Werth a lot, Missing ZNN, and Roark

Dusty said recently that he wants to use MAT like a 6th man. There's a couple things in there that bother me - the idea that he's proving his worth with great spring stats, the idea that you would give Bryce Harper more than a day off a month - but all in all it's what I'd want to hear. MAT will get enough playing time to see if he's making progress. This is a necessity for the Nats to help make decisions for 2017 and beyond.

The follow-up question is what happens if Werth struggles? Could MAT take over his role full time? If Revere struggles, that would certainly happen. If Bryce struggles enough that MAT could take over for him, the Nats are doomed. But if Werth struggles it is not as clear cut. Ideally yes, MAT would take over. Werth is a liability in the field now, so if he's not hitting his value is reduced to seeing pitches and maybe smart baserunning. MAT on the other hand gives you defensive value even if he's not hitting. It would make sense to pull him.

But how long a leash do you give Werth? It will be tempting to pull him if, say, he gives you a bad April, but that may be premature. It was just 2014 when Jayson hit .292 / .394 / .455, a line we'd kill to have MAT match. Taylor has only hit that level once ever for any extended time in minors or majors (discounting a Puerto Rican Winter league stint), during an extended stay in Harrisburg in 2014. Werth's very good at getting on base, and that's a big skill for this team. (The team's OBP last year without Bryce is a dismal .304) He's also never been a fast starter with the Nats, generally having his best months in the dog days of July and August. Give up on Werth too early and maybe he never gets the reps he needs to get loose. There's also the question of how he'd react. He's shown himself to be a bit... self-important. Could he react to a demotion positively?

This could very well be the question of the early season if Werth struggles. In my mind Werth has earned the benefit of time. However, it all depends on how bad he's hitting.


ZNN is gone and he's not coming back. Most people are ok with it. Ross seemed like a fair replacement for the departing ZNN who dipped a little in his final season in DC. It's almost certainly true that the Nats didn't need to sign a ZNN to a long term deal. However, it's going to be hard for Ross to be ZNN. Over the course of the 2012-2015 window, ZNN was the Nats most valuable pitcher (Strasburg was arguably better but pitched a 130 fewer innings). Not only that he was arguably a Top 10-15 pitcher in the entire league. He's not a Kersahw, Sale, King Felix or yes, Scherzer. However, he was healthy, pitched all the time, and pitched well for four years. He was as valuable as a Cueto, Lester, or Bumgarner.

For the sake of 2016 and beyond there are really two questions. The first is whether Ross can match what ZNN puts up during the same time frame, helping to figure out if the Nats could let ZNN go. That's most likely a yes given their respective ages. At the very least we can agree it's a fair gamble. The second is whether Ross can match what ZNN put up over the last 4 years, helping to figure out if the Nats can expect the same sort of production from him as they got from Jordan. That has to be most likely a no. The hurdle you are asking Ross to clear is to be one of the best 15 pitchers in the majors over the next 4 years. I like Ross but I'm sorry I'm not putting my money on that. ZNN was a special talent when the Nats had him and it's going to be hard to replace that.


With Arroyo down and Giolito being expensive 6 years or so down the road, Roark looks pretty secure in his role as the 5th starter. Is Roark up for it? Roark works if he gets ground balls and keeps the ball in the park. He doesn't walk a lot of players but doesn't strike out a bunch either. His spring has looked ok in those regards - no homers, 9 Ks in 9 IP, but it's spring and the equivalent of one complete game, hardly anything you can hang a hat on.  I think the way to look at it is there aren't any warning signs things will be terrible. A bunch of homers (Gott?) or walks (Gio?), or no K's at all (Kelley?).  I think a big question for Roark will be not if he can get grounders but if he can get the grounders that he wants. The 3B/SS side of the field should be defended well. The 2B/1B side might be a big issue if Zimm can't move around. Roark can pitch like he wants to and still be beat if the batters can direct their grounders a little bit.  If Roark can't do it than next up would almost certainly not be Giolito but Blake Treinen. It could work but I'm not sure anyone would look to that with any sort of confidence.

Monday Quickie - Still nothing

Still nothing. But a week closer to Opening Day, so there is that!

Something to keep in mind as we go into this year, something I noted during the whole dream / nightmare scenarios is the idea of the Max Scherzer and Bryce Harper "problem".  The idea is pretty simple. It's more likely than not that Scherzer and Bryce will not reach the heights that they did last year. Given that the "base" Nats record may be lower than you think based simply on looking at last year's record and factoring in injuries.

Bryce had one of the greatest offensive season in history and post- WWII the guys that repeat such a performances (without a little injection of the ol' "invisible to media medicine") are named Williams, Musial, Mantle, and Pujols maybe. That's it. Other guys come close, but setting the bar at what Bryce did last year, they don't cross it. It was THAT amazing. And how amazing it was was basically lost because the team didn't win anything.

But the point here is it's likely Bryce won't do better than this either. It's likely he won't follow-up a Top 20-25 offensive season since the War with one equal or better. That's not to say he can't do it. He is at the right age. No one think it was a fluke. (Hey Norm Cash! Get out of here!) But it's more likely he won't do it than he will. That means the Nats will likely be, with some measure, worse.

The Max Scherzer season was not as dramatically good. It was worthy of Cy Young consideration but not historic. It was however, arguably Scherzer's best year ever, and given his age, if you are presented with the choice "equal/better or worse", again the smart money would be on worse. I'll repeat what I said with Bryce. It's not to say he can't do it. Max is a great pitcher. Pitchers have seen high levels of performance straight through to 34/35. That's not that uncommon. But it's more likely he won't do it than he will. That means the Nats will likely be, with some measure, worse.

Max and Bryce set extremely high bars last year. They will likely come in under those. The deciding factor will be how worse they play. A half-step worse from each and it will be a bump on the road. Two steps worse each and the Nats willl have some serious ground to make up.

