by Andrew Lang
by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears
by Stan4Nats
Victus Bats has been in this competitive business of crafting baseball bats for Major Leaguers for 5 years now as they continue to grow their market share. Victus can now claim Bryce Harper as a client. Harper started swinging Victus bats in Spring Training games after Jared Smith of Victus Bats arrived at Space Coast Stadium in Viera, Florida to meet with Bryce and dropped off these real eye catching bat designs (pictured below).
Updated 11:10AM: Bronson Arroyo was scratched from this start with shoulder soreness and will be replaced by Blake Treinen. This puts a big halt to Arroyo’s efforts to become the Nats 5th starter.
The bus is on it’s way to Jupiter Florida for a matchup with the Miami Marlins and Dusty once again is taking a roster close to his Opening Day line-up with the exception of Trea Turner starting at 2nd base in place of Daniel Murphy who played yesterday and Michael Taylor in the outfield replacing Jayson Werth who also played yesterday.
Bronson Arroyo, RHP, gets the start against the Marlins and he is expected to go 4 innings. Ryan Zimmerman gets the start at 1st base for his first official Spring Training start in the field.
Here is your line-up:
Bronson Arroyo RHP Blake Treinen RHP Continue reading
We all know the dangers of relying on Spring Training stats; however, they also can’t be totally ignored in some cases. Danny Espinosa for instance shows that he is struggling in a small sample size while Scott Sizemore looks like a Hall-of Famer in his small sample size.
Clearly Danny Espinosa won’t bat .000 in the regular season just like Michael A. Taylor won’t bat .435 in the regular season.
#Nationals manager Dusty Baker said yesterday there will be open competition between Turner, Espinosa, & Drew for the Nats starting SS.
— Today in MLB (@Todayin_MLB) February 20, 2016
Gio Gonzalez and the Washington Nationals travel this morning to face the Houston Astros and catch the 9AM bus to Kissimmee, Florida.
Danny Espinosa is back in the line-up and a few starters will also be in this line-up like Daniel Murphy and Jayson Werth. Lucas Giolito is scheduled to pitch today also. Dusty and Rizzo will also get to look at a few potential bench players who will start like Scott Sizemore, Matt den Dekker and Tony Campana. It’s also a big opportunity for Pedro Severino who will catch Gio Gonzalez.
Here’s your starting line-up:
Gio Gonzalez LHP
This game will be televised on the ROOT Network and MLB.TV App at 1:05. Radio will also be through the Houston feed on a delay. A h/t to NatsFan1a for letting us know that the game will also be televised live in MLB Network.
It took exactly a dozen games into the Spring Training schedule for the January 8th line-up to debut. Why January 8th you may ask? That was the date when Mike Rizzo traded for Ben Revere as the speedy lead-off man that his manager Dusty Baker had coveted to complete his vision for this 2016 team.
This was the Nats starting line-up on Sunday:
Max Scherzer RHP
The line-up before was only missing Ryan Zimmerman who was the designated hitter on Sunday, thus making this January 8th line-up, a reality.
Here is how the Sunday game got started, Revere – Single, Werth – Single, Harper – Double, Zimmerman – Single, Murphy – Out, Rendon – Single, Robinson – Out, Ramos – Single, Espinosa – Out. That is how the first 9 batters did in their 1st at-bats. This was all accomplished against a very good pitcher as Michael Wacha was hit hard and often.
With this line-up, the bench seems to also be close to set as Dusty seems to have tipped his hand that Michael A. Taylor will be his 4th outfielder or as Dusty likened him to the 6th man in basketball while also saying he expects him to get a lot of playing time.
The bench almost certainly will include these 4 players:
That leaves one spot remaining that will probably come down to either Matt den Dekker or Tyler Moore or a long-shot from the non-roster invitees. There is always a chance Rizzo could pull off a trade to free up a spot.
The starting line-up will include these 3 players:
The last 3 remaining spots will be taken by 2 pitchers out of Tanner Roark, Joe Ross, and Bronson Arroyo.
