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By Jeff Todd | at
Email a copy of 'Offseason Outlook: Washington Nationals' to a friend
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kungfucampby
Their most glaring weakness appears to be a manager who doesn’t understand how relief pitchers work and also enjoys antagonizing his best player into getting injured after calling him out in the media.
VAR
I’d hesitate before calling Harper his best player. 7th on the team in fWAR this year, 3rd last year, 2nd in 2012. He may be someday but hasn’t been so far.
stl_cards16
He only played 100 games this year. Even entering his age 22 season, I believe Bryce Harper is the best player on the Nationals. He’s already produced almost 10 WAR at an age that most are getting ready for a season in AAA.
VAR
The problem is everyone looks at Harper with an oh my gosh he’s so young lense. That’s fine, but it doesn’t make him the best player on the Nationals. He’s never lead the team in fWAR. From 2012-2014 he didn’t lead the team. Desmond and Worth had 14 and 10 respectively with Harper third at 9.5. He may have the best raw talent, he may someday be the best player on the Nats, but right now there is no metric you can look at that makes him the best.
Drazthegr8
He absolutely is the most talented player and needs to be cultivated to become the best player. He’s been injured the last two seasons and appeared to have an adversarial relationship with Williams. In 2015, Harp should be the cleanup hitter and perhaps even take over in CF (his favorite position) if Span is dealt.
Alexander_Brovechkin
Because last season he got the broken thumb and the season before he ran head-first into the wall and was out for an extended period. You’re comparing him to the other players on the team in a vacuum, and you can’t do that because not all of them have had the unlucky injury history that Harper has. You’re looking at metrics, but the numbers obviously won’t be there because he’s missed games.
Danny Phillips
Rendon was their best position player last year.
Vandals Took The Handles
Matt Williams grew a lot as a manager this year – his first year managing anywhere. He took his team to the best record in the NL. The Sporting News named him as NL Manager of the Year.
Drazthegr8
How did he “grow as a manager.” I watched just about every game and he had no ability to or interest in adjusting from his Plan A. Immensely talented team, but IMO Williams was awful and the nation saw it in the playoffs.
jccfromdc
He adjusted the positioning that was causing so much trouble in the early going, and the defense improved. He listened to the relief pitchers & stopped warming pitchers up without using them. And he really got the hang of using his entire bullpen so that no one was overused. I saw an article that noted that the Nats bullpen going into the playoffs was both very effective & well rested.
He certainly wasn’t perfect – no manager is – but he wasn’t a disaster. I kinda hope he wins MOY just to hear the howls of outrage.
Drazthegr8
The bullpen was rested because he had like 5 extra guys in September and had a huge lead in the division (all other teams in the division fell apart). He wore Soriano out and never put the closers into high leverage situations to get them ready for the playoffs (Clip starts the 8th, Storen starts the 9th, that’s it).
hoya33
Getting what the Nats got out of Soriano was amazing because when he came over from the Yanks he was done so to get that production out of Soriano helped the team win many more games than they would have lost. We can move on now that he is gone he will never be the pitcher he was in Washington.
hoya33
Amen JCCfromDC very well stated.
hoya33
I agree with Ben and I did see every game. Williams did a job better than Johnson the year before only screwed up in his bad pitching moves in the playoffs but for me he was outstanding.
hoya33
“Enjoys antagonizing his best player” what the hell is that I never saw or heard that all year. Williams maybe made that mistake in the playoffs with his pitching but to think that was a season long problem would be a joke because it was a complete opposite he did a great job during the season.
Alexander_Brovechkin
He’s talking about when he sat Harper for “not hustling.”
drkrick
After he dogged it on a routine grounder. Harper said he had no problem with what Williams did at the time and there were no signs of a problem between them for the rest of the season, even after Harper called for Span to be benched in his favor in center (the team seems to have dismissed it as a kid mouthing off and moved on). Non issue.
bobbleheadguru
Amazing how much better Fister was in a Nationals uniform than with the Tigers.
His ERA was a full run lower in 2014 v. 2013, but his FIP was HIGHER!
Luck, much better defense and a going to the National league all contributed to this.
Bob Bunker
Since his FIP was lower for Detroit wasn’t Fister actually better for the Tigers? FIP measures the performance of the pitcher in a vacuum after all.
Edgar4evar
Miller for Souza, M’s. Get it done.
hoya33
NO, Souza is to good to let go. If Espinosa would bat just righthanded he would be a much better player than Miller he is better defensively than Miller now and he only played a handful of games at shortstop.
Edgar4evar
Miller’s defense is ok for shortstop, but should be above-average at second base. Still, I’ll give you that Espinosa is better in that regard. Miller’s bat, however, is a notch above Spinner’s. Throughout his career he has walked more, struck out less, and made better contact than Espinosa. He had some “sophomore slump” to start last year, but should mature into a plus-hitting second-baseman whereas Espinosa is a below-average bat even at shortstop. And Miller is two years younger.
Bob Bunker
That’s interesting. Miller would be a good back up option for Desmond and the Nats do seem to have OF excess. I think the Nats would be smart to look into that especially since Desmond/Fister/Zimmerman could be shopped for better OF prospects then Souza.
Christopher Henderson
Would love Jordan Zimmerman playing for the Sox… but not at the cost of Xander Bogaerts!!!!