Going Deep with The Nats

The last 24-hours ended the question as to who would remain with the team out of the pending free agents as both Ryan Madson and Gio Gonzalez were both traded. For Gio, he only has to walk a few hundred feet to his new team while Madson has to fly to Los Angeles. Only Bryce Harper, Matt Wieters and Mark Reynolds remain as the only healthy members on the team’s pending free agent list. Kelvin Herrera, Jeremy Hellickson and Joaquin Benoit remain on the DL as they are also scheduled to be free agents after the season. In total, six players were ultimately traded in the past 31 days which started with Brandon Kintzler‘s departure.

This time last year Stephen Strasburg was the best pitcher in all of baseball in the second half of the season. In his last outing, Stras looked better than he did in his previous outing as he works his way back into form after a stint on the DL. If times were different, he probably would have been pitching his last two games at Harrisburg or Potomac — but these are not normal times as the Washington Nationals now need a miracle to secure a playoff berth and must play well just to finish with a winning record for that matter. Continue reading →

Photo by Marlene Koenig for TalkNats

The Washington Nationals now need a miracle to secure a playoff berth and must play well just to finish with a winning record for that matter. The team did wake-up this morning to find they picked up a ½ game against the first place Braves after Atlanta lost last night. The Nationals face the Milwaukee Brewers this weekend in a series that the Nationals must sweep someway — somehow. Yesterday, WTP wrote about the Nats 5.5% odds of making the postseason.  Continue reading →

If you believe that the one-run performance Gio Gonzalez posted up 5-days ago in 7.0 innings of work against the Mets is an indication that Gio is primed to finish up his tenure with the Nationals as an ace then tonight should be a good time for Gio to pitch his best. In that game against the Mets, the Nationals could not score a run against Jason Vargas, and the scoring droughts when Gio Gonzalez is on the mound is all too familiar while he is in the game. Continue reading →

On Thursday, we were able to witness a pitcher’s duel with two of the three Cy Young frontrunners on the same mound. Aaron Nola of the Phillies and Max Scherzer of the Nationals squared off on the Nationals Park mound while Jacob deGrom pitched on that same day in his pursuit of the Cy Young crown. Tonight, all three pitchers are showcasing for the NL Cy Young voters, and Nola and Scherzer will once again face each other. The weather conditions should be different as it will be warmer and there won’t be Half Street wind blowing in from leftfield like we saw last Thursday. Juan Soto put two “A” swings on Nola pitches where the wind robbed him of a 2-run home run and a double. For his effort, Nola pitched a shutout, and Scherzer was victimized by one cutter that was hit for a 2-run homer to rightfield by the Phillies lefty Odubel Herrera in the seventh inning of what was a scoreless game. Continue reading →