by Andrew Lang
by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears
by Stan4Nats
This time last year the Nats were starting their promotion where fans could win promo items by finding Teddy around the DC area, so it should be in the very near future that the new promo schedule is released.
It’s probably too late because I’m sure that the schedule has already been set, but here is what I’d like to see and what I expect to see. Continue reading
Lots of very interesting presentations at the DC SABR meeting today. Sam Mondry-Cohen of the Nationals had the meatiest presentation. Will have an overview of his presentation within the next day. But here is a quickie post to give Ghost a night off. Continue reading
Earlier today, Daniel Murphy did an interview with Thom Loverro and Kevin Sheehan on ESPN 980 .
Loverro asked Murphy, “from the outside looking in, what do you think went wrong with the Washington Nationals last year?”
Murphy simply started his answer, “They couldn’t stay healthy…”
https://twitter.com/Nationals/status/685137488516526084
Murphy continued his answer talking about why the Nats struggled in 2015, and Murphy was correct in saying he thought the health of the team was a major factor as he talked about Rendon, Ryan Zimmerman, Werth and Span who all suffered through injuries.
Murphy missed a key stat by 1500% as he guesstimated that the Nats fielded the Matt Williams #1 lineup for “just over 30 games together”, and in fact it was only 2 games the entire season. We have previously referred to the 2015 #1 lineup as the January 14th lineup. Why did we call it the January 14th lineup you might ask? That was the day the Nats traded for Yunel Escobar (1/14/2015) and the starting line-up was complete: Span CF, Rendon 3B, Harper RF, Ryan Zimmerman 1B, Werth LF, Desmond SS, Escobar 2B, Ramos C was what everyone hoped was going to be the Nationals 2015 Opening Day line-up, and it was not for 160 games in 2015.
That January 14th line-up first debuted on August 25 which was Game #124, and by the end of the game on August 26th we would never see them together in the same line-up again. 2 total games with this #1 line-up:
Coincidentally, new Nats reliever Shawn Kelley faced that lineup on August 25th and pitched a perfect inning.
So what line-up did the Nats envision on January 14, 2016? That would probably be called the January 8th line-up which was when the Revere trade happened. Not to digress, it might be a good time to circle on your 2017 calendar the 6 days of (January 8, 2017 to January 14, 2017).
What could this January 8th line-up look like against right-handed pitching? Murphy was asked in his ESPN980 interview where he thinks he will bat in the order and he gave the politically correct answer of “wherever Dusty Baker sticks me!”
For those of you who are old enough to remember the stand-up comedy of Rodney Dangerfield, you know his famous line, “That’s the story of my life, I get no respect!” and that seems like the history of the Expos and the Nationals. The Nats are easy targets as they don’t stand up for themselves generally, and the media knows that. It’s like the bullies who pick on kids that won’t fight back.
You have to wonder if Ted Lerner, the billionaire owner of the Nats, has finally had enough of being bullied by Angelos who he saw sign Chris Davis to a 7 year/$161 million deal, and raise the Orioles payroll to within $10 million of where the Nationals are currently at. Angelos cries poor and the Nats with their current cashflow are feeling poor.
MASN filed with the courts for a ruling to have the MASN arbitration hearings moved to an independent arbitrator which would change the original contract terms where any disputes would be settled by MLB’s RSDC panel of MLB owners.
The Nats countered with notice to the courts that they have complied with a change of counsel where they have retained the law firm of Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan who specialize in Media and Entertainment and Sports Law. Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan is known as one of the most expensive law firms by billable hours and retainers, and if you believe in “you get what you pay for” then the Nats should be in good hands with their new legal team.
Besides the Orioles signing Chris Davis, the baseball world saw what TV money can do when the Arizona Diamondbacks who landed a major Regional Sports Network deal signed Zack Greinke away from the Dodgers with a record baseball contract for 6 years at a total contract of $206,500,000. The annual amount of that deal before deferrals is $34.4 million per year! http://sports.yahoo.com/news/ap-source-zack-greinke-diamondbacks-reach-6-deal-015320122–mlb.html
You wonder how the Diamondbacks all of a sudden can pull this type of deal off and outbid both the Dodgers and the Giants. Simple, RSN (Regional Sports Network) money kicks in for the 2016 season under their new FOX deal they signed earlier in 2015. The deal believed to be worth $1.5 billion plus an equity share in the network over 20 years averages to over $75 million a year and some estimates believe with a profit share could be closer to $100 million a year.
The Bronson Arroyo signing doesn’t qualify as 1 more big deal. Mike Rizzo hasn’t made his annual shocker trade/signing this off-season…..yet. There’s still time for Rizzo to surprise us, and most likely it would have to be a trade to catch us by surprise. Maybe Rizzo is done since last off-season he made 3 shocking moves by acquiring Yunel Escobar for Tyler Clippard, the Joe Ross/PTNBL (Trea Turner) trade for Souza, and then the January free agent signing of Max Scherzer.
