Juan Soto has three more days to make his case to win National League MVP honors. He already locked up a slightly less significant honor today.
Soto was named the Nationals' 2021 Player of the Year, the second straight season the young star won the award given out annually in a vote of media members who regularly cover the team.
Soto is joined by Kyle Finnegan (Pitcher of the Year) and Josh Bell (Good Guy Award) in receiving this year's honors, which are being presented prior to the start of...
We have arrived at last at the final homestand of the season. Three more games to wrap up what undeniably has been a season most everyone around here wants to forget. But first, there are three games to play against a team that very much needs to win as many of these as it can.
The Red Sox enter play tied with the red-hot Mariners for the second wild card berth in the American League, two games behind the Yankees, one game ahead of the Blue Jays. There are all kinds of scenarios that could play...
At some point in each of the next three evenings, Ryan Zimmerman is going to step to the plate at Nationals Park and receive a massive ovation each time. It won't matter what he does, whether he drives a ball off the wall for a double or strikes out on three pitches. The crowd will shower him with adulation whenever his name is mentioned, anytime he does anything of note, really, on the field.
And when he steps off the field for the last time during or after Sunday's season finale against the...
Well, we've reached the final leg of a long and often painful season. The Nationals flew home from Denver late Wednesday night after a long and painful, 10-5 loss to the Rockies. And now after a well-earned day off, they'll face the Red Sox over the weekend to wrap things up in 2021.
There are some compelling storylines to come over the next 72 hours, from Ryan Zimmerman's potential final games to Juan Soto's attempt to finish hot and win either the batting title or the National League MVP...
They played two-plus innings in a little more than an hour before the heavy rain arrived in Colorado, then waited through a two-hour delay before taking the field again. They then played 6 1/2 more innings across nearly three more hours, each team using up most of its expanded bullpen, all in a vain attempt simply to complete this 159th game of a season that long ago was lost by both participants.
And when it finally ended, when the Nationals lost 10-5 some 5 hours and 57 minutes after Rockies...
Turns out Patrick Corbin's start Tuesday night in Colorado was his final outing of the season.
Nationals manager Davey Martinez met with the left-hander this morning and emerged with the decision not to send him back to the mound for one final start in Sunday's season finale against the Red Sox, for both physical and emotional reasons.
"You saw Patrick make his last start yesterday," Martinez said in his Zoom session with reporters prior to today's game against the Rockies. "He's got a...
It's the final road game of the season for the Nationals, who haven't exactly thrived away from home in 2021. They enter today's matinee at Coors Field with a 30-50 record on the road, though if they win it'll only be the fifth-worst away record in club history, the 2006, 2008, 2009 and 2010 teams having been worse.
It's also the final start of the season for Paolo Espino. Who could've imagined the way this played out for the journeyman right-hander? Summoned way back in mid-April for an...
Juan Soto went 0-for-4 without reaching base Tuesday night, and that still didn't qualify as the most surprising fact about the Nationals' 3-1 loss to the Rockies.
No, that honor went not to any one individual but to the clock at Coors Field. The game started at 6:40 p.m. local time, and it ended at 9:40 p.m. local time. Yes, a three-hour ballgame. At the best hitter's park in baseball, with two of the worst pitching staffs in baseball competing against each other.
For the Nats, this was an...
We don't know at this point if Patrick Corbin will pitch again this season. Davey Martinez is still contemplating whether to send him back to the mound for Sunday's finale against the Red Sox, or whether to let tonight's outing in Colorado serve as his closing act on a dismal 2021.
If, however, this was it for Corbin this season, he can head home for the winter with at least some reason to feel better about things. His final numbers were unsalvageable, but the left-hander did put together...
Ryan Zimmerman is in the Nationals lineup tonight for the 47th time this season, the 44th time at first base. It appears he'll make at least one more start this weekend during the final series of 2021, but manager Davey Martinez still doesn't know exactly how the potentially retiring Face of the Franchise wants to handle his playing time down the stretch.
"We're just taking it day by day," Martinez said during his Zoom session with reporters before tonight's game in Colorado. "I'd like...
