Underlying the whole Nationals season is an unsettling fact for Nats fans. Beyond the injuries and past the bad luck/variability, lies the simple truth that the Nationals have not played like a playoff team this year. This is not a division winner undone by circumstance, but a team that would struggle to make it in, now struggling to make .500 because of things not going their way. The only reason it doesn't look worse is because arguably the Braves and Phillies are both the type that would struggle to make it in as well.
The pythagorean record suggests this. A 77-63 record run is good, not great, on pace for an 89 win season that would miss the playoffs as often as make it over the window period. A quick jaunt through the schedule confirms this (and forgive me if this retreads ground)
Mar 30 - Apr 29: 12-16 (14.3-13.7 pythag, which projects to 83 wins to help you understand)
The Nats would start fast but would then slow down as injuries piled up. Eaton and Rendon would both go down during this time, and Zimmerman would struggle mightily as it was clear something was wrong with him. With the Mets playing well, the schedule was on the harder side and honestly, but understandably, the team didn't play well during this time. Add in a little bad luck and it was a bad start.
Apr 30 - Jun 8 24-10 (23.4-10.6, 111 wins)
That would all change in May as they shed the bad luck and started to get better. Notice I didn't say healthy, because outside of Rendon coming back that didn't happen. But they got better players in the line-up. A struggling Zim would finally sit allowing Adams and Reynolds to play more. Soto would come up when Kendrick went down. Kendrick was good but he's no Soto.The schedule softened and the Nats took advantage of it and played like they should - dominating the bad teams*
At this point the season had gone to form. They had injury troubles and that cost them a little, but all in all a talented team, a playoff team, was playing up to its potential now. The bad luck hadn't been replaced by good luck but it had been mitigated by a long stretch where things were pretty even. They were back in first place. All that was left at this point was to incorporate the injured players as they came back and cruise to victory. Instead the Nats suffered a reeling 1-2 combo.
Jun 9 - Jun 26 5-11 (4.8-11.2, 49 wins)
Now here's part 1 where the season changed. It was understood the Nats would need to reincorporate Eaton, who'd been out most of the year, and Murphy, who'd been out all year. They figured they'd bring them in and probably get even better. However, injury returns can be tricky. It wasn't out of the question that they might suffer a little. But they didn't suffer a little - they suffered a lot. These guys struggled, Bryce struggled, and Roark and Gio went off the rails. What should have been a period where the Nats went around .500 and held ground instead became a time where they crashed and burned. Thanks to some hot play from NL East rivals, they found themselves 4 games out.
They played extremely poorly and had no one to blame but themselves for the bad position they were in. It wasn't bad luck at this point. Nearly half way into a season being under 2 games off by pythag is nothing. It wasn't injury. They were healthy now. It was the Nats. They deserved to be where they were, set up for a fall.
Jun 28 - Jul 4 1-6 (3.1-3.9, 72 wins)
And here's part 2. The Nats would suffer 4 one-run losses in 5 games. This run of bad luck would put the team behind the 8 ball for the remainder of the season. But please note - they didn't particularly play well here. Even looking at RS/RA, they weren't playing .500 ball against the good teams.
Jul 5 - Jul 15 6-5 (6.3-4.7, 93 wins)
So now the Nats were forced now to play catch-up. The good part is that they had a couple of easy stretches to get back in the race both before and after the ASB. If they could play like they did during May the Nats would make up the ground they needed. Maybe not all of it, but a large chunk, setting the team up for a fight in August and September. However, the Nats before the All-Star break were not impressive. They didn't dominate, but instead were merely ok against a soft bunch of teams which isn't good enough to make a real playoff run. There was the loss of Doolittle at this time but a team in the dog days is going to have to work around injuries.
To summarize: The Nats up until the injured guys came back
were in contention and not terribly unlucky. Injuries cost them a few games but things were fine. Then the Nats would play a month-plus of baseball that was not playoff worthy. They would play terrible for half that time. They would play poorly and catch some bad luck. They would play middling and not make up ground. The Nats were in position. The Nats failed. Even with even luck, the now healthy Nats should have only went something like 14/15-19/20. Strip away the excuses and for this month, there's a mediocre team underneath.