Can they do something like that? Sure. Injury returns and some new players should make a big difference. But they'll also need to not have a bad season performance wise. That's a pretty obvious statement but what is less obvious is they didn't have a bad season performance wise in 2015, taking away injury issues. For each minus (Ramos, Desmond, Fister) there was a plus (Escobar, Robinson, Ross).  All in all the players healthy on the field gave the Nats an even performance. This wasn't a snakebit team who had nothing go right. It was a team unlucky with injuries that was otherwise pretty even.

Spring Training Stat review!

Michael Taylor is hitting with power! ... which we all kind of knew he could. It's nice to see it. It could translate into a bit more pop this year. However it's not his power that was ever an issue. It was the average and getting on base. So while this is nice to see it doesn't mean you should be excited about Taylor this year. We have to see if he can keep the average up and maybe work a few walks when the games count. Remember average in Spring means nothing.

Danny got a couple hits. Good enough for me to just say start him. He could still be awful but I'm only holding the worst Springs against anyone.

Given their presumed importance. I'd like to see Kelley and Papelbon not stink, but it's still too early to think there's an issue. Everyone else who truly stunk is unimportant and/or already gone.

Monday Quickie - Zim sighting

Zimmerman DH'd over the weekend. So good! He's playing DH today, too. Double good! If it goes well today he should play first this week. Triple good! It's kind of funny he started playing again right after a "the Nats will play me when I'm ready" interview. That kind of hints that this is a real day-by-day type of thing, but as long as we're on the right side of that for now - what more can you ask?

Soo.... what do we talk about then?

As we discussed, there is no CF battle. The bullpen, at least as of right now, isn't being set into a 7-8-9 rhythym (unless you think Nick Lee could end up the 8th inning guy). Arroyo vs Roark? Well Roark should win and is winning that.  Hmmm. I suppose right now we'll focus on when Danny Espinosa will get a hit (0-14 with 7 strikeouts). 

But this is good! Spring training talk that we care about is injury talk and with Zimm getting back into the lineup we don't have any of that. I'm all for a nice quiet Spring.

Let's check on the rest of the NL East

Mets : deGrom has a stiff back, probably nothing. Asdrubal has a knee injury, not nothing. Nimmo, their top prospect has a minor injury.  Wheeler still isn't back. Wright has been out - should start playing this week.

All-in-all not terrible but the Cabrera injury threatens to throw the first monkey wrench in their title defense. The important thing though is no SP injuries yet. That's this team.

Marlins : Capps, an important reliever, is out for year with TJ. AJ Ramos, another important relief arm, hasn't pitched yet due to a calf injury. Stanton is taking it slow in Spring (only a few ABs so far). Cosart gave them a scare but appears ok.

I'd be worried. We all know how a bad bullpen can help to derail a season. It's not like we think the Marlins are very good across the board that they can handle the failure of one part of their team.

Phillies : Aaron Altherr, OF propsect who might have started this year, is out for basically the season with a wrist injury. Jerad Eickhoff, P prospect, who likely would have started in the rotation, fractured his thumb, may or may not be ready by Opening Day. Cody Asche, who would have played OF too, has an oblique injury and it's up in the air when he comes back.  David Hernandez, important pen arm, hasn't pitched in two weeks. Other minor injuries abound to the half-prospects and retreads.

They were looking up, or at least looking to be better than Atlanta. Lose 2 of 3 OF starters though and you can book a return flight to Garbage City.

Braves : Freeman went out with wrist discomfort but apparently is fine. Andrew McKirahan, possible relief arm, is out for year with TJ. Tyler Flowers, who will back-up for the Braves at catcher, has had some minor issues.

Biggest issue related to injury for the Braves is actually other team's injuries. They are still ready to trade everything and Peralta going down for the Cardinals means Aybar might be gone.  Even if things break for this team they'll use that as a way to help rebuild, not challenge in 2016.


Short recap. The Nats are sitting pretty. The Mets haven't gotten off track yet but any thoughts they might be better in 2016 are on hold with Cabrera's injury and Wright/Wheeler getting back. The Marlins are on the cusp of a bullpen emergency already, questioning their threat to the top two teams.  Phillies are crashing and burning before the season starts. Braves are having no issues, but are committed to rebuild and it would take a miracle for them to compete.

No changes. Nats vs Mets for NL East and as of March 14th, things are a brighter injury wise for the Nats.

Friday Quickie - Did Bryce say something

I've been working and travelling so I missed this. Bryce wants to have fun while playing baseball and maybe make the game more demonstrative? Ok. That's fine.

I would be lying if I were to say that was my cup of tea. It isn't. I watch sport for the sport of it, not the ornamentations. But a little bit of demonstrativeness by a player, a bat flip, a stare, a fist pump, that doesn't take anything away for me. I haven't stopped watching other sports because of that, I certainly wouldn't stop watching the sport I love the most if it had more. If there were full out dance routines that take several minutes that may make me lose interest, but a short celebration when warranted? Not going to bother me.

You may feel differently. That's fine, too. It's entertainment. How well something entertains us is an ongoing decision process. Maybe the entertainment changes and we decide it's not for us. Maybe the entertainment doesn't change but we do and reach the same conclusion. That's how it works. The only way to be wrong here is assuming that what you think is the "correct" answer for how the entertainment should be and how everyone should react to it. It's the correct answer for you, nothing more.*

As for Spring Training - let's look at the stats and see if any heavily caveated things are going on:

• Scott Sizemore is the only guy down there hitting homers so far (and 2 doubles).  I suppose at 31 he could blossom into... Danny Espinosa with average fielding? Someone that won't hurt but won't help? As he is at very best a bench player for the Nats really nothing to see here. Maybe another team will want to take a flier on him though.
• Espinosa is hitless in 11 at bats with 5 Ks. He could easily be terrible this year as he was terrible just a year before so keep an eye on this. He doesn't have to hit much (he hit .125 last Spring), he just has to do not absolutely nothing.
• Revere is clearly A-Team and Taylor B-Team. A quick lineup look tells you that. This will be the last mention unless something new happens. Who's A-Team 1B with Zimm out? Was Moore, more recently Clint. Too early to say anything has stuck.
• I suppose pitching wise you could look at Cole or Solis, maybe? Honestly we're still in the 2-3 appearances max time frame so one bad outing can make you look terrible. Come back in a week (if they are still around). 
• Zimmerman still hasn't played. Look - if you want to see a guy ease into Spring you only have to look at Werth. He's only played 4 games and only has taken 8 at bats. He's played DH some. He's clearly slowly getting back into the swing. Zimmerman? He's not slowly adjusting to playing baseball after the break. He's OUT.

