Four Weeks

That's all that stands between today and the playoffs. Not for the Nats mind you. Four weeks from today the Wild Card games start. The Nats won't be in those. For the Nats it's four weeks from Friday.

But still we're past the Labor Day weekend so we're getting our last couple of weeks where non-obviously injury related streaks can be worried about or gotten excited about. Everyone, EVERYONE, has 2 weeks of great or terrible baseball in them during a season. Usually multiple such stretches. Once we get to the 18th or so we can't really get to hung up on whether a non-injured guy finishes the season hot or not. Not only because of the whole, "it's hard to pull meaning from something that everyone does" but there will be almost a week off, they will face the better players on the better teams, they will do this in high pressure situations. It's different, almost too different to expect normal streaks to carry over.

So before we get to those last two weeks, we look for extended streaks that may carry into them. Are there any such issues for the Nats? Anyone have a bad/great August and has had it carry (so far) into September?

Batting- None.

No really. Kendrick was the only one (not counting Turner's brief set of games) to do really well in August. He hasn't done well in the first four games. Maybe you like Difo's good showing. He's also not doing well. But guys you might worry about, Zimm, Murphy - they are hitting better. I suppose Lind didn't have a great August and hasn't hit in Sept but it's only been 3 ABs.  Wieters hasn't hit in August, but he's also been sit down and plus Wieters isn't an "August" thing. He hasn't hit all year.

This isn't writing off the issues of August, or giving up on the hot bats. One good or bad game can throw September out of whack. However there isn't anything that seems that is "focus on" rather than "check in on" as of today, outside of Turner and Werth's continued on the job rehab. (Both had slow weekends)


Pitching : Roark, Scherzer, Kintzler, Doolittle

The pitching carried the Nats in August and it continues to do well. I'm very heartened at this point by Tanner Roark's re-emergence as a solid starter after a rough first half. Scherzer is still Scherzer. The back of the pen are the only guys who have pitched in multiple games so far and Madson was out most of August so he falls into the Werth/Turner rehab group. Kintzler and Doolittle keep looking good.

There was barely anyone who was doing bad in August - Cole, Matt Grace. And barely anyone bad so far in Sept - Perez had a bad outing. Same thing as above. We'll check in, in two weeks or so when more games are being played to see the long-term trends heading into the post-season.


Where's Bryce? When's Bryce? How's Bryce?

We don't really know, but a little less than a week ago he wasn't close to running. If he can't run, he can't play. He basically trying to keep every part of his body that isn't that leg in top condition so as soon as that leg is ready he can jump back into action. We don't know when that will be but we'd probably ideally want to see him back on the field in less than 2 weeks, the chances of that seems slim unless we hear something soon about his progress that suggests otherwise. That same date probably marks the playoff delineation line. For now he can still be back, even if it's for just a game or two of swings before the regular season ends. If we get to the 16th/17th weekend and there still is no clarity on his return then you can probably kiss the NLDS goodbye.

But remember - the playoffs are LONG. The last day of the regular season is the 1st of October. The first day of the NLDS is the 6th. That means Bryce still has a full month to heal to play in that (though yes you'd like him to get some swings in first). The first day of the NLCS is the 14th. That's 39 days from now. That's a lot of time.