Jul 20 - Aug 5 9-6 (10.7-4.3, 115 wins)
After the ASB was better. Rizzo went a little nuts, trading away Kintzler and Kelley trying to force team unity. That is a risky move but the schedule was soft and if you were going to try something like this now was the time. And to be fair the Nats did respond and played this stretch like they should. For a brief two and a half week period the Nats were a playoff deserving squad again. On the down side they lost Strasburg and a good starting pitcher is a hard thing to cover for without a deal. They chose not to trade for anything. They didn't make up much ground in the division, but made some gains in the Wild Card race and set up a possible exciting finish, though at this point it was feeling like the normal playoff pace wouldn't do it and more would be needed.
Aug 7 - Aug 19 5-9 (6.3-7.7, 73 wins)
Turns out it didn't matter because the Nats couldn't even hit the normal playoff pace. Again the team wilted in the face of good competition and their season was relegated to "miracle please". Once again a goal wasn't reached.
So now over the past 2+ months of baseball (Early June to Mid August) the Nats primarily played like a non-playoff team. Did they suffer bad luck? Sure. Did injuries cost them that first month? Definitely. But the main reason the Nats weren't contending was the Nats, when healthy and not seeing the ball bounce the wrong way, were not playing well.
Aug 21 - Sep 4 7-7 (7.6-6.4, 87 wins)
For completeness (doesn't count yesterday bc I did this last night). At this point, a reeling Phillies team would help the Nats stay .500 but they'd lose series to the Marlins and Mets, meaning not good against the bad. Then top it off with losses to the Brewers and Cards - not good against the good. The Nats were a different team now. Murphy had been dealt. Adams had been dealt. Gio and Madson would go at the trade deadline. It's hard to say this team could do any better than they have. But they certainly haven't overperformed.
The Nats were dealt a raw hand with the luck and the injuries but they also played worse than expected for a good chunk of the season. Where you want to lay the blame for that is up to you but you can't just blame outside forces. The problems were internal this season and it's that base that allowed everything else to turn this team into one fighting for .500.
*remember in general you go for around .500 against the good team, around 100+ win pace for the bad teams. Assuming relatively even distribution of these games you finish in the low 90s.
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20 comments:
Great analysis as usual, Harper. One question is, if you think that injuries only cost us that first month or so, what is to blame for the remainder of the season not working out? The long-standing narrative was that injuries put us in a hole, and we've been trying to claw our way out ever since. But in reality, those injured players had all be back for a while and we still couldn't get out of our own way. So is it coaching? Player execution?
My thing for the past 5-6 years has been that this team is a talented group of individuals with no collective buy-in. Hard to prove as no one is in the clubhouse, but it certainly looks that way on the field. Maybe you do in fact lay that at the feet of the manager? ... who was just guaranteed his job yesterday by Rizzo. Oh boy.
Thank you for posting this. All year the Nats have all pretty much blamed injuries. I agree that they have been mostly healthy for a while now. Granted not 100% healthy, but what teams are 100% healthy. They are still a .500 team at best. Remove the hot May and they are not even that. My biggest fear is that the Nats will be dumb enough or arrogant enough to think they can keep basically the same team together next year and do any better than .500. And please, please tell me that Rizzo doesn't really think that Martinez has done a great job as it was reported last night. They play fundamentally awful and uninspired baseball most of the time. Sure they rally to make it close, but usually that is too little to late.
A big chunk is underperformance. Roark and Gio. The bullpen beyond Doolittle. MAT and Trea and Murphy and Bryce (a little). And then there's roster construction - lack of starter depth, no good catcher, lack of moves before year when it was clear Murphy wouldn't be ready for season and Zimm wasn't right. Lack of moves at deadline when a bullpen help, a new back-up MI, and a starter was needed.
I don't know what I lay at Martinez' feet. I can say I look at the season and see a lot of underperformance and only brief streaks of maybe overperformance against bad teams. That doesn't speak to him being GOOD, but whether he's bad or just another guy that could easily lead the team next year to the playoffs, I don't know how I feel right now.