*Well I mean I can see situations where the entertainment or the reaction to it could be damaging to society on a larger level but that's a more complicated discussion and doesn't apply very often.

Monday Update - Where's Zimm?

We're only a few days into the Spring season and things are moving along. It's too early to even think about looking at stats, even for the most broadest of reasons (which is about all you can do in Spring), although I suppose if you were really hoping for a Taylor Jordan resurgence back into a rotation battle you may be in trouble.

No, there aren't many stories right now for the Nats, which is good, because for a team with significant injury risk, no news is often the best news. Which brings us to Zimm.  The Nats have played 5 games so far. Exactly zero of the starters have played in more than two*, so Werth having played only one isn't anything to bat an eye at yet.  Two players haven't played in any games. Ramos is explained away by his LASIK surgery, but where is Zimm?

Well he's supposedly healthy and not playing as a way to avoid aggravating his plantar fasciitis. I don't know if I buy that. The issue I have is the idea that he hopes to start playing in games in the next couple of weeks. I can see giving Ryan more time between games but I can't see him not playing at all. He's had all winter to rest and be healthy. Now is the time to test it out. If you really believe playing on it say... once or twice a week in early March is going to aggravate the foot, then that gives me little hope of him playing every day when the season starts in, oh yeah, 4 weeks. I think its more likely that he is having issues with it now. Or if not that, perhaps it's the oblique strain, which you may or may not remember ended his season in early September last year.

Anyway you look at it, as far as early news goes about Zimmerman, this is not encouraging. But he's only one! Nats can handle one. It's four at the same time that gave them trouble last year.

 *Speaking on this point. Ben Revere has played in two games and had 4 ABs, like Rendon, Murphy, Bryce, and likely starter Espinosa. Michael Taylor has played in 4 games with twice as many of at bats, like Heisey, Reed Johnson, Keiboom, Moore, Brendan Ryan, Skole, and likely AAA shortstop Turner.  CF Battle?  There is no CF battle.

The Nightmare Scenario - can the Nats reach .500?

Ok so even though I do this every year I guess I should clarify some points. I don't factor in injuries beyond what I think is a reasonable playing time estimate. "Healthy" doesn't mean "100% completely healthy, playing 154-160 games" but "the most reasonable expectation of health given age/recent history". Still given that, it generally that means a full season of playing time, outside a few players (Zimm, Werth). I am a little more conservative with pitchers so I won't go 200+ innings for Strasburg, rather 170ish.

This isn't really scientific, more about general feeling. How good can the Nats reasonably expect to be if nothing really surprises in a negative way, and vice versa? Then how can we get to the nightmare or dream scenario from there.  So on Wednesday I kind of felt it out and the Nats can be say in the 94 win range without having any major positive surprises (or negative ones).  Not quite where I'd like them to be for an easy division title. Let's flip things around now.

We generally stick to the assumptions made with injury returns and replacements, assuming they were fair and not positive. Looking at it I can only see one place that might have been a bit positive which was Roark replacing Zimmermann. Like I said Zimmermann's year wasn't all that great but Roark was a little disappointing last year. I could see a fair assessment matching ZNN but also coming in under it. So knock a half-win away. 92 wins.

Then we get to the "plays a little better/worse" expectations. I think we can probably pull that half-win away from Rendon that we gave him here (remember we are being on the negative side of fair) keeps him around league average at 3B. 91.5 wins. We can also go ahead and pull a half-win from Ramos/Lobaton who I liked to stay same, since they are trending down. 91 wins. I don't feel fair taking from Strasburg since it was mostly a inning increase thing, or taking more from Espy (right now at least). Oh I could take from Gio too, who surprising not only arrested his fall but got a little better. 90.5 wins.

Now we get to some bigger disappointments that would still not surprise me. I took 1.5 wins from Bryce and 1 win from Max before. This still made them MVP worthy and in the Cy Young discussion. But you could probably fairly pull another win from Bryce and a half-win from Max. They were that good last year that they can fall alot and still be good. Bryce would still be in the MVP debate (just probably wouldn't win it). Max would still be a likely All-Star. That's not bad! It's good! And it's another 1.5 wins lost. 89 wins.

Anyplace else to cut fairly? I could probably assume that the bench isn't much better. I gave them a win and a half, instead let's give them just a half. 88 wins. And the bullpen could get no better. 87 wins. Oh I forgot about Trea. Yesterday in the comments I kind of bumped the positives up a win for him. Let's say a half-win up instead. 87.5 wins  Any other place that would be a fair take before we get into other things? Werth was so bad last year and he's 37 so you can probably justify him barely being worth playing this year even without injury. Not a negative mind you, and not where I'd bet, but a tiny positive and in the realm of possibility. Take away a win 86.5 wins.  We all know Espy can be terrible, We saw it in 2013 and 2014. Let's knock off a win there. That's still better than most #5s I bet. 85.5 wins. I still think we could knock another half-win at least from Roark. Hell, I'm trying to get down here let's make it a win. 84.5 wins. I guess maybe Ross regresses a little and Gio gets back to falling? Another win... 83.5 wins.  Hmmm... maybe Revere/Murphy could get a half-win worse combined? They've been pretty consistent so it's not fair to knock them too much.

