State of the Nats roster: Infield

State of the Nats roster: Infield
We begin today a periodic look at the state of the Nationals roster at the point spring training was suspended and project how things may look whenever baseball is played again. Up first is the infield ... No aspect of the Nationals roster underwent as much change last winter as the infield. There was only one major departure (Anthony Rendon) but Matt Adams and Brian Dozier also left as free agents, leaving general manager Mike Rizzo with a couple of different paths in an attempt to make up for...
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Tales from the clubhouse: Stanton's balk-off

Tales from the clubhouse: Stanton's balk-off
This extended break is offering us a chance to write some stories we wouldn't normally write and to take a few trips down memory lane. So here's a trip back in time for you that includes an epic behind-the-scenes story from the postgame clubhouse. Maybe this will be the first of several such stories that can be shared with you until we have real baseball again. The date is July 15, 2005. The Nationals are in Milwaukee, facing the Brewers in front of a packed Friday night house at Miller Park....
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Rizzo on employee payments, season prep and Nats charities

Rizzo on employee payments, season prep and Nats charities
In addition to paying all full-time employees' salaries through at least the end of May, the Nationals have not yet discussed asking for the organization's highest-paid employees to reduce their salaries while baseball is shut down during the coronavirus pandemic. General manager Mike Rizzo, during his regular conference call with reporters today, confirmed the Lerner family's recent commitment to pay all full-time employees full salary and benefits through May, following a trend established...
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Nats commit to pay full-time employees through at least May 31

Nats commit to pay full-time employees through at least May 31
The Nationals informed full-time employees they will continue to receive full pay and benefits through at least the end of May, a source familiar with the decision confirmed. Following the lead of nearly every other major league organization in recent days, Nationals ownership sent an email out to all full-time employees Thursday with news they will continue to be paid through May 31. The club previously had committed to paying full salaries through the end of April. A decision on payments...
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After "magical" fall, Rizzos adapt to spring of confinement

After "magical" fall, Rizzos adapt to spring of confinement
Mike Rizzo spends his life in motion. If he's not in his office at Nationals Park, he's in the clubhouse meeting with the coaching staff. Or he's on the field watching batting practice from right behind the cage. Or he's on the team charter flying to nearly every road game during a season. Or on the rare occasions he's not with the big league club, he's somewhere else in America watching a top college or high school prospect who's on the Nats' radar for the upcoming draft. What, though,...
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Nationals trivia quiz: Highs and lows

Nationals trivia quiz: Highs and lows
How well do you know your Nationals history? If you tried our two previous trivia quizzes (the first highlighting opening days, the second all about the postseason), you may already have an idea just how proficient you are at these things. But whether you aced those quizzes or failed them spectacularly, it's time to get back on the horse and give it another try. Today we present the latest edition of Nats trivia, this time looking at some of the most notable highs and lows for the franchise...
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Zimmerman willing to play in empty parks, but has other concerns

Zimmerman willing to play in empty parks, but has other concerns
As various proposals to play an abridged and altered Major League Baseball season get leaked, and the sporting public debates the practicalities and merits of them all, we must remind ourselves of the following key point: Eventually, MLB is going to have to make an official proposal for the 2020 season. And then the players are going to have to agree to it. And the second part of that equation is essential to any plan actually becoming reality. Players and owners haven't exactly seen eye to...
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Zimmermans grateful for new charity support, double goal

Zimmermans grateful for new charity support, double goal
Ryan and Heather Zimmerman were a couple of weeks into their unexpected spring together at home with nowhere to go when they started wondering what they could do to help their community through the coronavirus pandemic. They immediately thought of the doctors, nurses and other health care workers who were being overwhelmed with COVID-19 cases, didn't have enough personal protective equipment and didn't have enough time to take care of themselves and their families while simultaneously taking...
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Schedule design could have big effect on eventual season

Schedule design could have big effect on eventual season
We don't talk about the schedule much in baseball, because it really doesn't matter all that much under normal circumstances. During the course of a 162-game season, every team in the majors is going to play every other team in its division 19 times, every team in its league's two other divisions six or seven times and then 20 interleague games. Sure, teams in tougher divisions - and those that play the toughest division in interleague play - have a little bit of a disadvantage. But rarely...
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Which pre-2019 Nats team should have won the World Series?

