Rachel Levitin: Reconsidering the roles of Nats relievers

Here's the thing about Tuesday night's game at Nationals Park between the Washington Nationals and New York Mets - Washington starter Joe Ross threw a good game. He was able to keep up with 2015 All-Star pitcher Jacob deGrom in a head-to-had match-up, which should be viewed as an accomplishment for the young rookie pitcher. The unfortunate part is that the accomplishment dissolved amid a quiet offense and struggling relief pitchers.

The onus isn't completely on the quiet offense. deGrom is a pitcher the Nats need to be weary of, especially in the National League East Division. deGrom is 10-6 after winning last night's game 7-2 in Washington after just two years as a major league pitcher. deGrom was even the National League Rookie of the Year in 2014. So, the lack of runs is partially understood. But it's even more important to note that Ross can keep up with the guy.
New York didn't have an advantage one way or another on Tuesday. It was a clean ballgame. Each starting pitcher went through the first nine batters faced with ease. Each team managed at least a run before the floodgates near the end of the night broke open, courtesy of the Nats bullpen.

Whether it's manager Matt Williams' choices of who to put in to pitch and when or not, the fact is that the relievers didn't get the job done on Tuesday and made things worse. When you don't have your go-to guys a ring away via the bullpen phone, that's when the season gets interesting. Experiments (if you will) are conducted. The outcomes of those tests are recorded. And then Williams keeps working his equations to see what's working, what isn't, and what he wants to do about along with his coaching staff.

When reflecting on last night though, on a game that got away, maybe it's time to reconsider the timing and placement of a given reliever throughout a series - pending the circumstances allow.

Rachel Levitin blogs about the Nationals for District Sports Page. Follow her on Twitter: @RHLevitin. She will be sharing her observations about baseball in the nation's capital as part of MASNsports.com's season-long initiative of welcoming guest bloggers to our little corner of cyberspace. All opinions expressed are those of the guest bloggers, who are not employed by MASNsports.com but are just as passionate about their baseball as our roster of writers.