I think I've hit my floor at 83 wins. Nothing surprises here but basically everything is on the wrong side of fair. Werth doesn't come back. Rendon is merely ok. Espy was kind a fluke. Roark is just rotation worthy. Max and Bryce come back to Earth. Gio, Ross, Ramos, all slide a little. The bench, the pen, Stras, Zimm, Murphy, Revere, don't get any better. There isn't any single event here that jumps out as unlikely, but the combination of all of it going in that direction is.

Can I get to .500 from here without injury? Sure. Roark completely flames out and they never get a good 5th starter. That alone would do it from here. Or Bryce could "struggle" and merely be All-Star good. Or Werth could be flat-out done. Or Trea Turner could give the Nats nothing. There are ways.

So the Nats range of possibility is pretty large in my opinion, from like 83/84 to 93/94 wins. That doesn't mean I think they'll win 88-89 wins, just that this is the "no surprises, no injuries" range for the team. It's pretty variable to begin with. Toss in the youth involved (Ross, Turner, Taylor, Rendon maybe, Bryce - though really how much better could he be?), the injury returnees (Rendon, Zimm, Werth), the age issues (Werth), the potential career years (Scherzer, Bryce), and the intangibles and the inherent variability of the pen and bench, plus the usual crashes and soars of a baseball season and you have a team whose fortunes fly all over the place. Could it all come together and the Nats have a team like 2012 or 2014? I can see that. Can the Nats have a couple key injuries and have a team that finishes below .500.... That's a little tougher given the competition in the NL East, but if say the Marlins surprise, ok sure.

Where do I put the Nats? Well no official prediction until Spring Training is over (it'd be stupid to do that - guys can get hurt). I think I like the Nats for about 91 wins or so. But like the previous paragraph said that's a very weak bet. I have as little confidence in knowing how this season will play out as I've had in years.

Your annual Spring Training stats reminder

They doesn't matter.

Not really anyway. For example :

Best hitter on the Nats last Spring? Matt Skole.  Also very good in the Spring. Tony Gwynn Jr, Wilson Ramos.

Best pitchers on the Nats last Spring? Matt Grace, Blake Treinen.

Yes, I cherry picked a little - you could toss in Clint Robinson, Bryce and Max in there. But that's doesn't kill the point. How well you do in a limited time frame against a large variation of competition produces results that are pretty much random. That's even before you factor in the "working on something" aspect of Spring Training.

Oh the stats guys will try to pull together something or other from it because that's what they are being paid to do but try not to pay too much attention.  At best these are "maybe something is there" or "confirming what I already thought" types of stats. For the former you need more data, more REAL data. For the latter you already have the data, this is just the final shovel of dirt on the coffin.

...
Ok fine. What are these things? Well for me I look at three things

(1) If someone hits for substantially more power than they usually do. That's falls into the "maybe something is there" category.

(2) If someone does terrible and you thought they might be terrible. That falls into the "confirming" category. But here when I say "terrible" I mean "terrible".  ERAs over 6.00.  BAs under .100. That sort of thing.

(3) I'll also allow a "I don't really have a preference between these two players so I'll let Spring Training decide".  Something has to right? The Nats shouldn't be in this position. They have decent reasons to make their decisions. But if you are choosing between say Jedd Gyorko and Johnny  Giavotella for your starting 2B, first I'm sorry, and 2nd, sure, what the hell. Use ST stats to make the decision.

Anyway friendly reminder out of the way. When Solano or Difo hits .380 for the Spring I hope you remember this when I call your cries of "Start him!" stupid.

The dream scenario - an easy division title

I said before that the Nats season could break anywhere from .500 to 95 wins (or something like that) without injuries. Today we test the latter assumption. Can a healthy Nats team win 95 games and likely cruise to the NL East crown (you figure a good chunk of the 95 will come from the Mets)?

Let's set the base first and for that I like to use Baseball Prospectus' 3rd Order win totals. You can read up on it, but basically it answers the question "How well would my team do if it played in an absolute vacuum?" The Nats, who finished with 83 wins, sit with 89 wins in this scenario. Sound odd? Well the Pythag record agrees but still it doesn't feel like the Nats were an 89 win team in disguise last year.

Turns out the Nats were helped by a good number of skewed results. The Nationals won 8 games by 9 runs or more and they never lost such a game. Pythag and 3rd order submit that runs scored are just kind of randomly distributed. In other words the Nats happened to score a lot in the same game that they happened to give up a few. Possible sure. But 8-0 seems more than just luck. It feels like something internal to the team like how we went over how Blake Treinen was a different pitcher when there was less pressure on him. I'm going to let my gut change things a little and knock the Nats back down to 88 wins. It's my exercise and that's closer to the team I felt I saw last year.

OK, so now let's roll up our sleeves and do it. First let's make everyone healthy and let them play kind of as expected. Rendon is healthy, plays full season but he's young enough to say we can't be sure about him repeating 2014. We'll put in two more wins. Zimmerman healthy (which let's be honest means 120 games) a win and a half more. Werth healthy (maybe 140) two more wins. Might be underselling Werth a little but he is 37. Eventually you don't bounce back. That's 5.5 more wins for 93.5 wins. Almost there. Wow that was easy! But of course they play and they take away time from others. Robinson plays less (93 wins), Yuney is gone (91 wins). Ok 91 wins.

Now what about replacements? I'm going to make Murphy replace Ian, and Revere replace Taylor (for now) that's about two more wins combined. Back to 93 wins. But Span is gone and he was very good when he played. 91.5 wins.  Ross pitches a full year.  92.5 wins. But Roark replaces Zimmermann. 91.5 wins - ZNN's 2015 wasn't particularly good. Bullpen gets better, but the pen actually wasn't terrible in raw stats, just when it counted, and pens aren't actually all that impactful...another win? 92.5 wins. Maybe the bench is a win better? I'm not sure we can say that for sure. We'll come back.