At the end of the day, injuries and variance are still the two biggest issues. Sure, some players underperformed (Roark, Gio, others). But some people over-performed too (like Soto, Max, and Doolittle before his injury). And many roughly hit their projections (Turner, Rendon, Zim)
https://www.rosterresource.com/mlb-disabled-list-tracker/
Pythag has the Nats close to the division lead. And its not hard to imagine that they would be in the lead right now had they not lost the 'If we had Realmuto on our team.....' game, and decided to buy at the deadline rather than do a slow, month long sell-off. One tough loss might have altered the course of the 2018 season. We don't know since we can't do a rewind....
Roster construction can be blamed, but the Nats were objectively projected to win 92 games pre-season.
https://www.fangraphs.com/standings/playoff-odds?date=2018-03-28&dateDelta=
One can say, 'I don't trust the projections', but I'm not sure there is a better way to predict how a season 'should' go (of course no one knows how it 'will' go).
As far as bullpen underperformance goes, I'm starting to think Martinez has a lot to do with it (and this is coming from a Martinez apologist all year long). But after watching the past few games, some of the failure has been associated with overworked arms, which is Dave's doing.
- Austen Williams: throws 33 pitches in 2 innings on 9/2 and is the FIRST guy out of the pen on 9/4, which an expanded bullpen no less. Proceeds to give up 3 solo homers. Overworked?
- Kyle McGowin: started game in AAA on 9/3, threw 53 pitches. FIRST guy out of the pen on 9/5, again, with an expanded bullpen no less. Gives up a solo homer and struggles with command. Overworked?
- Brandon Kintzler: last year under Dusty, 22% of his appearances came with zero days rest. This year, it was over 48%. Overworked?
- Ryan Madson: last year under Dusty, 15% of his appearances came with zero days rest. This year, it was over 30%. Overworked?
- Justin Miller: 28% of his appearances this year have come with zero days rest. Overworked?
Aside from pitching Shawn Kelley every 6 games, he has operated as if he only has 2-3 arms in the pen. And all those instances don't include days where those guys are getting hot in the pen, only to not come in the game. These guys coming in and missing their spots, and getting punished for it by the other team, is the reason for under-performance, and I believe that's directly correlated with some of Martinez's selection of who pitches on what day. Maybe its Liliquist? I don't know, but someone in the coaching realm is to blame for that.
And - The Nats were terrible running the bases this year, I can't remember a season with so many bad, rally killing plays.
I think it's hard to not attribute at least part of the under performance to injuries- certainly for Murphy. MAT, Roark, and Gio, maybe Trea a little, but he's been a solid 3-4 WAR player although a bit inconsistent. I do completely agree this was not one of Rizzo's best years with all of the poor planning on roster construction and lack of pitching depth. I wonder how much of that was due to ownership and costs though
I fully blame Davey at this point. Not to say he should be fired, but he was set up to fail given the team had WS aspirations and he had never managed before. Bullpen management has already been discussed at length, but there's a much bigger issue at hand in my opinion.
The big problem with this team is they don't do the fundamentals well. Last night is a perfect example. You get men on 1st and 2nd with nobody out in the bottom of the 9th, you HAVE to move the runners over. It's mind boggling that those same two runners stayed on their bags for 3 consecutive hitters. I don't care that it was Zimmerman that was up to bat and he probably hasn't bunted in a decade, you HAVE to move the runners over and you HAVE to put the ball in play, not strike out looking.
Those types of decisions aren't always meant to be made by the manager, but if the team actually cared about the TEAM and not their individual performances, Zimm or Taylor would have at least changed their approach at the plate to match the circumstances (I don't blame Difo, his approach was fine).
And that's been a consistent issue all year. Everyone likes to talk about luck with regard to 1-run games, but you win (and lose) those types of games based on how you approach a situation. Not all situations are alike, so you HAVE to change your approach. Screw all the talk about players being creatures of habit, you are being made millions of dollars to play a game where the objective is to win, meaning you should be trying to win at all costs. It feels like Rendon and Soto are the only two players on the roster capable of doing such. And not instilling that mindset ABSOLUTELY is a coaching issue
I'm not a Davey apologist, though I don't like it when armchair fans can't think of any concrete reason for failure, and therefore blame the manager. He's not been great, and the bullpen usage has been bad.
THAT SAID, I think a lot of the blame this year goes to the front office. It appears that the Lerners have impaired Rizzo somewhat by making deals with Boras. The Weiters situation is a disaster, among others, and the high-priced players have put the nats into luxury tax problems. Also, it appears the Lerners were behind firing Dusty (and losing Mike Maddux in the process) AND on Bud Black passing on the job. That's really limiting the GM. However, the half-measures have really hurt the team.
