by Andrew Lang
by Stan4Nats
by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears
by Andrew Lang
One of the recurring topics that the talking heads like to talk about during the Hot Stove season is why the NL needs to get with the times and adopt the Designated Hitter. And with the recent announcement of David Ortiz’s retirement, I am sure that it will come up again. Well, let me say that his impending retirement is exactly why the time is now right to get rid of the DH.
There are two arguments for why the NL needs to adopt the DH that drive me crazy. Continue reading
The Nats said goodbye last week officially to their most tenured player in Ian Desmond when he turned down his Qualified Offer to become a Free Agent. Desi was here or there depending how you look at it when he signed with the Montreal Expos out of High School in the 3rd round of the 2004 draft. The Nats for lack of a better word had ‘garbage’ in the Farm System when the Nats were moved to Washington from Montreal. Desmond was perhaps the Top Prospect and he was just an A ball player as a Sand Gnat in 2005 in Savannah Georgia before the Nats had transitioned the Minor League homes.
Desmond: "I want to be part of something bigger than myself. I want to win a World Series." https://t.co/NpSvGOHurH pic.twitter.com/BXJRCRaIbi
— Nationals on MASN (@masnNationals) November 12, 2015
On October 19th, it was made public that the Nats dismissed their medical training staff led by Lee Kuntz and their head of strength and conditioning John Philbin. A few days 
later we learned that players were not pleased with their medical care.
The Nats, after several weeks since we announced Paul Lessard was hired, has made his hiring official along with several other Doctors and staff members. We’re not exactly sure why there was a long delay, but believe it was to fully name the entire medical team.
From the Nats Official Blog: “With a focus on being proactive and utilizing injury-prevention techniques, the Washington Nationals announced a new medical structure and expansion on Tuesday, with several personnel additions and changes. Nationals President of Baseball Operations and General Manager Mike Rizzo made the announcements.
The afternoon conversation on the last post was whether Rizzo turns to making a trade or dives into free agency, or both, to add some key players to this 2016 team.
Names bounced around are Ben Zobrist, Gerardo Parra, Denard Span and Dexter Fowler. Only Fowler would require the Nats to forfeit their #1 pick in the 2016 amateur draft as the rest were not Qualified Offered players.
Mike Rizzo last week at the GM Meetings had this to say:
“You’re going to have a team that is going to have 4 or 5 players that are 24 and younger. It’s going to be a younger, less experienced, but more athletic team with more speed. Those are the characteristics that we’re going to bring into the season.”
We certainly know from Dusty Baker’s radio interview on Friday that Dusty wants a prolific lead-off man and he made it clear that he wasn’t enthused over the Nats lead-off situation. Dusty said he hadn’t discussed with Rizzo what the budget is or the players he is targeting for the team.
Sol Tucker for TalkNats
Casey Sterns during the radio interview said Dusty went through 74 (exaggerating) lead-off men with the Reds. They discussed how important the lead-off is. Dusty acknowledged:
“I don’t know if we got that guy yet because the other guys are prone to strikeouts and don’t have that high OBP. We had that guy in Denard Span. I don’t know if we will sign him or have a chance of re-signing him. I haven’t really talked to Rizzo or the organization yet about potential Free Agents…or what the payroll is going to be…I’m always trying to pump people to get the best team, not only the best team, the best overall balanced team. This is what I’m shooting for.”
Dusty Baker called into MLB Network Radio on the “Inside Pitch” show hosted by Jim Bowden and Casey Stern yesterday. The “Inside Pitch”show airs weekdays starting at 2pm EST on Sirius XM. http://www.siriusxm.com/MLBNetworkRadio
It was a long interview that was lengthened when Dusty lost his cellphone connection twice. At one part of the interview Dusty seemed to digress to a text message he received from Jeff Kent and then Dusty corrected himself that it was actually an email from Jeff Kent which Dusty revealed,
“Tell my soul Mormon brother don’t play so angry ’cause you will make it harder on yourself”
Dusty Baker this afternoon had a call-in interview on MLB Network Radio on the “Inside Pitch” show hosted by Jim Bowden and Casey Stern. Stern has a relationship with Dusty from his on-air TV work with Dusty. Dusty’s intro from Stern was “my friend and a brotha from another mother” which set the tone as a lighthearted interview.
This is just 4 minutes on the link in the Tweet from Dusty’s interview:
Dusty Baker talks about the #Nationals chance to win it all & his own Hall of Fame case AUDIO: https://t.co/QY1wnuCGXi #InsidePitch
— MLB Network Radio on SiriusXM (@MLBNetworkRadio) November 13, 2015
Dusty said that Ted Lerner personally called to tell him don’t believe what you’re hearing in the media about the Nats managerial job meaning the job was not necessarily going to Bud Black and shortly afterwards his agent John Hamilton was negotiating the deal with the Nats.
The Hot Stove season is long and there are only so many what if stories we can come up with during the winter. We thought that an occasional story about things the Nationals do off the field might be of interest to Nationals fans. Most of us know about honoring military folks at every game. And a lot of us have heard that the Nationals have created the Dream Foundation, but very few of us know much about the activities it is involved with. Continue reading
One of the reports out of the GM meeting was that support was growing for a rule change that would require a reliever to face at least two batters. There was little or no detail about how the rule would be implemented. For example, does the reliever have to start the next inning if he has only one PA, but he gets the third out? Continue reading
Scott Boras was the center of attention at the GM Meetings today at the Boca Raton resort today in Florida. Boras had many subjects to talk about today which included talk on everything from Bryce Harper to Max Scherzer to Stephen Strasburg to Denard Span.
The other agents name that sounds like “Boras” is Jeff Borris who is recognized by few. He’s the agent at Beverly Hills Sports Council and reps Darren O’Day who is the most popular reliever this year given the very light crop of Free Agent relievers. Even the bullpen rich Royals are rumored to have their GM, Dayton Moore, in touch with Borris.
The center of the universe at the SB meeting!