Now we get into the "plays a little better"/"plays a little worse" type of stuff. Let's go around the field. Ramos/Lobaton? We haven't talked about them. I generally think they'll play the same terrible way. I kind of like Espy to falter a bit. 92 wins. But I think Rendon can make that up. 92.5 wins.  Zimm/Werth I'll keep same for now. Bryce... Here's the thing. Bryce was SO good last year than he can be Paul Goldschmidt great in 2016 and be about 2 wins worse. I'll give his youth the benefit of the doubt and say his regression from historic to merely great only costs the Nats a win and a half. 91 wins. Rotationally, Scherzer too is up for some regression. Again we'll only go from Cy Young candidate to Cy Young possibility and cost the Nats a win 90 wins. But I like Strasburg to step up and cover that. 91 wins.

OK this feels a little low. 91 win team for next year with relative health and expected performances. What's the easiest way to get from here to 95? Let's take that win from the bench now. Taylor plays a little better, Robinson keeps on keeping on, Drew has a decent year. The big thing though is simply replacing those absolute zeros of Moore and Uggla. so we could probably go a win and a half actually, 92.5 wins.  Hmmm. Hmmm. There are places sure but where do I see the most potential improvement? Did I give Ross a win more?  I can give him another half win. That's not crazy at all. Probably in line with a good number of projections. 93 wins. If the pen gets much better we're putting it at near best in the majors. Don't want to go there. I could probably throw another half win at Murphy assuming he plays close to a full season. 93.5 wins.

This is tougher than I thought.  We'll give Werth another half. When he's healthy he's been good and we're assuming health. 94 wins.   Now I think I need to find someone to surprise and frankly that's Rendon. It wouldn't even be much of a surprise. He's 25-26 and two years ago was fringy MVP. Right now we have him as fringy All-Star. Let's make him a sure thing. 1 more win and there you go 95 wins.

OK so I was a little wrong. This Nats team, at least in my eyes, doesn't easily range to 95 wins. So it would be tough for this team, without some surprisingly great play, to end up WS favorites. (I looked it up - that's what I said - not 95 wins). But something just below this? 93 wins or so? That won't be too hard for this team to reach if it stays healthy and has no crazy drops in performance.

There's some leeway here. Some places where the Nats could really take off that wouldn't be crazy. Ramos closes in on average. Zimm plays closer to a full season. Werth defies age again. Ross has no regression and gets even a little better. Roark is closer to 2014 than we think. That in itself is like a 99 win team and that's still with Bryce and Max not repeating what they did.  Of course at this point this becomes an "everything goes right, no one gets worse or injured" scenario, so you'd expect super high win totals. I think what I'm saying is that there is some coverage here for injuries and bad performances. Split the difference and to me it looks like a 92-93 win team.

But let's look at the nightmare in a couple days before I conclude anything.I think it'll be pretty hard to get to .500 but I wonder where I'll end up hitting the floor.

Monday Quickie - Quick thoughts

Totally forgot to do the "nightmare" and "dream" stuff last week so that'll be this week. Random thoughts as we are mere hours away from watching baseball for about 2 innings and then waiting until Opening Day.

Ian signed. I still think he could have gotten a multi-year deal if he waited until after the draft but I can also understand not wanting to wait for that. If you are desperate to prove your worth, you want to play Day 1, even if it's at a different position in a different league. That is where Desmond is. Was Desmond stupid not to take the extension? In hindsight definitely. Now his future lies heavily in how he does in 2016. But the failure was based in him having arguably the worst year in four years at 29 in a walk year. Even a simple average offensive performance would have kept him paid. It's a bet most would take.Was he stupid not to take the qualifying offer... well I think this is more of an agent thing. A few guys read the market and took those QOs understanding the depth of the market and the shift toward (overoverover)valuing draft picks. You have to think though they were heavily influenced by the guys they hire to read the market. Anyway - it's over now. We can get on with the Spring.

Everyone loves Dusty don't they? Man the guy plays the media like a virtuoso and dammit if he doesn't win over a lot of fans too. But I state again: a winning manager doesn't get fired three times for no reason. He likes to find enemies from anywhere outside the clubhouse, and while that can be unifying, it can also make his continued presence untenable as it is often upper management or ownership that he's clashing with. (but don't think you're safe - he's made the fans the bad guys too). I see a lot of potential for a Bobby V in Boston type crash here. Not that it's likely, but all the same elements are basically in play. Despite that, I feel like the coverage and attention Dusty gets has been pretty much completely positive. At worst it's "This is a question for Dust..... NAH! LOVE THIS GUY!" Am I crazy here? Aren't there important potential negatives? Let's just hope things go well and the Nats win a bunch of games and it doesn't even matter.

I'm not sure how Revere/Taylor will play out, but I'm getting fairly certain Arroyo and not Roark will get that 5th rotation spot. Which means after a great 2014 they'd have relegated Tanner to long relief two straight years. I'm all for depth but Tanner was a hot commodity after 2014. If you didn't internally think he was good enough to be a rotation regular for the Nats, he should have been dealt then and there. Depth can be found or developed. Tradeable players at the top of their value you can afford to lose are rare beasts.

A quick thought on re-signing Ian

With the recent Dexter Fowler return to Chicago, the idea of Ian Desmond returning has gotten more interest. I don't think the Nats will re-sign Ian. I think they probably have a budget that doesn't allow it. I think they have a plan in place for the rise of Trea Turner that they like. I think they are petty when guys decline their low, but within market value, deals. I think that they have some trepidation on whether the production that Ian would have would outpace Espinosa/Drew (I don't share this). I also think Ian probably has a multi-year deal waiting for him after the draft.

In short I'd be very surprised if he's came back.

