How bad is too bad?

When the Nats lost Trea Turner on April 3rd to a hand injury it was unfortunate, but not something to worry about. Unless you really believe in single year defensive WAR stats (and you should NOT really believe in single year defensive WAR stats) Trea was an important cog, but not the Nats best player. Almost every team will suffer through an injury to an important player, and should be able to soldier on with little effect. It was a typical baseball problem, just earlier than you'd like.

When Rendon went out on April 21st the situation became problematic. He is arguably the Nats best player. Even with a decent back-up in line (Kendrick) now you had two important cogs out. That's harder to overcome. Not impossible mind you, but a challenge. Especially when Kendrick was needed to spell some bad play elsewhere. This problem doesn't happen to every baseball team, but it isn't uncommon. Maybe half will fight out a stretch like this. It's tough but a playoff team should be able to play good baseball, if not winning baseball. 

When Juan Soto went out on May 1st, things changed to dire. Soto had been expected to be a huge bat for the Nats this year and while he wasn't exactly doing that he was still producing. Now you had three important cogs out. Your depth would be tested as far as it could reasonably be expected to go. And honestly all you'd be expected to do is hold ground give the players lost. .500 would be a fine run while this situation was happening.

When Matt Adams went out on May 5th things it became a situation of survival. Zimmerman, who Adams was replacing, being gone wasn't a huge deal because Adams was the very capable, arguably better, back-up for him. Adams isn't an important cog, but he's a decent piece. But more importantly, at this point, with three infielders and an outfielder out, you start to dig past your expected depth. If this was the only injury Kendrick or Dozier might be manning first. With this being the fourth you force someone not expected to play at all into an every day role. At this point the expectation is only to not be embarrassing. A 70 win pace would be fine. Winning 4 out of every 10 games more likely hoping you don't run into tough competition.


Suffice to say the Nats were in a bad spot the past few days. No team could be expected to continue to produce at major league levels with three important bats and another starter out. You'd only be expected to survive. But here are some records

After Trea : 8-7
After Rendon : 3-6
After Soto : 2-2
After Adams : 0-3

The Nats didn't play well enough, in my opinion, after Trea went down. They didn't play well enough, in my opinion, after Rendon went down. They did play well enough after Soto went down, and not after Adams went down, though those are both a more limited number of games.

The overall count after Rendon is 5-11, after Trea is 13-18. To me it's tough to look at those numbers and say "Davey is doing a good job keeping things together".  Where here do you see leadership translating to something on the field?

It would be fine if Davey had a history of doing such. It's five weeks of baseball and things happen. Catch even breaks and the Nats are maybe sitting at 16-19 which is more reasonable. We all know the bullpen issues. But Davey doesn't have this history. Last year's team faced some adversity and also crashed at one point running off a 9-21 stretch.

He may be keeping the clubhouse together but the results are about as bad as can be. There are only 3 teams in baseball with a worse record.  I ask you again - Where do you see leadership translating to something on the field? If it doesn't translate to something on the field, what is the value of it? If 200 games is not enough time for us to see it, how many games would be?

No manager is going to turn this ship around into a 90+ win playoff team. It might happen but it would be luck as the team would have to play like a 97 win squad the rest of the year just to get to 90 wins, which is above nearly all expectations. But another manager might get this team to play simply to expectations, something Davey has continuously failed to do, even adjusting for the situation at hand.  Play to expectations, get a few breaks, and you still might get a Wild Card or luck into winning this flawed division.

I suppose it could be just bad luck. The breaks not going his way for 200 games leading him to be about 10 games under where the expected W-L would be based on runs scored. I guess it could be. But is there anything here that makes you believe it's worth the chance that it isn't? Obviously we aren't in the clubhouse. Our call from out here is only slightly informed. But still to me the call is glaringly obvious. This isn't working.

Rendon is back now so we'll see. Can they survive? Getting to 4-6 on this trip is unlikely. 3-7 we hope? Then the stretch that should break Davey for eveyone if this level of play continues. Mets at home, Cubs at home, Mets away, Miami at home. Some tough games but not playing good teams on the road tough. A stretch that even a hobbled Nats team should be able to find more wins than losses. If they can't do that, I don't know what to say to even the most ardent defenders of Martinez.