We've known this day was coming, officially for a month now, unofficially for longer than that. Bryce Harper is playing tonight at Nationals Park, and he's not playing for the home team. How will the new Phillies slugger be greeted by the crowd? Check back shortly after 7 p.m.
More importantly, how will Harper fare at the plate against Max Scherzer? The two have only faced each other in live batting practice during spring training. That doesn't come close to counting. Rest assured, Scherzer...
Nationals fans, by and large, love former Nationals.
Think of all the prominent ex-players who have come back as an opponent over the years, and think of the crowd's response to them. Adam Dunn. Ian Desmond. Jordan Zimmermann. Adam LaRoche. Michael Morse. Wilson Ramos. Daniel Murphy. All received, at minimum, warm applause. Some got standing ovations. None was booed.
Has anyone who previously played for the Nats ever been on the receiving end of boos upon stepping into the batter's box or...
Patrick Corbin knew the situation when he took the mound Sunday afternoon at Nationals Park. He knew what happened to the home club on opening day, then again on Saturday. He knew the responsibility that rested upon his left arm in his first-ever start for his new team.
"I just wanted to go out there and give us a chance to win after those first two games," he said. "I'm not saying we had to win this, but I just wanted to go out there and do my best."
Corbin wasn't quite calling the...
He's perhaps the fastest player in baseball, and he already has twice as many stolen bases as anyone else in the sport. And because of that, there's sometimes a perception that Trea Turner needs to be a small-ball guy, someone who just needs to put the bat on the ball and then take advantage of his speed.
Thing is, Turner also has serious pop in that bat, as evidenced by the 19 home runs he hit last season.
So when the Nationals desperately needed someone to deliver them a win - their first...
The Nationals have a bullpen problem. But they'll worry about that later tonight, because right now all they care about is celebrating their first win of 2019, thanks to the power supplied by one of the fastest players in baseball.
Trea Turner, who had already clubbed a three-run homer earlier in the afternoon, drilled a walk-off shot into the fierce wind blowing in from left field to deliver a much-needed 6-5 victory over the Mets after the Nats' shaky bullpen suffered through a late...
Tony Sipp can admit it now, after the fact, because everything worked out well Saturday. But as he jogged in from the Nationals bullpen to make his season debut in the seventh inning of what at that point was a 4-4 game against the heart of the Mets lineup, the veteran reliever had no idea what to expect.
"It was definitely a lot of questions that I had," he said today. "I believe I was ready, but then you run out there and you're thinking: 'Am I ready?' It's a tie ballgame. It's a...
It's a cold, gray morning here on South Capitol Street, and the infamous Skittles tarp has been covering the infield. But don't despair: The forecast calls for the rain to end soon and the sun to come out. It's going to be cold and windy, but the Nationals and Mets will be finishing their season-opening series as scheduled.
You hate to say this after only two games, but let's go ahead and say it: The Nats really need to win today. It's not just about avoiding a season-opening sweep at the...
It's been an admittedly negative first couple of games to the Nationals season, what with back-to-back losses to the Mets that included defensive gaffes, baserunning gaffes and bullpen gaffes.
But today's a new day, so let's try to think positively if only for a few minutes. Here are some encouraging developments through the first 18 innings of the 2019 season in D.C. ...
* Juan Soto is doing Juan Soto things,
The 20-year-old left fielder has picked up right where he left off as a...
It had been 19 months since Trevor Rosenthal last took the mound in a major league game, and so the veteran reliever understandably was happy about that important fact.
"It was an exciting day, obviously," he said. "Getting out there for the first time, the situation, it was a good experience and something I really enjoyed and look forward to happening again."
Rosenthal said all this with a smile on his face, but behind the smile was the recognition that he's only allowed to look on the...
They were sloppy in the field and sloppy on the bases again, digging themselves into an early hole that had South Capitol Street grumbling again only 48 hours after a fundamentally flawed opening day loss.
But when the Nationals clawed their way back to tie up the game thanks to the exploits of young outfielders Juan Soto and Victor Robles, the ballpark came back to life, now believing things were pointed in a positive direction after a ragged first 11 innings to the season.
