A Totally Subjective Analysis of Why the 2016 Nationals Will (Finally) Win 100 Games

Posted on April 3, 2016 by NatsRed4DinDC

I love analytics. Really. The numbers quite often confirm what we see on the field, and indeed they often explain why things are the way they are. You want to know when Bryce Harper  took that next step and became an MVP in 2015? Take a look at what FanGraphs calls its “plate discipline” metrics and you’ll have a great foundation for understanding where it all went right. Continue reading →

Posted in Analysis, CRob, Dusty, Espinosa, Gio, Harper, Jayson, JRoss, Lineup, Lobaton, MedicalStaff, Murphy, Papelbon, Ramos, Rendon, Revere, Roark, RyanZimmerman, Sabermetrics, Scherzer, Strasburg, Taylor, Treinen | Leave a comment

Spring Training is officially over for the #Nats

Posted on April 2, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

The Washington Nationals finished Spring Training with the best Spring Training record in the Majors with a 19-4-4 Won-Loss-Tie record. While we can be optimistic about much of what we saw, let’s check how Spring Training records relate to World Series champions.

We analyzed the last 20 years of Spring Training records, and 13 of 20 World Series champs had winning records, 1 tie, 6 were losers.  That makes 65% of the World Series teams had winning records in Spring Training.

  1. 2015 – Royals 20 -10 W
  2. 2014 – Giants 17 – 12 W
  3. 2013 – Red Sox 17 – 17 T
  4. 2012 – Giants 18 – 15 W
  5. 2011 – Cardinals 14 – 16 L .467
  6. 2010 – Giants 23 – 12 W
  7. 2009 – Yankees 24 – 10 W
  8. 2008 – Phillies 12 – 18 L .400
  9. 2007 – Red Sox 15 -12 W
  10. 2006 – Cardinals 15 -14 W
  11. 2005 – White Sox 14 – 18 L .438
  12. 2004 – Red Sox 17 -12 W
  13. 2003 – Marlins 14 – 16 L .467
  14. 2002 – Angels 17 -15 W
  15. 2001 – D-Backs 19 – 14 W
  16. 2000 – Yankees 13 – 20 L .394
  17. 1999 – Yankees 14 – 19 L .424
  18. 1998 – Yankees 15 – 12 W
  19. 1997 – Marlins 21 – 5 W
  20. 1996 – Yankees 16 – 15 W

Let’s look at Dusty Baker‘s Spring Training record to see how he did in various seasons.

  1. In Dusty’s first season with the San Francisco Giants when they won 103 games in 1993: 14-17
  2. In Dusty’s World Series season with the San Francisco Giants in 2002: 16-16
  3. In Dusty’s first season with the Chicago Cubs, they went to the playoffs in 2003: 17-11
  4. In Dusty’s 97 win season in 2012 with the Cincinnati Reds, they went to the playoffs: 15-17

Continue reading →

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#Nats (weather permitting) will finish Spring Training today vs. #Twins

Posted on April 2, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

Last night, Dusty Baker‘s roster was announced for Opening Day with a few twists and turns. Today, Dusty has penciled in Joe Ross to start this final exhibition game set for 12:05pm against the Minnesota Twins who will start Ricky Nolasco.

The weather will once again be a twist for today’s game based on this Tweet below:

Interestingly we learned last night that there was thunder, lightning and rain in the DMV halfway through last night’s game and it never affected Nats Park.

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Dusty Baker announces his Opening Day roster for 2016 #Nats & Payroll

Posted on April 1, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

And the drum roll please….but before we announce the Opening Day 2016 roster, let us recap Dusty Baker‘s pre-game presser, he announced that he made the decision that Joe Ross would be on the Opening Day roster even though he won’t be needed for a start until April 13th. Most likely Joe Ross will work out of the pen only for a few games and will need to pitch a sim-game on April 9th to tune-up for his start on April 13th. Word we got from our source was “Dusty didn’t want to over-complicate things and cut a player in 2 weeks” which makes some sense from that standpoint. Continue reading →

Posted in Analysis, Dusty, Roster | Leave a comment

The #Nats are back in DC for a pair of exhibition games against the #Twins

Posted on April 1, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

The Nats arrived back in Washington late on Wednesday night as players settled into their 2016 residences. Today, weather permitting, the Nats will face the Minnesota Twins (formerly the 1960 Washington Senators) in an exhibition game at Nats Park and will have another game tomorrow against the Twins.