Which pre-2019 Nats team should have won the World Series?
What's the best team in Nationals history? The one that actually won the World Series. Duh. But it's worth remembering the 2019 Nats only went 93-69 during the regular season. Four previous clubs won more games than that: the 2012, 2014, 2016 and 2017 clubs. Those four teams, of course, lost in the National League Division Series, often in agonizing fashion. And so they're forever viewed as underachievers. Here's the question, though: Were any of those teams good enough to win the World...
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Why the Nats' team Zoom chat captivated us so much

Why the Nats' team Zoom chat captivated us so much
What would you have thought if someone told you a month ago you'd be spending four hours on the night of April 14 watching two dozen players, coaches and others from the 2019 Nationals hold a video conference call with each other while (sort of) re-watching Game 7 of the World Series? Or that it would be the most enjoyable thing you've watched in the last month? In these strangest of times, it's the strangest of entertainment that is captivating us. And, more importantly, bringing us all...
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Wednesday morning Nats Q&A

Wednesday morning Nats Q&A
Well, we've completed the re-watch of the entire 2019 postseason. And it was capped off last night not only with the reairing of Game 7 of the World Series on MASN, but a once-in-a-lifetime Zoom chat with about two dozen Nationals players, coaches and broadcasters. If you missed any or all of it, the full four-hour video is still up. Major props to Ryan Zimmerman and Dan Kolko for putting the whole thing together, and for helping to raise more than $200,000 for the just-formed Pros For Heroes,...
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Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 7

Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 7
(Note: You can watch Game 7 of the World Series tonight on MASN at 7 p.m.) There's a strange anticipation to Game 7 of the World Series that doesn't exist any other day of the year. It's the ultimate game, and so there's excitement for the prospect of that. But it's also guaranteed to be the final game of the year, so there's a tinge of sadness that comes with that realization. No matter what happens, no matter who wins, there will not be another ballgame to come after this. The Nationals...
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Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 6

Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 6
(Note: You can watch Game 6 of the World Series tonight on MASN at 7 p.m. Eastern time.) Man, oh, man, did a lot of stuff happen in this game. I mean, this one game alone included Alex Bregman carrying his bat to first base after homering, then Juan Soto responding by doing the exact same thing. It had Stephen Strasburg tipping his pitches in the top of the first, then making a correction and pitching so well he actually took the mound for the bottom of the ninth. It had Adam Eaton hitting a...
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Sunday morning tidbits

Sunday morning tidbits
A random assortment of tidbits for you on this Sunday morning with no baseball ... * We put the World Series re-watch on hold for a couple of days so we could line up the final two games with MASN's rebroadcast schedule. So look for my re-watch article about Game 6 on Monday morning, with MASN showing the game at 7 p.m. Then I'll have my re-watch article about Game 7 on Tuesday morning, in advance of the telecast at 7 p.m. Hope you've been enjoying the entire experience all over again. * As...
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Nationals employee tested positive, completed quarantine

Nationals employee tested positive, completed quarantine
A Nationals employee who was with the club during spring training in West Palm Beach tested positive for COVID-19 after returning home, has completed quarantine and is now symptom-free, general manager Mike Rizzo revealed today during his regular, weekly conference call with reporters. The male employee, whose name was not revealed, tested positive "well after we shut down the facilities in West Palm Beach and D.C.," Rizzo said. "And fortunately he's home and resting and doing well. His...
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Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 5

Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 5
As fans began entering Nationals Park for Game 5 of the World Series, a few thoughts probably were foremost on everyone's minds ... * The home team had to win one of these games eventually, right? * The fact that Max Scherzer was starting for the Nationals should help make that happen, right? No. And no. Not even close. The home team would not win on this night, nor on any forthcoming night (though nobody could have realized that at the time). And more troublesome, Scherzer would not start...
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Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 4

Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 4
If Game 3 of the World Series was the most frustrating four hours of the Nationals' entire postseason run, what was Game 4? Awfully frustrating in its own right, that's what it was. There weren't as many squandered opportunities at the plate as there were the previous night, but there were more than a few. And though the final score (an 8-1 Astros victory) was lopsided, the game was very much there for the taking in the bottom of the sixth and top of the seventh, perhaps the key stretch of...
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Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 3

Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 3
Has there ever been more excitement and anticipation for a Nationals game than there was on the evening of Oct. 25, 2019, when the World Series came to D.C. for the first time since 1933? This was an event some weren't entirely sure would ever take place. Then throw in the not-insignificant fact the Nats went into Game 3 up two games to none on the supposedly superior Astros, and you had the perfect convergence of joy, intensity, nostalgia and celebration on South Capitol Street. The whole...
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Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 2

Home confinement re-watch: 2019 World Series Game 2
Honest opinion: What was your reasonable, best-case scenario for the Nationals in the first two games of the World Series? Maybe you had a pie-in-the-sky dream of snatching both games from the Astros and returning to D.C. flying high, but realistically you just wanted to see them win one of two on the road. Especially when those two games were started by Gerrit Cole and Justin Verlander. Right? Well, after beating Cole in Game 1, the Nats returned to Minute Maid Park the next night for Game 2...
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