If you're going to keep Soto and Robles, then trade away everything that's not nailed down, including Harper, and reload the farm IN JULY WHEN YOU CAN GET SOMETHING so you can go into 2019 in a strong position. I don't mean just MLB-ready talent, I mean take the best that you can get; prospects that don't help the nats can still be packaged into trades.
The fact that they've traded away all these guys for just salary relief, and then not enough salary relief to get under the threshold, while still fumbling around, is just the worst possible outcome. Either wave the white flag proudly or burn the thing.
I just feel like Rizzo painted himself into a corner this year, and had a lot of bad injury luck (who loses 4 closers in a season?) but a lot of it is just not doing enough to fix the short- and long-term problems the team has. They've traded away most of their depth in prospects, all 20 catchers in the system are terrible, and the last few drafts have been very weak. They lost Edwin Jackson 2 days before he could have been useful, and haven't stocked up on enough retreads to get by when injuries come. Those are things where the process has to change, and that takes time. Maybe they'll change the process.
...and another thing - I don't know that "go .500 against good teams and beat up on bad ones" is good enough. Maybe that's a recipe for losing in the NLDS every time? You'll face those good teams in October, and you have to go at least .501 against them.
So, I think they can lose 3 games the rest of the way; With how bad the Phillies & Braves are playing right now I still think it's going to take less than 74 losses (more than 88 wins) to win the division, so pick which 3 games you want them to lose! Braves still have a tough schedule (the West coast trip, Cards coming in) but the Phillies & Braves still have 7 games so someone has to win those 7 games.
The good news: After the Cubs series, they really only have 2 "tough" series left: @ Braves and @ Rockies, and note I didn't include @ Phillies, if you play 3 series against the Marlins & Padres after July ends and you only win 1 of those 3 series I can't label you a "good" team, and the Rockies series is the final series of the season, so hopefully the Rockies have already locked up the division or Wildcard by the time that rolls around so they sit some regulars.
Bad news: Well, where do I start?? They'll be lucky if they manage to split the 4 games with the Cubs, so that looks like 2 of the 3 losses right there meaning they can only lose once the final 2 weeks, and I see them losing at least once, so right there is 1 loss at least meaning you have 3 weeks to only play with 2 losses. Finishing this 19-3 stretch is going to involve sweeping a bunch of teams, and this team hasn't swept a series of 3 games or longer since the end of May, so why do you think they would suddenly start now. Third of all, they are still closer to the Mets for 4th, than to the Braves for first. Until they can get closer to Braves in first than the Mets in 4th I can't take them seriously.
Best case scenario, and about the only path I see them to the playoffs: They somehow gain 5 games on Philly BEFORE the first of the 2 series starts, so when the Braves & Phillies start the first series in Atlanta on the 20th the Nats are in second place, the Phillies win at least 3 of the 4 games, and Nats match that at home vs. the Mets. Then you'd go into the last week no worse than second, but probably first. Then it doesn't matter how the second Braves/Phils series in Philadelphia goes because as long as you take care of business vs. the Marlins & Rockies you'd likely make the playoffs. Basically, the long way of saying "Make sure we jump the Phillies in the standings by the 20 (2 weeks from today), hope the Phillies win the majority of those remaining Braves games, and make sure we at least match what the Phils do in that time frame so they don't jump us. Continued on next post:
Continued from first post:
And by the way, sorry for the long post, but anyone else confused why Davey pushed Max back an extra day?? IF Max starts last Sunday vs. Milwaukee which was the regular rest, he can pitch Friday vs. the Cubs, but the bigger thing and this is more important now is he can start on regular rest vs. the Phillies (Wednesday the 12th) but also if needed he could come in and pitch the final game in Atlanta (Sunday, the 16th) on 1 less day rest, but if the Nats have already won the first 2 and have a chance to sweep and let's say get to within 1 game of the Braves you'd obviously take Scherzer on 3 days rest than Joe Ross or Eric Fedde on normal rest right, you'd be an idiot not to! By pushing Max back that extra day to Monday, he can start on normal rest against the Braves, but it all but eliminates him from the Phillies series. You can still pitch him on 3 days rest, but then you'd also pitch him on 3 days rest for the Braves series, I'll pitch him once I don't want to pitch him twice. So, for our 2 biggest series left this year (Phillies & Braves next week) we could've had our 2 best pitchers (Strasburg & Scherzer) for 4 of the 6 games, instead we'll only get our best pitcher for 3 of the 6 games. Not a smart move. Martinez should actually skip Scherzer on Saturday, have him start Monday, so we get Scherzer & Stras both on regular rest for the Phillies & Braves series. The Cubs series is irrelevant, our season comes down to the next week, where imo we have to win at least 5 of the 6 games. Make sure your best pitchers can get as many starts in that time frame as you can!! If some idiot on the internet can figure that out, how come an MLB manager can't??