Continue reading →

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Book Report: Lawyerball: Os vs the #Nats

Posted on April 1, 2016 by Power Boater

Name the title, author, and the number of pages:
Lawyerball: The Courtroom Battle of the Orioles Against the Nationals and MLB for the Future of Baseball, Charles H. Martin, 242 pages

Identify the type of book:
Non-fiction

Identify the main characters:
Ted Lerner and the Washington Nationals, Peter Angelos and the Baltimore Orioles and Mid-Atlantic Sports Network (MASN), Justice Lawrence Marks, Proskauer Rose Law Firm

Describe the book’s setting:
New York County State Court where the previously private contract for the Nats broadcast rights and the terms of the internal MLB arbitration have now been made public.

Give a brief summary of the plot:
The core of the book was the dispute between the Nats and MASN over the TV broadcast rights fees. Starting with the history of baseball in Washington and Baltimore, including the legal history of anti-trust exemption and the reserve clause, then the biographies for Ted Lerner and Peter Angelos, followed by the original contract that gave the broadcast rights to Angelos, leading into the arguments presented in court by both sides over the past year, and finally a summary of the impacts of the case.

What was the theme of the book?:
That the dispute over hundreds of millions of dollars between two billionaires will likely have a lasting impact on MLB, along with anyone bound by a contact with an arbitration clause that now has a lower threshold to be reversed in court.

Explain why you liked or disliked the book:
A book on the MASN dispute would likely have a very limited audience of Nats and Os fans who have an interest in reading legal minutia about the case so the author wrapped the dispute in a great deal of background, including legal precedents and conclusions on how this case could affect a lot of people who may have never even heard of MASN. In reaching for this larger reader base there was a very large amount of tangential information, including a couple of pages on the history of the Civil War in the neighborhood where Ted Lerner grew up and way too many pages on deflategate.

However the middle sections on the legal arguments were fascinating, with a ton of information previously only available in the court transcripts.

Buy on Amazon

Buy the book now, before reading any further, in previous reviews I was careful to not reveal too much but the MASN case has too much juicy info and some but not all are about to be listed here.

Continue reading →

Posted in Analysis, Lerners, MASN | Leave a comment

Bryce Harper’s new TV commercial is about hair! #Nats

Posted on April 1, 2016 by Andrew Lang

Most Nats fans know that Bryce Harper is quite proud of his flow. Bryce’s older sister Brittany used to style Bryce’s hair through his teenage years and was very creative with the daring styles.

A year ago MLB’s Cut4 did this piece about Bryce’s hair:   Cut4 Bryce’s Hair

Now Bryce stars in a commercial as a barber that we previewed last month, and the final cut is great! The commercial was shot on February 26th in a Cocoa Beach barbershop.

bryce harper commercial

Photo by Bo Clancey

In this new MLB commercial starring Bryce Harper which is part of a series of MLB commercials known as #THIS, Harper shares his grooming secrets with the fictional ‘Little Nats’ team.

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Creativity is part of the GM’s job #Nats

Posted on March 31, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

Some General Managers are more creative than others.

When the Stephen Strasburg shutdown was announced in 2012, the plan seemingly lacked creativity. Stephen Strasburg pitched Opening Day on April 5th and pitched his turn in the rotation each time until he reached his 160 inning pre-determined limit on September 7th as his season abruptly ended. The only time Strasburg had more than 2 extra days of rest between starts was for the All Star break. Rizzo was boldly criticized as the NL East Champions did not have their Ace for the post-season. That is now ancient history, and that was then and this is now. We all knew there was an innings limit for Strasburg; however, Rizzo would never publicly disclose what that limit was just like Jordan Zimmermann when his season ended just as abruptly the year before Strasburg at 161 1/3 innings.

