Monday, April 28, 2008

The Way We Was: Week 4

All things considered, it was a pretty good week. Four and three is always a good week, I suppose. You do that every week, and you've got ninety or so wins. For a team that was taking on water like the inside of Screech's costume on an August afternoon, 4-3 is terrific. For a team that faced John Smoltz, Tim Hudson, Carlos Zambrano, Johan and Santana -- not to mention Ryan Dempster, Ollie Perez and Ted Lilly, none of whom are slouches -- it was a sensational week.

  • STATS
    Record: 4-3; 9-17 overall; Pythag, 9-17
    Offense: .257/ .338/ .335, 28 runs.
    Most Similar Batter: 2005 Damian Jackson, just without speed. Probably the same level of defense, though!
    Pitching: .269/ .353/ .372, 28 runs
    Most Similar Bater: Jose Cruz Jr, 2006.

  • WHAT'S GOOD?
    1) Wil Nieves!!!! (.500/ .529/ .688). The best part of his homer might not be the result, but the sheer joy you can see on the guy's face.

    2) Felipe Lopez, sorta!!! .250/ .323/ .393 isn't going to win any awards, but if he hits that for the full year, you won't be toooo disappointed. More importantly, there's this. One other thing... is it just me, or have you noticed far fewer groundballs sneaking through that right side? (Your sample size alarm should be blaring, but the ERA before he won the job on 4/18 was 4.63. Since, it's been 4.43)

    3) John Lannan's Big Brass Balls!!! 14 scoreless innings... just try to ignore the 7/7 K/BB ratio! Here's what I like about the kid. Fifth inning, and things fall apart. Working on a no-no, he allows back-to-back singles to the bottom of the order. With Ted Lilly readying to bunt, the runners take off and Wil Nieves can't throw them out with his head up his ass, putting runners on 2/3 with nobody out. Frustrating play, and an easy one for the pitcher to lose focus on.

    With the corners pulled in, Reid Johnson hits a sharp grounder to NJ and it pops out of his glove. The runners hold, but Johnny doesn't think to cover first base, not moving til it's too late, leaving Johnson & Johnson into a foot race to the bag. Johnson wins. No, the other Johnson. Bases loaded, one out and Lannan's mistake in not covering probably cost him an out. You could see the frustration on his face; he was yelling to himself.

    St. Claire ran out immediately, calmed him down, told him to focus on the task at hand and that one pitch could get him out of the inning.

    With the game potentially crumbling around him, one pitch was all he needed. He focused, got the sharp grounder, and got out of the inning.

    We've seen pitchers melt down in that situation. Johnny didn't. What he lakes in stuff, he makes up for with those balls!

  • WHAT'S BAD
    1) Austin Kearns: .120/ .185/ .120. Ouch. Hard to defend him, but at least he plays defense. Somewhat interestingly, in the last three/four games or so, he's showing signs of life. He was robbed of a hard hit at least twice. And he's starting to drive the ball a bit more. Sometimes you can have good results with bad outcomes. That doesn't win ballgames though!

    2) Wily Mo Pena: .238/ .304/ .238. Like Kearns, just without that pesky defense. He had a big hit yesterday, but he gave away a few more with his glove. Unless he's slugging .580, he's going to be a liability on the field.

    3) Jesus Colome: Four innings, Four runs. I cannot stand watching this guy pitch. He's allll over the place with his control, but the worst part is how S...l.......o.......w..........l.......y he pitches. When each AB takes nine pitches and each pitch takes three minutes, it makes for a dreadfully long game, especially when he's mostly being used in mopup roles, ie: "get the farkin' game over so I can get home already" time!


  • AWARDS
    MVP -- Wil Nieves!!!
    Cy Young -- John Lannan!!! (They're the greatest twosome since Proctor and Darling!)
    LVP -- Kearnsy. Please for God's sake get a hit before they bench you for Dukes.
    Joe Horgan Award -- Matt Chico. Yegods he blows.

  • WHIPS AND DUCKS
    4/21: Duck to Chico for burying 'em early
    4/22: Whip to Lannan for being totally awesome
    4/23: Duck to Zimmerman for the o-fer with an E
    4/24: Whip to FLop for pulling that game out of his ass!
    4/25: Whip to Nieves for pulling that game out of his ass!!!
    4/26: Duck to Chico for sucking as per his usual
    4/27: Whip to Lannan for warming my heart in the cold! Seriously, why the feck didn't I bring a jacket???