Daniel Murphy was a mini-shocker as the news leaked out days beforehand. The inside sources have been on top of most deals this off-season except for trading Yunel Escobar for Trevor Gott. Most Nats fans expected Escobar to be traded but nobody had Gott’s name as a target.
Even though it’s not getting much attention, the Rockies are still looking to trade an outfielder, and it’s entirely possible to see the Yankees trade Andrew Miller from their back of the bullpen trio of Miller, Bentances and Aroldis Chapman. The Rays quietly have discussed trading a starter, and the Nats have been rumored to have dangled Gio Gonzalez out there.
From the chatter on our site, commentors seem to be most concerned about the back of the Nats bullpen as Papelbon just was not good statistically to finish his season with the Nats, and that is an issue besides his people skills.
Rizzo was asked after acquiring Murphy and before trading for Ben Revere if he was done with his roster: “…we like our depth and we like our talent level. I like the roster. I think we’ve achieved a lot of our goals going into it. We’ve balanced our lineup, we’ve acquired high skill sets, and I think the roster as constructed today is something that we really like.”
Since Rizzo made that comment he acquired Ben Revere and then pursued Yoenis Cespedes. This is always part of Rizzo’s thought pattern,“If there’s a value out there that can help the ballclub, then we would certainly look into it.” Yoenis Cespedes probably looked like a “value” until the negotiations started going. All the Nats did was cost the Mets millions more as they seemed to succumb to the public pressure, and signed Cespedes to a $75 million deal.
Should the Nats consider bringing back Ian Desmond as a possible shocker? He could be looking for a 1 year ‘pillow deal‘. Todd Hollandsworth said this morning on MLB Network Radio “Will Ian Desmond have taken 3 and 30, 3 months ago. I don’t think he would have.” Steve Phillips replied, “No probably not. Would he take it now?” Hollandsworth emphatically said, “I think he absolutely would, yes.”
Who do you see as a possibility for a shocker trade/signing?
The Washington Nationals on September 27th of 2015 hit their low-point of the season when Jonathan Papelbon put his hand around Bryce Harper’s neck in what we’ve called “The Choke”. It became emblematic of the way the 2015 Nats season went as it was also a choke in the eyes of many.
The Nationals were written about by one writer who claimed that there was dysfunction in the Nationals clubhouse and this story hit the news stands the day before “the choke”. Was it coincidental in the timing that tension increased after that story to spill over to a physical altercation or was it totally unrelated? We will never know, but that story was not a positive picture of the clubhouse and this paragraph from that story may have sealed the fate of Matt Williams even if “the choke” never happened:
Now, several Nationals players believe Williams won’t be able to grow even if the club brings him back for 2016. And this isn’t just one or two malcontents. These opinions span positions and experience. “It’s a terrible environment,” one player said. “And the amazing part is everybody feels that way.”
Mike Rizzo responded days later to that quote and others by saying, “If I knew who that person was, I would respond to it. When it’s some blind accusation from an unnamed source, I don’t react to those.”
We could all guess who “that person was”; however, we agree with Rizzo that unnamed sources putting out negatives like that aren’t what we are about. Not making the playoffs of course raised the tension level in the Nats clubhouse.
When the 2015 season ended so did many jobs in the Nationals organization with the reigning NL Manager of the Year (Matt Williams) and many in his coaching staff headed to the unemployment line.
Matt Williams is gone and so is the player (Drew Storen) who was none too happy after his public demotion when Papelbon was brought in as the closer as Storen was traded earlier this month ending his employment with the Washington Nationals.
Still after all the moves Rizzo has made, the Nats are still a target from those who say the Nationals clubhouse is toxic and trying to say that players aren’t coming to the Nats because of a toxic clubhouse. James Wagner made this comment in December regarding why Zobrist didn’t come to the Nats saying, “He didn’t feel as comfortable in the Nationals clubhouse.” We contacted Zobrist’s agent at Octagon for a comment about Wagner’s quote, and did not receive a response.
Rizzo said this after the Winter Meetings in December, “I don’t see any common thing between the 3 [O’Day, Heyward, Zobrist] other than they chose the teams that they chose over many other teams that had interest in them.”
The article below was originally written in 2013 when it looked like the Nats were moving their spring operation to Kissimmee, with the new ballpark opening in Palm Beach as early as next spring I’ve tweaked some of the text but most of the ideas are still relevant. Original Article on WNFF
The PB69 family travels down to Florida for spring break as often as we can, splitting time between Disney, the beach, and the Nats. Below is what I would suggest to build the new ballpark area to tip the scales towards baseball.
1) Ballpark and Practice Fields
What a crazy January. The Nats officially announced the signing of Daniel Murphy then traded Storen for the speedy lead-off guy Ben Revere and just when you thought that maybe Rizzo was done the news broke that he was “in” on Yoenis Cespedes.
“I DON’T GIVE A CRAP WHAT THE METS ARE DOING”
The post The Automated K Zone & Technology. Is it time? generated a discussion of how good/bad are the umpires at calling balls and strikes. So lets take a look at that question using the Game Day data which is presumably the same data used by the BrooksBaseball.net PITCHf/x Tool. Continue reading
