Gio was the stopper, HRs in support & a steal of home by TVT: Postgame

Posted on July 20, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

The Nationals finally beat the Dodgers this season, and made it look easy with an 8-1 win behind a nice pitching performance by Gio Gonzalez and the bullpen. Koda Glover had a 1-2-3 inning in the 9th to finish the game.

The Nationals had home runs from Bryce Harper (451 feet), Ben Revere to RF, Jayson Werth to LF, and Anthony Rendon to LF.  Trea Turner had a triple and stole home on a double-steal with Danny Espinosa.

The Dodgers were held to 4 hits, and Gio controlled their line-up well. The Nats showed all their tools tonight with pitching, the power game, defense, and baserunning.

“Trea Turner brought that fire tonight,” Bryce Harper said. “It really reminded me of 2012. Running the bases. Doing everything possible to get some  fire on this team. He did unbelievable…We have a great core of guys.”

“I was impressed with Trea’s baserunning and speed,” Dusty Baker said. “I’m used to speed. I love speed. Speed kills. It does a lot of things. It creates a lot of mistakes [for the other team]. I had fast cars and a lot of tickets. I love speed.”

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Game #95 Gio Gonzalez is rested and ready: Game Thread

Posted on July 20, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

The Nationals call on Gio Gonzalez to step up and be the stopper tonight as the Nats have lost two straight games and some ground in the NL East. The Dodgers scratched Hyun-Jin Ryu who will  miss this start due to elbow irritation, and he will be replaced by righty Bud Norris.

Gio Gonzalez has not pitched since he beat the Mets on July 10th, and he should be sufficiently rested and ready.

The Nats had to put together a lineup last night that was not optimal for a rookie’s debut, and was caused by a flu running through the clubhouse that took down both Anthony Rendon and Stephen Drew. While Daniel Murphy was the only available 3rd baseman without moving both Danny Espinosa and Turner, it was Murphy’s 87th MLB game at the ‘hot corner’ and he did not do well there.

While we wait for Dusty Baker‘s line-up card, here is a look at StatCast™ on Trea Turner‘s triple in this video that featured a top-speed triple at 22.7 mph.  Speaking of Turner, his defensive range and athleticism at 2nd base has been very impressive and better than what we saw briefly last year.

Reynaldo Lopez had a short stay and has been optioned back to Triple-A Syracuse as the Nats promote Koda Glover to the bullpen and Nick Lee was designated for assignment to make room on the 40 man roster for Glover. Continue reading →

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Mike Maddux and staff will be poring over the results on Reynaldo Lopez

Posted on July 20, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

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Tonight was the good, the bad, and the real ugly: Postgame

Posted on July 19, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

Tonight was the long awaited debut of Reynaldo Lopez who gave up a home run to the first batter he faced in his MLB career. After a 3-run 1st inning, we started to see some of the ‘stuff’ from Lopez we were hoping for. In 4 2/3 innings, Lopez gave up 6 earned runs which was real ugly, but he had an eye-popping 9 strikeouts in those 4 2/3 innings and dazzled with a knee buckling curveball, a changeup that tumbled, a tight slider, and fastballs that sizzled near 99mph.

Lopez’s fastball averaged 96.6 mph with his maximum velocity clocked at 98.6. You can see an impressive pitcher that got lost behind a bad overall outing which included some bad luck, but also some poorly placed pitches. The game calling was questionable at times, and Lopez was 1 strike away from getting out of the first inning at 1-0. He will learn.

The Nationals offense was a Jose Lobaton HR, a Trea Turner  triple, and 2 Daniel Murphy doubles with very little remaining that was positive when it counted. Jayson Werth had a double, and Clint Robinson and Chris Heisey both had singles.

Trea Turner had the clutch hit of the game with men on 3rd and 2nd. Turner split the gap with a double to most hitters, but Turner sped into 3rd with a triple and scored on Murphy’s second double of the game on a ball that hit the extreme top of the wall and bounced back into play.

That is how this game went. By the way, the final score was 8-4.

Here is the Reynaldo Lopez pitching stats from Brooks Baseball:
Reynaldo Lopez debut

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Game #94 Reynaldo Lopez debut game: Game Thread

Posted on July 19, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

The Los Angeles Dodgers come into Washington, D.C. for their final series of the regular season with the Washington Nationals, and the Nats certainly want to get even in their season series.  In that June series in Los Angeles, the Nats found new ways to lose, and the grounder not fielded in centerfield by Michael Taylor to allow Yasiel Puig to walk-off on a three-base error is not how the Nationals want to finish their season series with the Dodgers.

The Nats are calling up Reynaldo Lopez from Triple-A Syracuse to make his Major League debut. The hard throwing right-hander just finished an electrifying inning last week at the All-Star Futures game. Lucas Giolito will be starting tonight for the Triple-A Syracuse Chiefs.

https://twitter.com/andywward/status/755535186905923584

Continue reading →

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July trends for the Nats has pitching up and offense down

Posted on July 18, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

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Trade winds are blowing as deadline approaches! #Nats

Posted on July 18, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

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One team had to win this, and the Pirates took it in 18 innings: Postgame

Posted on July 17, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

Both starting pitchers had pitched very well if you remember back to Max Scherzer and Chad Kuhl. In the 9th inning with the Nationals behind 1-0—2 outs, Daniel Murphy hit a game tying HR off of Mark Melancon to keep the game going.

