nats starting pitchers have a combined ERA of 4.93 and that places the starters at 3rd from last in MLB. The reliever’s ERA sits at a 5.84 and now the worst in baseball in ERA.
Here is how the starters rank by ERA:
No. 5 Starter: Cade Cavalli 0.00
No. 4 Starter: Mitchell Parker 5.43
No. 3 Starter: Brad Lord 3.28 (starting/relieving)
No. 2 Starter: Jake Irvin 4.90
No. 1 Starter: MacKenzie Gore 4.09
Washington Nationals vs. Kansas City Royals
Stadium: Kauffman Stadium, Kansas City, Missouri
1st Pitch: 7:40 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 178 for the home broadcast and the road team is online only.
Line-up subject to change (without notice):