  • WHAT'S AHEAD?
    Atlanta and the Pirates. Glavine comes off the DL, and hopefully we'll retire him as we were close to doing last time we faced him! Then we get Jair "Dy-No-Mite" Jurrjens, who's actually been quite sharp. (I remember rumors of interest for him... was that in a deal for Cordero, or was that in the Soriano sweepstakes?)

    After that, it's the Pirates. Sure, they're better than they've been, but they're the feckin' Pirates! If we don't take two out of three, well, we might suck. (OK, we do anyway, but let me dream a little!)

    We sweep all six games, and we're within sniffing distance of .500! Woooo! Stay the course, Nats!!!

    • posted by Chris Needham at 9:33 AM

    21 Comments:

    • No Chico under what's bad?

      2 starts - 8 IP, 16 Hits, 11
      runs.

      What's the guy got to do? Kill someone? Because he will. Don't test him.

      By Blogger Harper, at 4/28/2008 10:48 AM  

    • Chris - Actually it's both. The original rumor was the Nationals were scouting Jair Jurrjens as part of the Soriano deal.

      And then last year, they were scouting him as part of a Cordero or Rauch deal

      By Blogger Brian, at 4/28/2008 10:50 AM  

    • Harper -- I grade on a curve. For Chico, that's a pretty good week!

      I dinged him further on. Man, I can't win! ;)

      By Blogger Chris Needham, at 4/28/2008 10:51 AM  

    • What's the over/under on Chico's demotion? I'm guessing May 7th.

      By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4/28/2008 10:58 AM  

    • The problem with Chico's demotion is that this is the list of pitchers who could be promotable from AAA:

      1) Colon Battlestar

      That's it. There's not much depth down there. Mock hasn't pitched very well. Clippard's ERA is over 7.

      The only thing they could do, really, is to send Chico down, bring up Schroder -- who really should be here over Colome anyway -- and move Irish Mike to the rotation. But Acta seemingly insists on having a lefty in the pen.

      If Hill goes down or one of the other pitchers gets injured, we're fecked. That vaunted pitching depth ain't there yet.

      By Blogger Chris Needham, at 4/28/2008 11:00 AM  

    • Wasn't Tim Redding teh suck in Columbus before he got the call last year?

      Perhaps its just a matter of throwing enough S*&^ against the wall and seeing if something sticks.

      By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4/28/2008 11:21 AM  

    • Mike Bacsik's pitching well down there....

      just sayin'...

      By Blogger Chris Needham, at 4/28/2008 11:22 AM  

    • I was about to mention how Bacsik was doing in long relief.

      By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4/28/2008 11:34 AM  

    • Having a leftie in the pen has to take a back seat to having a rotation. Ballister should not be in the majors until July. My guess is Schroder up, Irish to the rotation and Will Nieves to the all-star team.

      Actually, seriously. Having an excellent defensive catcher as your back-up has long been the conventional approach, for good reason. I would much rather see Nieves back up Lo Duca/Estrada than have those two as our only two catchers. Let's say you're a run up in the bottom of the ninth and a fast guy is on 1st. Nothing to stop him basically walking to third is there...

      By Blogger Unknown, at 4/28/2008 12:23 PM  

    • Um, that's NOT water in Screech's outfit.

      Are the Yankees ready to take Estrada for a crate of Nathan's?
      Addition by subtraction.

      By Blogger blovy8, at 4/28/2008 12:39 PM  

    • An excellent summary of an up and down week. But more up than down, which makes it seem like a really great week this year.

      A comment on the Cubs'"double steal" in the 5th yesterday: From my vantage point, it looked like Zimmerman had plenty of time to throw out the runner going to second, if he hadn't decided to argue with the third base umpire instead. That was another mental error that Lannan fought his way through.

      By Blogger Section 222, at 4/28/2008 2:02 PM  

    • 1. Couldn't O'Connor take Chico's role and Bacsik take O'Connor's role. Then we could leave teh suck in Columbus where it belongs.

      2. 2 out of 3 with the Bucs? Have you already budgeted a rain out in this 4 game series? Stan won't let that happen.