Now, GM Mike Rizzo potentially has two key starting pitchers who are on innings limits. We are projecting limits of 140 innings for Lucas Giolito and that could certainly increase to 160 innings that Jordan Zimmermann and Strasburg were shutdown at. We are projecting 183-191 innings for Joe Ross depending if Rizzo goes 20% or 25% over Joe’s 152 2/3 innings from 2015. Creativity will be needed once again, and Mike Rizzo gets a do-over of sorts. This should be much easier with Lucas Giolito as he isn’t needed on the MLB roster in April, and Joe Ross’ inings will be more difficult to control as he is the Nats #5 pitcher and his innings have to be controlled at the MLB level.

Photo by Luis Albisu for TalkNats.com

Photo by Luis Albisu for TalkNats.com

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Posted in Analysis, Dusty, Giolito, JRoss, RizzoForADay, Roster | Leave a comment

Jayson Werth once again reminds his critics that you shouldn’t count him out!

Posted on March 30, 2016 by Andrew Lang

Jayson Werth has always had his critics. They have been around his whole career doubting him. The Orioles used a 1st round pick on Werth in 1997, but gave up on him and traded him just 3 years later to the Blue Jays. The Blue Jays made a decision 12 years ago from yesterday to trade Jayson Werth and go with the rookie Simon Pond. Werth would continue to bounce around from the Dodgers to the Phillies and got his big break in 2008 as Charlie Manuel made Werth a starter at the age of 29. Werth proved that perseverance would pay off.

Werth has always believed in himself when others have not. Werth will turn 37 in 50 days, and while he has admitted recently that he can’t play forever, he also said he feels like he has a lot left in the tank.

Bryce Harper Michael A Taylor Jayson Werth Ben Revere

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The Grapefruit League finale game (weather permitting) 3/30/16 #Nats

Posted on March 30, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

The Nats travel to Port St. Lucie to face their division NL East rival, the NY Mets, in the Nats finale in 2016 for the Grapefruit League. Max Scherzer will stay behind in Viera and pitch in a minor league game starting shortly. The reason for that is weather related as Dusty Baker wants Max to get his full work in just in case the rains cancel the game against the Mets.

The Nats have a Delta charter set to leave later today for Washington DC as the Nats have 2 home exhibition games against the Minnesota Twins formerly the 1960 Washington Senators that Calvin Griffith took to Minnesota for the 1961 season. After the weekend exhibition games the Nats will travel to Atlanta for the regular season Opening Day on Monday April 4th.

Line-ups for today are subject to change without notice:

  1. Ben Revere CF
  2. Anthony Rendon 3B
  3. Bryce Harper RF
  4. Ryan Zimmerman 1B
  5. Daniel Murphy 2B
  6. Jayson Werth LF
  7. Wilson Ramos C
  8. Danny Espinosa SS
  9. Max Scherzer RHP changed to Trevor Gott RHP

Some teams have started naming their final rosters. We still don’t know when Rizzo will make his final cuts, but we were told this morning by one of our sources that unless there is a last minute change, Joe Ross will stay behind in Viera on Opening Day for extended Spring Training.

The Nats are still sticking with Max Scherzer to start on Monday on regular rest and Stephen Strasburg will pitch on 4 days extra rest on April 7th for the Nats home opener. Strasburg’s start yesterday was shortened by the inclement weather but he got his work in by throwing in a bullpen setting to finish his day after his 3 innings on the mound versus the Cardinals.

Today’s game will be televised and on the radio via the MLB App. Matt Harvey is scheduled to start for the Mets today. 1st pitch set for 12:10pm.

Posted in JRoss, Sabermetrics, Scherzer, SpringTraining | Leave a comment