The Pirates had the best chance to win the game early in extra innings on a hit off the centerfield wall, and Michael Taylor got the rebound off the wall and threw the relay to Danny Espinosa who nailed the runner at the plate with a swipe tag by Wilson Ramos.

Extra inning games require that added element of managerial strategy, and in the 18th inning the only remaining players for either team were players who weren’t available to pinch-hit. With 2 outs and the Pirates’ pitcher Jonathan Niese on-deck, the Nats pitched to Starling Marte who launched the 2 out HR. Why wasn’t he pitched around or intentionally walked with Niese on-deck?

That becomes one of those questions that Talk Nats readers commented on as Marte stepeed into the box. Sec3, TexNat, and ManassasNatsFan all wondered. Who knows why sometimes.

The Nationals had several chances in extra innings, and readers were wondering why in the 17th inning the Nats didn’t run Michael Taylor with 1 out and a 3-2 count on Jayson Werth. Seemed like the play you put on, and Taylor stayed glued to 1st base and as expected Jayson Werth grounded up the middle for a tailor-made doubleplay. There were other plays, but in the end the Nats had a chance to tie or win with Espinosa up and Ramos and Drew on-base and Espinosa struck out to end the game. Nats lose 2-1.

In the post-game press conference, Dusty admitted he wasn’t quick enough to put up the 4 fingers to walk Marte in the 18th inning.

Dusty Baker confirmed that Reynaldo Lopez would be starting Tuesday against the Dodgers. Sammy Solis will be moved to the DL due to what is being called a minor knee strain.

Statcast analyzed that Taylor to Espinosa to Ramos play at the plate:

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Game #93 Scherzer wants to keep it going: Game Thread

Posted on July 17, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

The Nationals pitching staff has been ‘nails’ in their 5-game winning streak with just 5 earned runs in those 5 games by the starters and only 17 hits. This will be Max Scherzer’s first appearance since his perfect inning in the All-Star game where he threw 99.0 mph, and has been on a nice streak of his own lately giving up just 2 earned runs in his last 3 starts. On May 6th, Scherzer was at a 4.60 ERA and enters this game at a 3.03 ERA where he was almost tied with Tanner Roark in ERA before yesterday’s game. Scherzer would clearly like to follow Roark’s blueprint from yesterday, and possibly replicate his own June 2015 start when he faced the Pirates and had a very special and historic start.

The Pirates will start Chad Kuhl in his fourth MLB appearance, and in his last start Kuhl was pulled in the 3rd inning after giving up 4 runs. His ERA is 6.08 entering the game. Since the Nationals have never faced Kuhl before, we will look at his scouting report. Kuhl pitched for the University of Delaware and was picked by the Pirates in the 9th round of the 2013 draft. Kuhl turns 24-years-old in September, and is a right-handed pitcher and is 6’3″ tall according to his bio. Kuhl throws a power sinker, slider and changeup. If his sinker is up, he is very hittable even with his 95mph velo. Kuhl’s reachback fastball can touch 97mph. Continue reading →

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5 in a row, 20 games over .500, 7 game lead in the NL East, Roark gem/shutout: Postgame

Posted on July 16, 2016 by Stephen G. "Ghost" Mears

The #1 overall pick in the 2011 draft took the loss in this game, and the player who once was playing independent ball got the win and the shutout. Tanner Roark finished the game with 8 innings of shutout ball and lowered his ERA to 2.82 which is……wait for it……..13th best in the Major Leagues. If the All-Star game was next week, Roark would have to be on the All-Star team.

The Nats bats came alive early and often for the 6-0 win with contributions across the board, and Stephen Drew was 3-4 with 3 doubles. This bizarre play (video here) blew the game open when the score was 2-0. The Pirates continue to self-destruct in this series and the Nationals continue to capitalize.

The Nationals running game was aggressive again tonight, and the Nationals matched their 2015 season total tonight in steals (57) when Werth and Espinosa recorded steals in the game.

Honorable mention to Blake Treinen who came in for the 9th inning to relieve Tanner Roark with 2 men on and no outs. Treinen tried to induce a doubleplay but a weak grounder found a hole to make the party full with bases loaded and no outs. No problem for Treinen who then got 3 straight outs with another of his Houdini acts and preserved the shutout.

There was an oddity in the game where Gerrit Cole entered the game with a 2.77 ERA and Tanner Roark entered with a 3.01 ERA, and by the end of each pitcher’s outings, it was as if they exchanged ERA’s. Roark had a chance to get close to 2.77 if he threw the complete game shutout and Cole’s ERA shot up with 4 earned runs to a 3.11 ERA.

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