The Nats were built to rely on quality starts, not lots of bullpen innings. Roark and Gio struggling, missing Strasburg and Hellickson... these situations will overwork ANY bullpen.
What was truly maddening was watching the offense go dead simultaneously with a grouping of quality starts.
"What was truly maddening was watching the offense go dead simultaneously with a grouping of quality starts."
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I'm a big fan of sabermetrics. However, I think an easy fallacy to fall into when you're looking at stats is assuming the season is all about how many runs you score and how many you prevent. One of the maxims against small ball and/or manufacturing runs is "when you play for 1 run, that's usually all you'll get." And it's true, but in a lot of cases, 1 run is exactly what you need. Murphy's notion that he doesn't want singles because they "hurt the team by requiring other guys to get a hit" may make sense in the abstract, but how many times have the Nats been 1 base hit away from winning a game? I feel like it's been about 30 times this season alone. And in those cases, I'd much rather have a guy who's likely to get a single, or at least get on base at all and keep the rally going, than a guy with a small-but-decent chance of hitting a homer.
Also, I think you should bunt against the shift at least once in a while, for the same reason a football team should onside-kick in about 10% of their non-obvious kickoffs. Why? Because you'll force the defense to adjust for it. If you bunt into a shift a few times, you'll see a normal defensive alignment in the future, and can go back to hitting. If you onside kick every now and then, you'll force a return team to consider that, at the expense of their normal kick return preparation.
Since Doolittle went down, the Nats have lost six 1-run games and seven 2-run games. Don't know if that makes any difference, though: 2 of the 2-run losses were shutouts.
Still, a closer look at the boxscores during Doolittle's absence might reveal something. He last pitched on July 6th, and won on a Reynolds walk-off HR. Since then, four of the Nats' 1-run losses were walk-offs (including that ugly Sunday-nighter against the Cubs).
Two nights ago, the Nats gave up 4 runs in the 9th in their 11-8 loss. On August 18, the bullpen coughed up a run in the 9th and 2 in the 10th for a 7-5 loss to the Marlins. On August 7th against Atlanta, the Nats allowed 2 runs in the 9th for a 3-1 loss.
Whether Doolittle would have made a difference in, say, a half-dozen of those games is worth considering. Of course, the starting pitching and hitting have been mostly stinko during that stretch.
Yes, all teams endure injuries. But sometimes, WHO is injured can matter.
Who would have thought that Wieters would be a solid upgrade? Catcher probably turned out not to be as important as the bullpen.
@ Kevin Rusch
You make a very interesting point that broadens the discussion even more.
"When you play for one run, that's all you'll usually get" was Earl "Pitching-And-Three-Run-Homers" Weaver's sneering rejoinder to small ball. His theory was based on the sensible premise that at the start of each game, you don't know how many runs it will take to win. Do you play for 1 run early? In the 5th inning? In the 8th? And do you attempt a double steal in the 7th inning if you're leading by 6 runs? (Back then, the batter would take one in the ribs.)
His contemporary, Gene Mauch, was the Emperor of Small Ball, the complete antithesis of Weaver's theory of offence. 1 run was all he usually got. Mauch managed almost 4,000 games, and sported a .483 record with no World Series appearances. Weaver managed over 2500 games with a .583 record and 4 World Series appearances (he won in 1970).
During that era, though, the defensive shift was as rare as the Eephus pitch (although Ted Williams, interestingly, faced the shift throughout most of his career). Now there's a movement afoot, led by John Smoltz, to limit (if not eradicate) the shift.