Now would I re-sign Ian? Assuming it was a one-year deal and not expensive? Probably for the reason I noted. I think there is a good chance that he outperforms Espy/Drew. But it's not a slam dunk for me either and I don't even have all those other reasons to think about.

For me the question is about leadership. Not that Ian wasn't a good clubhouse leader, just that he was one at all. From the outside - this should have been Zimm's team, but he doesn't want it or have that in him. Other Nats who have been here a while ZNN, Stras, Ramos, Gio, Espy, they either didn't want it or play at a level that makes it hard for them to claim it. Werth seemingly wants it but has spent his time here flippantly breaking laws, undermining managers, and telling everyone how great he is, all while injuries force him into bi-polar episodes of play. Ian almost was a leader by default. Someone gets the mantle placed on him. But Ian didn't seem a forceful personality and didn't carry the team on the field. It was Ian's team but in the broad sense. It was a collection of good players who played well and, you know, maybe things work out for them in the end.

But now there is someone on the team who is a forceful personality and can carry the team. There is someone who seems to step up his game when it's important (and seeming to do this is the most important part - it's about perception). This should be Bryce Harper's team. He should lead the Nats in the clubhouse. The Nats should live and die with him.

By bringing Ian back you set the old ways back in place. Quiet, heads down, get it done and move forward. That's not a terrible thing, but when it hasn't quite produced results and you have a reasonable alternative... why go back?

I don't know. I'm not a player in the clubhouse. I'm not even a media guy who is there everyday and can take the temperature of the team. But from the outside looking in I say put a C on the Bryce's chest and run with that.

In all the unfamiliar places

Just for the hell of it - round up of old Nats in new places

Storen the Blue Jay

ZNN the Tiger

Span the Giant

Stammen the Indian

and even though he's been gone a year Clip the D-back.

The Ian Desmond Situation

Barry Svrluga, author of 'The Grind' soon to be released in paperback - makes a great Easter gift!,  wrote a column yesterday about Ian Desmond and why he hasn't signed. It's a good piece so read it.

In the column we get the why but we don't get the nitty-gritty. It's easy enough to say "draft pick compensation" is the reason, because it is, but does that reason even make sense?

The equation - as far as performance on the field - is simple. What will Ian Desmond bring to the team and when versus what a draft pick will bring to a team and when? The projections aren't kind to Ian, given how terrible he was last year. Let's look at what is probably the low-end and give him a projection that has him giving a team ~6 WAR over the next 4 years. That's not very good. Clearly a draft pick would be better than that, right?

Nope. 

Even looking at high draft picks and that low a bar your chances of getting better production from a draft pick than from Ian is worse than a coin flip. For those at the bottom of the first round it's hardly better than a roll of the dice. Don't believe me?

Here are the drafts. Figure a few years to get to the majors so let's start in 2012 and go back five years.... 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012.

There's a lot more nothing in these things than even average MLB players. So there's a better than even chance the player you draft ends up giving you nothing and hey - even if they do give you something it's at least a good 3 years away. NOTHING on the field says a draft pick is better than signing Ian for anyone competing today or tomorrow really.

Well that's Ian's problem #1. A lot of teams, like half the National League really, are not competing for today or tomorrow, they are competing for some time down the road. They have no use for a player like Ian because they don't care about production for the next few years. But that's not all the teams - what is it about for the rest of them? Money.

Let's say you hate Ian and you project him to give you that 1.5 WAR a year for four years. Let's say you also have a draft pick 16-20 and you project on average for him to give you .5 WAR a year. That's worse. But Ian costs you 10 million dollars for each of those four years, and the draft pick costs you maybe 500K each. 40 million for 6 WAR vs 2 million for 2? It's not even close what is the better deal.

In theory the better deal can help you spend more money on better players down the road, but it's not about the hypothetical. It's about the reality. Draft picks are excellent bargains when they pan out. So much so that if what you care about is value than it is silly to give them up for a FA signing unless you can get a good deal, or perhaps you plan to sign multiple FAs (you lose another draft pick but 2nd round picks have garbage chances at being good helping spread that lost value among more deals)

Wait though - didn't the other QO decliners all get signed? Well yes. But...

• Three players (Gordon, Iwakuma, Kendrick) re-signed with original teams meaning no draft pick loss. 
• Three teams signed more than one (O's, Tigers, Cubs), spreading out the value loss among seven players. 
• Two teams (Tigers and Marlins) had protected first round picks that couldn't be lost and it cost them a 2nd round pick instead. 
• The Cubs pick was so low, 28th, to be more comparable to a 2nd round pick.

So only four signings really, not 15, were really of the "give up decent draft pick for a single player" variety. 

Normally it may be enough to only have a handful of teams (these four teams, D-Backs, Royals, Giants and the Nationals, and let's add the O's, Tigers, and Cubs) ready to spend money on FAs but this was a particularly deep class that highlighted the compensation issue that had been only touched on before.

It was supposed to work out because some teams were supposed to put winning ahead of value. But the system is suffering because too many teams in a given year make value the driving factor in their business model. That sounds like a good idea. Rebuild smartly, get good young players, compete and when ready sign a few good free agents. Except... aren't all those other teams not competing this year doing that? And it's not like the teams that aren't giving up on 2016 are going to fade away to nothing. This isn't any smarter strategy for winning than what was done before. It's a smarter strategy for not losing a lot of money when you don't win.

Where does this leave Ian? A player that can help you win today but costs a lot and worse yet loses you that potential value down the road? Waiting for the clock to run out on that value question hanging around his neck or hoping for a team that has already made a signing to just go ahead and pick him up. Come on O's... you know you want to.

Monday Quickie - Papelbon being Papelbon

He's still here. He's still Papelbon off the mound. Is he still Papelbon on the mound? Probably so, at least for 2016, and does anyone care beyond that?

