After familiar April, Nationals need a bounceback May

Amid all the questions that were being asked of him following Tuesday night's 3-2 loss, Davey Martinez had one question for the assembled media in his postgame press conference.

"Is tomorrow May 1?" the Nationals manager asked. "I can't wait until tomorrow."

The calendar indeed has turned, and not a moment too soon for a Nats club that just endured through an awfully frustrating April (plus a couple days in March prior to that).

Losers in eight of their last 11 games, the Nationals now sit at 12-16 overall, fourth in the National League East, 3 1/2 games behind the first place Phillies.

And if this all feels familiar ... well, it certainly is.

The 2018 Nationals, you may or may not recall, went 13-16 in March/April. They had bullpen issues. They struggled to win close games. They dug themselves into an early hole.

What you also may or may not recall, though, is that last year's club got red hot in May, going 20-7 and seemingly righting its ship. The big difference from month to month? It wasn't the lineup: The Nats scored 4.34 runs in March/April, then 4.41 runs in May. It was the pitching staff, which gave up 4.21 runs per game in the first month, then 2.63 runs per game in the second month.

Now, things fell apart in June, most notably after Stephen Strasburg and Jeremy Hellickson got hurt and Gio Gonzalez and Tanner Roark struggled. But the 2018 Nationals did claw their way back from a ragged April to close out May in first place in the NL East.

So, what does any of that suggest about what may happen to the 2019 Nationals?

The March/April results are similar, as is the run differential (minus 1 this season vs. plus 4 last season). But this year's team is both scoring more runs (5.04 per game) and giving up more runs (5.07).

The extra runs allowed are mostly via the bullpen, which three days ago sported a major leagues-worst 7.34 ERA. Thanks to 16 consecutive scoreless innings since, that ERA is now down to 5.95. That's still bad enough to rank 29th out of 30 big league clubs, but at least it's trending in the right direction.

If the relievers continue to perform better, the Nationals have a chance to start winning all these close games they seem to find themselves in on a nightly basis. Of course, they also need better starting pitching (their 4.44 ERA ranks 17th in the majors) and better situational hitting, especially with Trea Turner, Anthony Rendon and Ryan Zimmerman out.

Here's the biggest challenge facing the Nationals in May: The schedule.

They just opened a 13-game stretch against three division leaders (Cardinals, Phillies, Dodgers) and another team that came within one game of reaching the World Series last fall (Brewers). After that, they host the Mets and Cubs. Then they travel to New York to face the Mets again.

That's a daunting stretch, even for a healthy team.

The Nationals, of course, aren't healthy. If they're going to survive these first few weeks of May, they're going to need better pitching all around and better execution at the plate.