Unless and until that happens though, your suggestion that teams--the Nats, you mean--play small ball against the shift is an intriguing one. The trick, of course, is to have in the lineup a sufficient number of hitters with enough bat-control skills to pull it off. But I've yet to see a pre-game batting practice where the hitter is told to lay down 10 and swing away on one.
Maybe there's a career for Roving Minor League Bunting Instructors.
The collapse of the 1964 Phillies was traumatic for me as a 7 year old fan living in northern Delaware. Mauch was the manager for that and a few other debacles (the 1986 Angels were one strike away from the WS!). I gave up on the Phillies who featured my favorite player Johnny Callison (I still rooted for him but he was slowed by knee injuries) and looked to the south for the Orioles and was rewarded first by the 1966 team that surprised the Dodgers in the WS. Starting in 1968, Weaver led several different styles of teams (he won with pitching, defense, and speed in 1973 and 1974 when Frank Robinson was gone and before Eddie Murray had arrived). Weaver went for three run homers, it's true. But I recall more than one walkoff win when the Orioles won with small ball. They won a playoff game against the Twins on a walkoff suicide squeeze, so Weaver believed in HRs and OBP, but he could also adjust situationally.
The only blemish on Weaver's record is probably losing two WS to the Pirates when the O's had 2-0 and then 3-1 leads (in games). In 1979, he did sort of a Dusty thing, sticking with players in certain roles even when they weren't performing (Don Stanhouse, it turned out was injured, but kept pitching).
The Nats seem to be doing the big play thing, but they are bad at fundamentals (baserunning, situational hitting, defensive intelligence). I never saw a better and smarter team, defensively than the 1960s-1970s Orioles. Ken Singleton said the O's worked drills non-stop on different situations; they hated it, but Weaver made them do it. Singleton said there was often a point in games where the other team would make a mistake because the O's were prepared and the other teams weren't. The Nats don't seem to have gamed out a lot of situations, so they always try to "make plays," often not the right ones.
You know, Johnny, I agree with you (in my best Ray Knight voice). All joking aside, I see the same thing from the Nats in terms of bad funamentals: situational hitting, baserunning, defensive intelligence. I was watching a Red Sox game this week and Mookie Betts was on the screen standing in right field in between hitters. He looks down at his left arm wristband and looked like he had a playbook, similar to a quarterback. After looking at this, he jogs about 10-15 ft toward the line and in a little. Defensive alignment on his wrist. Now that's either from him, or from the coaching staff saying, "here, read this while you're out there so you'll know where to stand." In either case, it shows more organizational commitment to the little things. Way more than some coach waving his hands at Bryce from the dugout to shift over toward the gaps.
These small, almost unimportant, things add up to a bigger problem in the organization. I think Rizzo has done a superb job at cultivating talent over the course of his tenure here; finding great deals with Lerner handcuffs around his wrists. But that's not all it is. I wonder what kind of organizational player development we have in the lower ranks that make these kids appear so far from "game ready" when they arrive in the big leagues, at least in terms of fundamentals. The talent is there for us. Some teams have a lot of guys that just flat out suck. We don't. But guys like Michael Taylor show flashes of excellence but play like they haven't a clue sometimes. Where does that come from? Especially when it's widespread. Managers come and go. Clubhouse leaders come and go. New players come and go. The source is in player development and how that is run, in my opinion. But you can't quantify that, so this an unpopular opinion I suppose.
GCX - my problem with this and why I wrote the article is that even with everyone back and taking out luck they have played worse than expected. If the core of this season was the core of a 92 win team the Nats would be sitting around .500 or a little over now, not three games under. If they just played like they should that itself would have been enough to get them closer around the trade deadline to set your scenario in motion. So is it injuries and variability, yes and yes, but first and foremost it's underperformance.
Max David - Don't read my next post! Keep dreaming!
No one mentions situational hitting. This team is putrid at situational hitting. Did it again last night in the 8th with 2nd and 3rd with one out and Reynolds does his swing for the fences routine and strikes out. Drives me nuts. I just don't think these players have much respect at all for Martinez- it shows up in their play which is lackluster at best. A strong manager is needed- showalter, Gerardi someone like that. But the Lerners are so cheap that'll never happen. Despite their billions. Smh
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