And then the...
If Thursday's season opener was an indication of things to come, Trea Turner is going to run a lot this season. If the Nationals did their scouting, Turner shouldn't be the only one running a lot today against Noah Syndergaard.
A perfect convergence of natural speed, organizational philosophy and matchups comes together this afternoon when the Nats face the Mets and their No. 2 starter.
Syndergaard, for all his talents as a pitcher, is one of the majors' worst at stopping the running game....
Even with Bryce Harper coming off the books, the Nationals entered the season with one of Major League Baseball's largest payrolls and the sport's highest-paid player for 2019.
The Nationals' opening day payroll of $185 million ranks fifth in the majors, behind the Red Sox, Cubs, Yankees and Dodgers, according to the Associated Press' annual calculations. The payroll total is up slightly from last year's $180 million figure, which ranked fourth in the league at that time.
Max Scherzer,...
The nature of the baseball schedule, especially in northern cities that require a day off following the season opener to account for weather postponements, lends itself to gross overanalyzing of Game 1 of 162.
No other game all season, aside from perhaps postseason contests, gets dissected like this. But with nothing else to write or talk about for 48 hours until they take the field again, we really have no choice but to make a big deal out of every little thing that happens on opening day.
So...
Pick out any number of reasons the Nationals lost their season opener today, 2-0 to the Mets. Look at Ryan Zimmerman's first-inning line drive, the one snagged by a diving Jeff McNeil at third base to prevent a run from scoring. Point out Davey Martinez's late-game pitching decisions to let Max Scherzer return to the mound for the eighth, then turn to Justin Miller and Matt Grace to face a couple of key hitters instead of Trevor Rosenthal and Tony Sipp.
But if you really want to encapsulate...
It's opening day, and that inevitably leads to two things from fans and media alike: excessive optimism and overblown pessimism, based solely on the results of the first game of a 162-game marathon.
A team's record on opening day bears no connection to its record on Oct. 1, and anyone who thinks otherwise need only look back one year ago when the Nationals beat the Reds by a 2-0 count in their opener and stormed out to four straight wins to give everyone reason for excessive optimism en route...
Tony Sipp, as promised, is here on opening day and ready to pitch in a big spot late against one of the Mets' big left-handed hitters. Howie Kendrick and Michael A. Taylor, as expected, aren't on the active roster yet. And they're not in Washington, either.
While Kendrick and Taylor continue to rehab from their spring training injuries in West Palm Beach, Sipp made the trip north after pitching in a minor league game Tuesday, the lefty's final tune-up before making his Nationals...
The wait is over. And for the first time in a long time, we aren't talking about the wait for Bryce Harper to sign with somebody. No, we're talking about the Nationals' long, six-month wait to get back on the field after a disappointing 2018 season. It finally happens today in the opener of what might just be the most compelling division race we've ever seen around here.
And it starts right off with a showdown between two of the four teams that come into opening day believing they can win...
Hey, do you know what today is? Yes, of course you do. And because you know it's opening day, you also know it's media prediction day!
Ah yes, media prediction day, when my colleagues and I make complete fools of ourselves (some more than others) in trying to guess how the Nationals' season is going to play out. This is now the 10th consecutive year we've done this, via three different media outlets. And our pool of participants has both grown and changed dramatically in that time. We've...
The Nationals reported for spring training last month with a pretty good idea already who would fill out their 25-man roster. There were only a handful of jobs up for grabs, and even those seemed fairly set in stone, barring something unexpected developing over the course of six weeks in Florida.
Well, something unexpected did happen. His name is Jake Noll, and thanks to one of the most unexpected spring training performances in recent club history the 25-year-old infielder is about to make his...
The countdown is on. We are now just shy of 24 hours from opening day across Major League Baseball. (Let's just forget the Athletics and Mariners already played two regular season games in Japan last week, cause it only makes things more confusing.) After an agonizing winter and spring waiting for free agents to sign, at last we can watch and write about what's actually taking place on the field.
If you're looking for our annual Nationals media season predictions, you're going to have to...