by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears
by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears
by Andrew Lang
by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears
by Stan4Nats
by Andrew Lang
by Stan4Nats
Howie Kendrick underneath Minute Maid Park, Houston, TX; Photo by Paul Kim
The Washington Nationals are the World Series champs, and that should give General Manager Mike Rizzo a little bit of extra time on assembling his 2020 roster. He indicated that he would move swiftly after the Winter Meetings, but now he is in a wait and see mode on Josh Donaldson we have been told according to a source. Continue reading
The defending World Series Champions were an integral part of two of the three biggest stories to emerge from the 2019 Winter Meetings in San Diego (if you thought the third one was Gerrit Cole, you thought wrong ;-). Continue reading
Photo by Andrew Lang for TalkNats
There was little activity yesterday after a lot of action at the Winter Meetings which are officially over for this offseason even though we are not even technically in the winter months. The Nationals, Yankees, and the Angels spent big money, and their deals for respectively for Stephen Strasburg, Gerrit Cole, and Anthony Rendon were all record breaking deals. In each deal, the runner-up seemed far behind leading to speculation that teams were just bidding against themselves. Continue reading
The Washington Nationals announced several changes on their coaching staff that includes one new hire and three new roles for existing coaches. Manager Dave Martinez‘s first base coach, Tim Bogar, will be his new bench coach, and he had actually interviewed for the Mets managerial vacancy. He was considered a “strong contender” before the Mets went in another direction and hired Carlos Beltran. Since Bogar is taking Chip Hale‘s spot as bench manager, Hale will take over as the team’s third base coach, and Bob Henley will move across the diamond to take Bogar’s spot as the first base coach. The final change on the coaching staff includes the only hire from outside the organization as Martinez hired Pat Roessler as the assistant hitting coach. Continue reading
The Washington Nationals struck quickly on the first full day of the Winter Meetings in San Diego, re-signing World Series MVP Stephen Strasburg to return their all-world rotation from 2019. Continue reading
It is official that the first of the big three free agents is signed, and that freed agent is coming back to the Nationals as expected with Stephen Strasburg agreeing to a 7-year deal for $245 million at $35 million a year with a $32.7 million per year AAV calculation due to the deferred dollars. There is a method to the madness of this signing if you believe that agent Scott Boras just set his other client, Gerrit Cole, as the biggest name left out there on the pitching side and bidders will have to surpass the 7/$245,000,000 that Strasburg just got, and they probably will be asking 9/$320,000,000 for the younger Cole. Continue reading
As the Winter Meetings officially open in San Diego, most of the key participants will be relaxing today with some golf at Torrey Pines and some other golf venues ahead of the some wining and dining at the Hilton San Diego Bayfront. The most important singular person at these meetings is super agent Scott Boras who lives just up the beach in Newport outside of Los Angeles, and he will be the man at the center of the free agent universe as he operates the hallways and suites at the Hilton. Boras reps Stephen Strasburg, Anthony Rendon, Gerrit Cole, Mike Moustakas, Hyun-Jin Ryu, Dallas Keuchel, and Nicholas Castellanos and others. Only Moustakas is signed on that list. In the top dozen players, the non-Boras clients are Marcell Ozuna, Madison Bumgarner, Zack Wheeler, Yasmani Grandal, and Josh Donaldson. Of the top dozen players, three are already signed and two of those players, Grandal and Wheeler, are not Boras clients. Continue reading
Mark Lerner with Scott Boras in happier times in 2009. Photo by Win McNamee for Getty Images
From Monday’s smashing success at the Nationals premiere of the World Series documentary, Mark Lerner agreed to do another interview today. It turned out to be another of those “cringeworthy” one-on-one interviews like Lerner has done before. Clearly, Ted Lerner’s son lacks the ability to maneuver through the minefield of direct questions about free agents when the situation calls for a more subtle response. The interview with Donald Dell for NBC Sports Washington appears to not have been done with any prepping from the public relations department. When Ted Lerner was the principal owner of the Nationals he was seen but rarely heard. He would never talk about the team’s strategic moves and always left that up to his baseball people like general manager Mike Rizzo. When the reigns of the team was handed to Ted’s son, Mark has given the occasional interview, and he lacks that gift of gab. Continue reading
A victory cigar; photo by Jeffery Salter
With rumors swirling like the wind, someone(s) is leaking information on every move that Stephen Strasburg and Anthony Rendon are making. The common denominator on these two star players is the agent they share, Scott Boras, who always seems willing to let their whereabouts play in the public forums if it helps drive up the demand side of the micro-economic curve. Typically when demand increases with more buyers than the supply of players the prices escalate and that will benefit a pitcher like Zack Wheeler in this case and probably Madison Bumgarner also who are on the tier below Strasburg and Gerrit Cole. It is starting to feel like a Veblen situation when you look at the number of starting pitchers who will get deals over $100 million and the high demand for what surely is a luxury item. There is certainly a caveat emptor disclaimer on each of these players as these are humans and not a Lamborghini, Ferrari, Rolls Royce or Bugatti built to one-of-a-kind specs. Wheeler has had shoulder and elbow issues, Strasburg has his TJ surgery on his resumé, and Bumgarner had a 3.90 ERA last season. Continue reading
The event kicked off with a quick Q&A with (L to R) Ryan Zimmerman, Mike Rizzo, Mark Lerner, Lindsay Czarniak, Craig Melvin; Photo by Sol Tucker for TalkNats
The premiere showing of the 2019 World Series documentary from Shout! Factory Productions was debuted last night to a sold-out crowd of 3,000 at The Anthem in Washington, D.C. This red carpet event was attended by Ryan Zimmerman and general manager Mike Rizzo as well as principal owner Mark Lerner, and the narrator of the film Craig Melvin. Local sportscaster Lindsay Czarniak who is married to Melvin acted as the emcee for the Q&A discussion in which Mike Rizzo talked about that he got married in Jamaica last week and said since the end of the World Series, “I’ve been drunk for a month.” That was met with applause and laughter. Much of the Q&A was met with applause and laughter as Craig Melvin asked Lerner if he could buy the Redskins. Continue reading