Nothing else to speak of as it is pitchers and catchers time which by definition means nothing is happening but beat writers warming up the daily news machine and columnists waxing poetic. Enjoy it for what it is. Not baseball but the general excitement that real baseball is coming... in about 5 weeks.

The Nats should have a boring Spring because there are really only a couple outstanding questions to resolve and you can only ask the same questions so many times.

(1) How will CF shake out? Will it be a strict platoon? Will it be Revere heavy with MAT back up? Vice versa? Will one be the clear starter and the other labeled 4th? Revere isn't overall good enough and MAT is not a strong enough prospect anymore for this to be very consequential assuming everyone else is healthy, but how it shakes out will tell us a few things; how the Nats view Taylor, will Dusty over emphasize the veterans.

(2) What's the lead-up to Papelbon going to be? I assume Rivero-Kelley-Papelbon (from what I've heard) but it could be anything. Honestly this can change week 1 so I wouldn't be overly concerned about it. Papelbon is the closer and they'll try someone out before him in the 8th spot. If it works out great. If not another arm will take the first arm's place.

Ten days until the first taste of baseball.

2015 Nightmare in review

About now is when I start running through the dream and nightmare scenarios for the season. But before I do that for 2016, I'd like to look back at the one closest to what actually happened and see how it compared to reality. Thankfully the Nats haven't really split the difference in any season making it easy to figure which one to compare it to. So let's get to looking at the Nightmare that was 2015.

First off my opening paragraph was dead on and super sad in retrospect.

It would mean that in the 4 year window where the Nats were arguably the best team in baseball, they would have made the playoffs twice and never made it past the first round. There's no good way to spin that as a positive. This nightmare scenario (is) ... real tough on Matt Williams who will have missed the playoffs with a better team than Davey missed with. How can he be kept around?

Answer? He couldn't be. 

I initially set the Nats "everyone healthy and plays to expectations" talent level at 102 wins. Yikes. I was right about some issues that I thought could lead to a big drop. Desmond's continued slide, Rendon, Strasburg, Fister, and Zimmermann being less productive, Werth and the pen being much less productive.

I was wrong however thinking Yuney might be a win less than LaRoche (the guy he was in practice replacing offensively). Escobar was actually better. I was wrong that Scherzer might be less productive. He was even better than he was in 2015. I was wrong thinking Gio would go down. He was stable. I was also wrong thinking Span would have to be less productive. He was actually just a good as 2015. And I was wrong thinking the Nats couldn't lose that many games without Bryce plateauing talent-wise. Bryce exploded.

Looking at those last two paragraphs in a vacuum it would be hard to see how the Nats actually missed the playoffs. Some things went right, some things went wrong. Even if you say "more went wrong than right" you aren't looking at a 19 game drop from the above. Maybe a couple of wins. Well it turns out two other things crushed the Nats.

One was injury. This can't be helped. I don't predict injury in these scenarios beyond saying this guy might play a handful of fewer games than a full season. (I had Ramos and Zimm at 120 for example) This is the only way to do it because long-term injuries are hard to predict. So it was great say that 2015 Span was equally productive when he played to 2014 Span, but 2015 Span played 60 games and his replacement, MAT, wasn't good. Zimmerman at the plate wasn't too far off 2014, but he didn't put up anything close to a full season. I flat out said "missing the playoffs without injury is almost unreasonable". We have to state this, because some people still think it isn't the case, but the Nats missed the playoffs in large part thanks to injury.

But even that doesn't exactly explain everything (although it certainly explains a lot and ties into what I'm going to say next). The other thing that happened is that I underestimated the slides that the talent could take. Desmond slid further than I thought. Rendon went from All-Star to average. Werth was worse than that. I had Zimmerman holding his disappointing ground and he was less productive. I had Ramos hitting just as bad as in 2014 and he somehow managed to do even worse. ZNN was well off his 2015 season. Once guys like Espinosa were pressed into regular service, the bench was exposed. The Nats not only got hurt but got worse and that combination countered the few bright spots that would have normally kept them very close to a playoff spot, if not in.

What does it mean for this year? Obviously injuries matter but that could be said of any year. It more importantly means that the "healthy & hit expectations" baseline production for the Nats has dropped a ton. 102 wins to some number I'll guess right now at least 10 wins worse. All these guys still here : Ramos, Zimmerman, Werth, Rendon, literally half the offense, have big drops in what we can reasonably expect they will do. That'll make the dream scenario that much harder to get to, and the nightmare scenario that much closer. However, I still expect to be able to work my way to a very very good year for the Nats from their "healthy & hit expectation" base.

I haven't felt this unsure about a Nats team in years. I could go into a coma today, wake up in October and you could tell me the Nats won 98 games or 80 games and I probably wouldn't be surprised. No breakouts and no injuries are needed, I think, to reasonably get the Nats anywhere from hugely disappointment to WS favorite. At least that's what I think I'll see. We'll find out next week.

Tuesday Quickie - The real problem in 2016

The Nats are a good team that had an off-year. They rebuilt in some minor but important ways to make up for some important losses. They have a good division rival, in the Mets, but it isn't a team that stands head and shoulders above them. The Nats can certainly win a bunch of games and potentially win the division, which is about all you can ask for to start the season.

But there is a problem, or more accurately there are 5-7 problems amplifying the 7 other ones.

The Reds, Braves, Phillies, Rockies, and Brewers all stink. They are predicted to be among the worst 6 or so teams in the majors this year. The Padres and Marlins could stink. They aren't much better than that. There are a lot of wins to be had against these teams.

The Mets, Cardinals, Cubs, Pirates, Dodgers, Giants and potentially the resurgent/remade Diamondbacks are all solid teams. They are going to rack up said wins.

That means the race the the Wild Card is likely to be another race to the mid 90s or higher. Last year the 2nd Wild Card won 97 games. That's a lot of wins.

