by Andrew Lang
by Andrew Lang
by Andrew Lang
Opening Day had a lot of heart and hustle on display; Photo by Sol Tucker for TalkNats
Today’s slate of games starts with the first leg of a doubleheader to make up for Monday’s postponement between the Nationals and the Braves. These are the 7-inning “variety” doubleheaders that MLB instituted in 2020. The teams will play 3 games in less than 24 hours. We will see the same lineup as yesterday for this first game of this doubleheader. Continue reading
Photo by Sol Tucker for TalkNats
The first pitch of the game was a Max Scherzer meatball that landed in the outfield seats for a Braves lead. The visitors ran the score to 4-0 on four solo home runs. The Nats’ roster on this Opening Day was depleted but certainly not defeated. With 10-players added to the injured list officially today, nine due to COVID, a team that had Hernan Perez playing second base, Andrew Stevenson in left field to face a lefty starter, and unemployed catcher Jonathan Lucroy signed off of his couch, all sprung into action and each contributed to this win.
“It was a good win, given all the circumstances,” Lucroy said. “I hadn’t seen live pitching in a week and some change.”
The Nats clawed back on a Nats’ debut 2-RBI double by Lucroy followed later by a Trea Turner 2-run home run. Remember, it was Turner who was not seen at the team practice on Monday and was presumed my many to be caught up in the COVID mess. Turner looked like his timing was off at times until he squared up that home run. The Braves took the lead in the 8th and Stevenson hung a blown save n the Braves’ bullpen to knot the score at 5-5. In the 9th inning against the Braves closer Will Smith, it started with a Victor Robles oppo single, followed by a Turner HBP, and then in a 3-0 count, Juan Soto ripped a single for the walk-off winner — the first walk-off of any kind in his young career. Continue reading
On the originally scheduled Opening Day on April 1 for the Washington Nationals, the itinerary was chock-full with a must-see lineup for the fans in attendance as the team promised a full slate of pageantry. The pre-game was to have the military F-16 flyovers, patriotic hymns sung by military choirs, an awards ceremony, a 2019 World Series banner re-raising, and a mystery guest to throw out the first pitch. And of course each player on the Opening Day roster would get his name called as they would run down a red carpet to line up on the baseline to the applause of a sell-out crowd of 41,313 5,000 screaming fans.
There is some good news and some bad news for Nats fans, almost everything will remain the same in the pre-game is the good news — but the bad news is that the Opening Day roster will be vastly different due to COVID positives and contact tracing with nine players moved to the IL. To use the words of general manager Mike Rizzo, “several” players from the original Opening Day roster will not be on today’s roster. That would be 10 players in total if you include Will Harris who was officially put on the IL with a hand injury. This is the reality. Max Scherzer will still be the starting pitcher. Continue reading
Right field gates at Nationals Park with Orange entry; Photo by Sol Tucker for TalkNats
The Washington Nationals players had to arrive hours before today’s scheduled practice for another round of COVID rapid tests as well as submit to samples that are sent out to the lab. All eligible players who met the protocols were allowed on the field. The first player who emerged before noon was Max Scherzer who will take the mound tomorrow afternoon as the scheduled Opening Day starter.
Trying to pinpoint when this first game would be played was like hitting a moving target after the large-scaled COVID positives that claimed 4 players as positives for the virus, as well as 7 more players in total were traced for contact with those four players. In all, four games were postponed and five days off of the regular season calendar. Continue reading
Photo by Sol Tucker for TalkNats
All of the past was going to be left in the past on Opening Day as 5,000 fans were supposed to be the representative core to cheer a re-raising of the 2019 World Series banner. A tradition with World Series winners is to hoist a World Series banner or flag on their Opening Day which the Nats were not able to do in Nationals Park in 2020 in front of their fans.
With the first series of the season cancelled due to multiple COVID positives, the Nats are without 35% of what was supposed to have been their 26-man roster as 9-players are out with four having tested positive for COVID.
That number could rise more given the lag times of when COVID would show up on a test. There is pressure to start the season on Monday against the Braves. We will see if that happens. If not, the Nats have a scheduled series in Los Angeles next weekend. Since that is a road game not subject to D.C. rules, would the Nats be able to get back some of those 9 players? Will the team be so out of rhythm that it won’t matter? Continue reading
Medical workers carry the weight of the world on their shoulders as they are our angels in fighting COVID; Mural art by Melbourne Murals
If you thought COVID-19 was behind us, we got the stark reminder and a jolt of reality that it is not. Washington Nationals general manager Mike Rizzo confirmed yesterday that one player (not identified) had tested positive for COVID, and today he said that two more players tested positive with the possibility of a fourth player who could be positive. From here, who knows where this heads as our own Nats could have created their own super-spreader situation. Continue reading
Welcome to Opening Day 2021! The celebration was somewhat muted after general manager Mike Rizzo addressed the media and informed them that one player tested positive for COVID-19 and four other players and one staff member will be held-out after they were identified in contact tracing to the player who tested positive. While none of those players have been named as of yet, it should be a simple matter of seeing who is not on the roster to determine who the five players are unless one or more were players scheduled to play at the Alternate Training Site in Fredericksburg, Virgina. Continue reading
Photo provided courtesy of Mary Beth Koeth
While Jeff Passan’s keyboard clicked off 5,902 words for his ESPN cover story of Juan Soto, you must appreciate every part of what went into this piece. Titled, “WELCOME TO JUAN SOTO’S MLB” with the kicker, “No one owns the batter’s box like the 22-year-old phenom — who soon might just shuffle his way into history,” Passan wrote one of the best articles ever written about the Nats’ superstar outfielder. The cover photo was taken by portrait photographer, Mary Beth Koeth. She will always be linked to Soto in an artistic sense. When your photography reaches Koeth’s level, it is art. Continue reading
With respect to the Washington Nationals final roster, I’m almost surprised with how un-surprising things have turned out. General Manager Mike Rizzo and manager Dave Martinez will formally post up their Opening Day roster shortly, and we should probably see the Alternate Site roster as well. As far as the 26-man roster goes, the sum is greater than the part; but nice parts! Continue reading
Bucky Harris
Manager 1954 Washington Senators
Age 57
Baseball Lifers have The Look. Years of seeing out upon the diamonds with a distant gaze produces a common appearance to the men that inhabit the dugouts. Endless hours of absorbing the sights of the game, calculating a next move, and assessing skills on both sides of the ledger all set against a backdrop of constant uncertainty take their toll. They all entered the game as clear-skinned youths. But, the cumulative effect the game takes is written clearly in aged faces. The “Crows’ Feet” etched into the corners of their eyes are not so much like gentle river deltas meeting salt water. Rather the chasms are rough and jagged-edged as if they were made by chisels and hammers struck into sandstone. Tool marks from mishits predominate as if the tiny invisible craftsmen who struck the permanent blows were in a hurry. To look at a Baseball Lifer’s face is to see what decades under pressure does. It’s all there encoded into those ragged cavernous Crows’ Feet. Amassed in the leathery braille in no particular order are hires, firings, blown saves, wins, blown leads, injured stars, playoff losses, celebrations, lost friends, and Opening Days.
"Opening Day should be a National holiday"
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