by Andrew Lang
by Andrew Lang
We had well over 200 comments on TalkNats, Twitter comments, and emails as to our poll questions and line-up construction.
We had sjm308 with the most creative of line-ups as he went “LaRussa” on us.
"OK – just read up and this is much fun! I agree with lots said below and would love to see Span back as…" — sjm308 https://t.co/KIm0fniBWE
— Talk Nats (@TalkNats) December 27, 2015
Here is sjm308’s line-up:
Bryce Harper talked and Mike Rizzo did listen and delivered the needed lefthanded bat. Bryce laid it on the line with what he needed in this line-up. Here’s Bryce’s quote:
“The one thing we definitely need is another lefthanded bat and hopefully a HUGE righthanded bat to hit behind me, or in front of me. If we can do that, that would definitely help us out and put us up to the top.”
Will Dusty Baker stack lefties in his line-up or separate his lefties and go to R-L-R-L type of alignment. Bryce wants a huge right-handed bat in front of him and behind him and that sounds like a place for Rendon and Ryan Zimmerman.
Shocking news for most Nats fans that Mike Rizzo has totally gone against his mantra he stated in November, “The 2016 Nats will be younger, less experienced but more athletic and speedier. A little transformation…We would like to get more left-handed.” Those are Mike Rizzo’s own words. Rizzo has talked about refocusing on pitching and defense in a year that the team slid in BABIP against, DRS, and team UZR.
Daniel Murphy is not young, not speedy, and not particularly athletic. Add to that his poor defense and the fact the Nats just forfeited their 17th pick in the 2016 Draft and this pick becomes somewhat muddled. Add to that Murphy’s controversial political and moral views, and you have a fanbase who probably won’t be thrilled with this move.
THIS JUST IN: Daniel Murphy agrees to a 3-year deal with the Nationals. (via @JimBowden_ESPN pic.twitter.com/4XjymPE9nx
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) December 24, 2015
Ken Rosenthal included a tidbit in his column on Free Agent Signings. Apparently the CBA allows a team with a protected pick to sign a Free Agent and then immediately trade him to another team as long as the Free Agent who is signing agrees to it. On the Hot Stove show on MLB Network Rosenthal doubled-down on this and implied that this was allowed as long as the Free Agent agreed before he signed. Given the history of the Lerners and Rizzo, this is exactly the type of creativity that they might try to pull off. Continue reading
Time for a philosophical debate.
In the spirit of the season, if you are sitting on Santa’s lap or you get a visited by the baseball gods, and you were granted one wish for the next twenty years of Nats baseball, which of the following two choices would you pick? And why? Continue reading
There are some GMs like Billy Beane and Managers like Don Mattingly who embrace the platoon concept and many times it’s out of circumstance rather than design. Some would say you need the right personnel to make a good platoon and others would say you have the wrong personnel if you have to consider a platoon. All good sides to the discussion.
The Nats are not a team that has ever used a platoon in their history as a regular strategy. Mike Rizzo has always looked for lefties like LaRoche, Span and Harper who can hit left-handed pitchers well. But there’s this player named Danny Espinosa who has struggled against right-handed pitchers, and there are have even been subtle attempts to use Scott Hairston as a right-handed “match-up” guy except the only problem was his defense was so bad it was counterproductive to pencil his name into the starting line-up.
Danny Espinosa has been one of the best 2nd baseman defensively in the league, and the issue is his bat from the left side has been on the wrong side of .250 for much of his career and his .217 BA and .286 OBP just won’t cut it on most teams. The good news is there are several 2nd baseman that we’ve highlighted like Luis Valbuena who is an above league average defender and well above league average as a lefty batter when facing right-handed pitchers and Valbuena has a similar problem as Espi where he has poor platoon splits.
Espinosa
Valbuena
Now combine Espinosa’s .795 OPS to Valbuena’s .808 and you end up with an OPS over .803.
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