The bullpen will have 5 spots sewn up:
The 2 spots that will remain could come from Sean Burnett LHP, Trevor Gott RHP, Blake Treinen RHP, and Rafael Martin RHP.
That leaves 5 spots on the 25-man roster that are still up for grabs if there are no trades and no other surprises. A surprise could certainly come from a shocking move based on these remaining 20 days before Opening Day.
What would happen if Danny Espinosa does not pull out of this offensive funk he is in? What happens if another player steps up and impresses Mike Rizzo and Dusty Baker?
Here is the latest FanGraphs projections:
FanGraphs has added notes about each player when you hover over the pen and paper icon. Worth a read.
There has been rumors lately that Danny Espinosa has been playing hurt, and these just seem to be rumors as some try to explain how Espi is hitless in the entire Spring with just 1 walk and today he is replaced by Brendan Ryan in the revised line-up and listed as a bench reserve.
This Tweet is a little out-dated at Trea Turner has started to step it up and of course he had a hit taken away on an infield single later changed to an error that was mind-boggling as the 2nd baseman had to charge the ball and speed kills as Trea just beat the throw to 1st. There was no booting the ball or a bobble.
Officially Espinosa is 0 for 14 with 7 strikeouts and 1 walk. Trea Turner now has 3 hits going 3 for 17 with 4 walks and 4 stolen bases however we really want to make it right and say 4 for 17 but can’t.
Danny Espinosa now 0-11 with 5 K. Trea Turner now 1-11 with 1 HR, 3 BB, 4 RBI, 2 SB. Who should start at SS? pic.twitter.com/4SFHnx6NRK
— Daily #Natitude (@dailynatitude) March 11, 2016
Certainly there will be more news to follow on this….
The Astros will pitch Cy Young lefty Dallas Keuchel today versus Joe Ross.
Here is your Nats starting line-up:
Joe Ross RHP
UPDATED: 11:40AM 3/14/16 Danny Espinosa is set to start tomorrow and lead-off vs Collin McHugh
Name the title, author, and the number of pages:
100 Things Nationals Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die, Jake Russell, 270 pages
Identify the type of book:
Non-fiction
Identify the main characters:
Bryce Harper, Frank Howard, Alfonso Soriano, Mickey Vernon, Max Scherzer, Walter Johnson, Josh Gibson, Ryan Zimmerman, Clark Griffith, Jose Guillen, Harman Killebrew, Gio Gonzalez, Frank Robinson, and a couple dozen others. With 100 separate stories this book covers all of the major players in DC baseball history. Continue reading
With the daylight savings time change, it feels like 7:30 and the clock has to change to 8:30 which makes that 1:05PM start feel like 12:05.
As Bryce Harper sort of spilled the beans in his interview on MLB Network on Friday, he said Werth, “This is the BEST I have seen JDub. He looks incredible” and Bryce also said that Ryan Zimmerman could play Sunday. Bryce must have known what others didn’t and he would be correct.
Max Scherzer should go 4 innings for the Nationals today against the St. Louis Cardinals.
Here’s the Nats starting line-up:
Max Scherzer RHP Continue reading
The Nats will have a game under the lights at 6:05 at Champion Stadium in Disney World against the Braves. Tanner Roark will start against former Yankee top prospect Manny Banuelos.
The Nats will send a travel roster featuring a travel roster that includes the hottest hitter perhaps in the Grapefruit League, Scott Sizemore, who could easily have a few more Home Runs if not for that left field jet stream that has been blowing with some strong gusts into leftfield.
Continue reading
It was like the shot heard ’round the world when ESPN The Magazine published on-line their interview with Bryce Harper. ‘Bryce Harper’ became the number 1 “trending” words on Twitter! His Google Trends soared! Bryce was being quoted as saying, “Baseball is tired.” It sure got Richard “Goose” Gossage’s underwear pulled too tight as he exploded on his own self-imagined images of ‘bat flips’ and verbally attacked Jose Bautista, and Goose Gossage had this to say about Bryce Harper “You’re going to let a young punk like Bryce Harper dictate this game. Are you serious?” ! Sports Talk Radio was monopolized with this subject.
Screenshot from Twitter