By any measure, it's been a miserable season for Patrick Corbin. The left-hander enters tonight's start at Coors Field with a 9-15 record and 5.92 ERA. A bad outing in this one, and he might just complete one of the worst seasons by any big league starter in a long time. The last pitcher to lose 16 games while posting an ERA over 6.00: Jason Marquis of the 2006 Cardinals (a team that actually won the World Series).
So, Corbin would certainly like to avoid reaching both of those thresholds...
The book on Yadiel Hernandez entering the 2021 season was pretty straightforward. He could hit fastballs, though he needed to prove he could hit off-speed pitches to have a chance of sticking in the big leagues, probably as a bench player. And if he was going to have any chance of playing the outfield with any regularity, he was going to have to take major strides in improving his defense.
So, what have we learned all these months later about the 33-year-old with zero major league experience...
Ask an inexperienced bullpen that has been on fumes for weeks to protect a one-run lead at Coors Field in late September and you're asking for trouble by default.
Not that Davey Martinez had any choice tonight. Despite five scoreless innings from Josiah Gray to begin the Nationals' series opener in Colorado, the rookie starter faded quickly in the sixth and got the hook with his team clinging to a 4-3 lead.
So it was up to a beleaguered bullpen to hold that lead, with no margin for error, in...
The Nationals are still mapping out pitching plans for the season's final week, but it's possible both Josiah Gray and Patrick Corbin could get another start this weekend against the Red Sox.
Gray and Corbin are starting the first two games of the team's penultimate series against the Rockies, with Gray on the mound at Coors Field tonight and Corbin to follow Tuesday. If the Nats stick with a five-man rotation, Gray would then be in line to pitch Sunday's season finale in D.C.
But manager...
We have reached the final week of the season, which makes this the final road series of the season. The Nationals are at Coors Field for the first time since April 24, 2019. Things have changed just a bit since then. That day, AnÃbal Sánchez took the loss and fell to 0-3 with a 6.00 ERA. Matt Adams was the cleanup hitter. Jake Noll batted seventh. Wilmer Difo batted ninth. Trevor Rosenthal gave up three runs on two hits, a walk, a hit batter and three wild pitches.
Now, a completely new...
Nationals relievers have thrown a total of 545 1/3 innings this season, which works out to roughly 3 1/2 innings per game. It's actually the fifth-lowest total in the majors, which may come as something of a surprise given how much it feels like their starters have struggled to pitch deep into games.
Here's a bigger problem, though: The Nationals have totaled 540 relief appearances this year, 12th-most in the majors. And that also works out to nearly 3 1/2 appearances per game.
It doesn't...
Condense this lost season for the Nationals down to one issue, one reason above all else to explain why this organization is where it finds itself today with one week to go until a long winter, and the answer is obvious: Pitching.
It's all about the pitching. It's always been about the pitching. And until something is done about the pitching, it's hard to envision the franchise's rebuilding efforts taking a significant step forward.
Today's 9-2 loss to the Reds was merely the latest...
Riley Adams has done just about everything the Nationals could've asked of him since joining the club following his acquisition from the Blue Jays. The 25-year-old catcher enters today's series finale in Cincinnati batting .288 with a .420 on-base percentage and .920 OPS in 81 plate appearances, with nine extra-base hits to his name.
So how is it that he's in the lineup today for the first time in 11 days?
That's where it gets a bit complicated. Adams, for all he's shown to date, is not...
The Nationals won't be winning back-to-back series. That possibility flew out the window with back-to-back, walk-off losses in Cincinnati the last two nights. But they do have a chance to salvage a four-game split if they can win today's series finale over the Reds.
They would certainly love to get another quality start out of Josh Rogers, who has been an absolute revelation since his arrival earlier this month. The left-hander has made four starts so far and has gone 2-0 with a 2.16 ERA....
It always felt like it was only a matter of time. Keibert Ruiz's track record in the minor leagues, not to mention his approach in his first extended stint in the major leagues, suggested the hits were going to start falling in. And once those did, the power would likely follow soon thereafter.
So consider what is now happening vindication for anyone with the Nationals who didn't panic when their young catcher got off to such an underwhelming start with the club earlier this month. There's...