Splitting a series in Colorado means possibly the Nats are better than Colorado. That's not necessarily good but you gotta start somewhere. Gore had another good start and the mountain air didn't lead to Gray giving up 81 homers. The bullpen though, looked suspect and while I like the bullpen the facts are that bullpens because they pitch fewer innings and have more pitchers, tend to be pretty variable. So if you have a slightly below average pen, which I think the Nats might, you can be slighly above average or well below just from good or bad breaks.
The Nats move on to play the Angels and the Angels, while they are fated by the Gods to end up like 73-89, are not a bad team. Win this series and then maybe we can start to think about moving the Nats up on the ol' rankings to the 20-25 range. Fun game is tomorrow as the Nats catch Ohtani. Yeah you want to win and you can watch Ohtani whenever but some guys you just want to see against a lineup you are very familiar with. Just feels different.
We're getting into our third starts so after this set we'll start to poke around and see what se see.
Around the league notes
Tampa really looks good going 9-0 now. Granted they've opened up again Detroit (maybe the worst team in baseball), the Nats (maybe the worst team in baseball), and the A's (probably the worst team in baseball). Still you figure 7-2 from that, not 9-0 and they've been dominant while doing it. Scoring over 8 runs a game (next is at 6.6) and giving up 2 runs a game (next is 2.6). The Red Sox aren't very good but they aren't the worst team in baseball so we'll see how this holds
No one's been overly lucky or unlucky to start so what you see is about right. It doesn't mean this will hold but it's worth taking a look at some surprises and see what's going on.
The Astros are 4-6. It's not the loss of Altuve. His replacement has been ok. Bregman is off to a horrendous start and they haven't found a DH to replace, well in practice replace Brantley. Alvarez moving off DH to OF to replace him.
The Phillies are 3-6. Is this a surprise with Bryce and Hoskins both out? I wouldn't say so. Their replacements have been terrible. Add in a bad streak from streaky Schwarber and the offense can't score. The relief pitching is bad, too. No surprises yet. The surprise is that also the starting pitching has been terrible.
The NL Central is wacky. The Brewers are 7-2 (three starters have given up 2 runs combined in 5 starts. Guys you never heard of are hitting like crazy) . Pirates are 6-3 (MVP Bryan Reynolds and some wildly divergent pitching performances) and Cardinals are 3-6 (hitting getting unlucky but SP could be a real problem)
Diamondbacks are ahead of the Dodgers. Dbacks are smacking doubles and stealing bases to score some runs like an 80s turf team and it's working. Dodgers are the closest to an unlucky team but also they've gotten downright hideous performances from 7-8-9 and 5th starter.
See you tomorrow for Ohtani Day
3 comments:
Nats are turning out to be the scrappy underdog that scratches out runs with singles, walks, contact hitting and smart base-running. Good to see lots of hits.
Seeing Dom Smith and Robles turn a would-be double play into an insurance run, a couple of steals, better use of the field, etc. This is good. Robles seems to be turning his career around, Abrams looks less lost. Lane Thomas might be a find.
Fielding is also much improved --- plays are being made. Third base and first base are being handled by experienced pros that are a pleasure to watch.
Corbin was pulled when he should have been pulled. Now lets see how Gray and Gore fare in the next two games.
Indeed Nattydread. If you squint hard enough, you can actually see a baseball team in there somewhere. Although personally I don't think it's a coincidence that Davey was away and the team played hard, smart and with purpose.
As a former (not very good, but committed) player of the sport, I really appreciate when the game is played well - with head and heart - even if not with overwhelming talent.
This could actually be a fun team to watch this year.
This team is definitely becoming more interesting to watch than anticipated, especially after Cavalli went down. I was really underwhelmed by the Candelario signing, but his D in particular has been spectacular to watch. Not to mention Garrett (SSS aside) looking like a future anchor of the lineup.
Here's hoping things continue to trend in the right direction, but strength of schedule so far has been pretty weak, so we'll see what happens when they face off against the AL Central teams
Post a Comment