Nats must find way to improve rotation, internally and externally

If you had to pick one - and only one - defining characteristic of the Nationals during their seven seasons as a contender, the answer would be simple: a good, often great, rotation.

This didn't happen by accident. Mike Rizzo's No. 1 goal in building a roster is to assemble an elite rotation. He saw firsthand what a difference that makes when he was farm director for the Diamondbacks during their run to the 2001 World Series title, and he has tried to duplicate it in his decade as general manager of the Nationals.

"Starting pitching is the lifeblood of a baseball team," Rizzo said Sunday before the Nats' season finale against the Rockies. "We've always said it: We're a pitching, defense, speed, athleticism organization. We're built around that, and I don't see that changing."

Problem is, that did change in 2018. The Nationals did not have a good pitching staff. They certainly didn't have a rotation up to their recent lofty standards. Even with the presence of perhaps baseball's most consistently dominant starter anchoring the staff.

Nats starters finished the season with a 4.03 ERA. That ranked 13th out of 30 major league clubs, ninth out of 15 National League clubs. Their final ERA was .40 worse than the 2017 rotation's mark, a full run worse than the 2014 rotation's best-in-baseball mark.

It was the Nationals' worst rotation ERA since 2010, when Livan Hernandez and John Lannan led the way and Craig Stammen, Luis Atilano and Scott Olsen each made 15 or more starts.

How did this happen? Let us count the ways ...

* Stephen Strasburg spent 2 1/2 months on the disabled list with neck and shoulder ailments, made only 22 starts (his lowest total since he was recovering from Tommy John surgery in 2011) and posted a 3.74 ERA and 1.200 WHIP (both the highest marks of his career).

* Gio Gonzalez and Tanner Roark, once the reliable third and fourth members of this rotation, had wildly erratic years. Gonzalez's ERA skyrocketed from 2.96 in 2017 (when he finished sixth in Cy Young Award voting) to 4.57 in 27 starts before he was traded to Milwaukee (where he went 3-0 with a 2.13 ERA in five starts, including Sunday's must-win game for the National League Central champs). Roark was much better in the second half after a dismal first half (3-12, 4.87 ERA before the All-Star break; 6-3, 3.43 ERA after the break), but never found the consistency that defined most of his career to date.

* Jeremy Hellickson proved better than advertised as the No. 5 starter (3.45 ERA, 1.073 WHIP), but made only 19 starts due to injury and averaged only 4.8 innings per start as manager Davey Martinez sought to avoid letting the right-hander face a lineup three times per game.

* The injuries meant the Nationals needed to dip into their pitching depth, getting 31 starts out of Erick Fedde, Jefry Rodriguez, Tommy Milone, Joe Ross, Austin Voth, A.J. Cole and Kyle McGowin. Those seven replacement starters combined for a ghastly 6.07 ERA and 1.543 WHIP. The Nats went 12-19 in those 31 games.

Suffice it to say, this is an area that needs major improvement in 2019.

The Nationals need Max Scherzer to continue being one of the best in the game, even as he turns 35 next July. They need Strasburg to not only throw 160-plus innings and be an elite starter during that time, hoping his velocity returns after it dropped post-injury. They need Roark to return to his form from 2014 and 2016, not from 2015, 2017 and 2018.

They need to acquire another proven starter, a legitimate No. 3 to take over Gonzalez's role. And if they could ensure he's a left-hander, it would be all the better. Hello, Patrick Corbin or Dallas Keuchel?

"It's something that you'd like to have," Rizzo said of a lefty starter. "To me, it's not a necessity. Good pitchers are good pitchers. And splits are splits. But I think we've been blessed to have great starting pitching here. I don't see that changing in the upcoming years. In a perfect world, you'd love to have a balanced rotation, both lefties and righties. But to me, having a guy on the mound every day that gives you a chance to win is what it's all about. And if they happen to be right-handed, so be it."

Finally, the Nationals absolutely, positively need starting pitchers from their own farm system to develop and become viable big leaguers. It's often overlooked, but they have not been nearly as successful in this regard as you might think.

Since 2012, the only pitchers drafted by the Nationals to make 15 or more starts for them in the majors are Strasburg, Jordan Zimmermann, Ross Detwiler, Cole and Taylor Jordan. It's awfully tough for a team to sustain pitching success over multiple years if it can't draft and develop its own starters.

So as important as Scherzer and Strasburg and Roark and (insert left-handed free agent here) are going to be to the Nationals' success in 2019, so too will Ross, Fedde, Rodriguez and whoever else might emerge from a farm system that needs to do its part to ensure this franchise can once again win on the strength of its rotation and not try to win in spite of it.