      By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4/28/2008 3:10 PM  

    • One of my pedant friends sent me a friendly email about the 2/3 thing, and I didn't bother changing it. I didn't think it'd take this long for someone to point it out in comments! :)

      (It's just my way of protesting Dmitri Young bobblehead night... I refuse to acknowledge it!)

      By Blogger Chris Needham, at 4/28/2008 3:14 PM  

    • (It's just my way of protesting Dmitri Young bobblehead night... I refuse to acknowledge it!)

      From the pictures I've seen of the Dmitri Young bobblehead, it doesn't even look like Dmitri. Not fat enough, and no 'fro sticking out from under the hat. There's gotta be a long lead time on those things, wouldn't you think, since they're made in China? They would have had to have the specs and working drawings (or more likely the bad photo of Dmitri) over there long before Manny ordered Dmitri to get a haircut. Or do you think perhaps the haircut order came down after the shipment of bobbleheads came in from China, and they were all effed up? (Couldn't do much about getting Dmitri to shed some pounds to match the bobblehead, obviously. Maybe they're hoping a relatively thin bobblehead will shame him into losing the weight...)

      By Blogger An Briosca Mor, at 4/28/2008 3:36 PM  

    • I heard Don Sutton say something last week about Kearnsy's elbow being the size of a grapefruit. He has been wearing a wrap. Yet, I haven't read a word that he his hurt. Anybody have any idea what is up with him, other than the obvious 'he sucks'?

      By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4/28/2008 6:51 PM  

    • Chris, "If Hill goes down..."

      If? No, Chris, it's when.

      As in, "When the sun rises tomorrow."

      Hill will be DL'd by June 1.

      They better not demote Nieves. He's helped win two games with his bat, for chrissakes. That would beat PLoD/Estrada by, uh, um, let's see now, two.

      By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4/28/2008 8:32 PM  

    • Chris - in doing a week's recap, did you notice just how similar Guzman and Lopez's OBP and SLG were last week? guz - .323 + .387 = .710 OPS, Lopez - .323 + .393 = .715 OPS (huh, new math on ESPN's website). Basically, 3 Lopez BBs swap for 3 Guz singles. Guz - 2 doubles, Lopez - 1 double and 1 (freakin' awesome) HR. Lopez, 2 more runs, 4 more Ks. For the season, Guz is .336 OBP, Lopez .329. Both are just a bit below what you want from the top of the order, but aren't a disaster.

      Still, I just wish we'd bat Nick in two and platoon Guz and Lopez at leadoff. Guz OBP v LHP/RHP - .432/.291; Lopez OBP v LHP/RHP - .290/.354. Johnson, even with his cruddy BA, OBP LHP/RHP - .344 /.415.

      Oh, for fun, Belliard's OBP v LHP - .353. But that is just 14 ABs. .326 v LHP from 2005 - 2007, but historically the same v righties. Maybe Belliard should platoon with Lopez if Manny thinks he needs to bat Nick clean up?

      By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4/28/2008 9:21 PM  

    • At least he plays defense??! I am so tired of this. Kearns is very average defensively. It sometimes LOOKS like he is making a good play, but that is only because he has no range and makes an easy play for some RFs look like a great shoestring play. I am not alone in this... an ESPN commentator, I believe Joe Morgan, classified his defense as "average at best." Wake up people. He is well-rounded in his suckiness.

      By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4/28/2008 9:32 PM  

    • That's not what my eyes tell me.

      That's not what the eyes of plenty of scouts tell us.

      That's not what the team's leadership tells us.

      And it's definitely not what the numbers tell us.

      By Blogger Chris Needham, at 4/28/2008 10:02 PM  

    • Kearns is fine defensively, above average, but not the gold-glover that Crap Carpenter used to shill about. As long as Jeff Francoeur is in the league, Kearns will never get a Gold Glove. But as a 5 or 6 batter, he's just absolutely a rally-killer. If it's not the DPs that he slaps into with regularity, it's those weak popups to the right side. He allows himself to get jammed with regularity, can't pull the inside pitch at all and, in golfer's terms, gets blocked on the outside stuff.
      In other words, worthless. I could see him as a late-inning defensive replacement on a good team.

      By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4/28/2008 11:29 PM  

    • Kearns is just as solid as Francoeur defensively but wont win that Gold Glove because he just cant hit.

      By Anonymous Anonymous, at 4/29/2008 12:26 AM  

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