It's hard to say today which teams have the advantage. I guess you can say the Dodgers/Giants/Dbacks are at a disadvantage (3 good teams, only one surely bad one), but even that isn't a given. Nothing happens exactly like we assume. One of those teams I say "stinks" will likely have a surprise year and play around .500 ball. The Padres or Marlins could surprise and skirt the playoff picture. So the Braves surprise and the Marlins do well too, while the Padres crash and burn? Suddenly the Nats and Mets are the ones in trouble, not the NL West leaders.

From day one the Nats need to look at the season as a race to win as many games as possible. That sounds silly, but there is usually a "let's find our footing, we'll get them later" sense to games in April and May. There shouldn't be in a normal season, but it makes even less sense for 2016. Start at full throttle and ease up if you can later. Do not start slow expecting to catch up because, hey, 2015.

The worst thing about the Nats of 2016 is the same thing that can be said about the 2015 Nats (and 2014 Nats to be fair). They aren't built for 2016. They are built for 201x. They are a rolling 90-95% in on any season. They lack starting pitching depth (unless you think Giolito is coming up early) and are relying on question marks to fill gaps. They replaced a set of dominoes in the bullpen anchored by a potentially unreliable closer in big games with a better set of dominoes anchored by a potentially unreliable closer in the clubhouse. They improved the IF bench slightly but still lack a player on there that you are ok with playing everyday for a few months (I'm ok with trying Turner - not so much with Espinosa so that evens out). A better team than last year... let's say yes. A much better team? Given the injury circumstances of 2015? I can't say that.

Last year felt a lot more certain because the young teams hadn't arrived yet and we had no idea when they would. The Nats looked to have weak competition for the East. The non-division winners between St.Louis/Pittsburgh and Los Angeles/San Francisco had the inside tracks for the WC. To mix things up you could put another name there. The rebuilt Padres were the most popular, followed by the full of potential Marlins. But you only KNEW the Pirates and Giants should be pretty good. In this environment, the Nats approach could be said to make sense. Didn't work though.

In 2016? There should be no certainty. The Mets and Cubs have joined the rest of the good teams giving the Nats competition for the division crown and making the Wild Card picture more crowded. If the Diamondbacks are more Cubs than Padres, then there's no margin for error. The Nats approach is far riskier and makes less sense.

Obviously, even if it is riskier, all that matters is if it works out or not. The Nats are a deGrom and Syndergaard double injury from clear sailing. But I can't help thinking the stakes have been raised and the Nats haven't kept up with them, that the team isn't good enough for the fall back position of "get in and get lucky" and the season is going to boil down to "Beat the Mets or Bust".

Not a False Idol

I like to think there are two-levels of "worst-case" and "best-case". One is the literal interpretation of the phrase picking out the absolute worst thing that could happen. The other is the reasonable interpretation picking out the worst thing that has some potential of happening that is not close to zero.

For Giolito the "literal worst-case" in the baseball sense is something like he gets injured before this season and never pitches again. Ok, that has a potential that is probably not close to zero, but it's also something that hangs over the head of every athlete in every sport. It's kind of unnecessary to say it because we all know that this threat exists. We have to take injuries out of these worst-case potentialities, because they'd dominate them and make them boring. If we do that, I'd say "literal worst-case" become Giolito struggles in AA and AAA (and majors probably - guys with this talent you move up just to see) to the point where the Nats have to shift him to relief. Where he also fails. Again this is something that I'm putting out there saying that the chance of it happening is very close to zero. An ignorable thought-exercise, not a scouting report .

The "reasonable worst-case" is probably just slightly grimmer than the "fair" pessimist take I put out yesterday. He stumbles a bit in AA and AAA but gets to the majors in 2017 at some point. Spends several years as a mid-back rotation guy because of some combination of finding his level and being consistent. Good, helpful, but not something to build a team around. This sounds bad, but we're setting a worst-case scenario as "Nats have a cheap rotation pitcher for 4-5 years"

The "reasonable best-case" is really nice, in my opinion. It would put Giolito in the rotation at some point this season, doing well but not dominant (think Ross last year), and have him graduating to a full spot next year with a "only if someone better comes along" ROY worthy season.  After that the sky is the limit.

(The "literal best-case"? He wins a spot in the rotation in Spring and begins a HOF career with a dominant 2016. Also, the kid can hit!)

I fall closer to reasonable best-case than reasonable worst-case. I see him up this year (late unless injuries force the Nats' hand). Where in relief he shines, much like David Price in 2008. He pitches in the rotation next year and is good to very good and is definitely in the ROY discussion (though it's not an obvious thing). Then he progresses nicely forming into #1 type pitcher by 2019 at the latest. That would be where I am.

Why am I here? Well I feel the Nats have a pretty good rotation so they don't have a strong impetus to push Giolito. They also won't want him to bounce up and down between minors and majors. You also have to consider his service time clock, which they probably won't want to start early this year, kicking arbitration and free agency a year closer. So it would take at least one and possibly two long-term injuries (plus Giolito starting strong) to get him up before September.

Every pundit agrees his stuff is great, so I have a hard time seeing him really struggle for long in the majors. I also understand that even the best pitchers have a year or two of adjustment. Those guys I talked about yesterday? Kershaw's Year 1 was blah. Bumgarner's Year 1 was very good but was followed by two ones that were just ok. Felix's first year was great, but his second year was average at best. Greinke's Year 1 was good/very good but then he had mental health issues and needed a year and a half to get back to the majors. He didn't come into his own until his 6th year. So thinking Giolito will come in and dominate immediately, to me is going a step too far. However the Nats are cautious and worked Strasburg well so I think the time they've taken with Giolito will help with some of these issues adapting to the major leagues. So I give him a first year that may not be as good as it could be but I also don't give him any regression. We'll see.

That's what I think will happen. What would I do? Throw him in the deep end. It'll probably end up with a start like these guys; some great, some meh, for the first 2-3 years. But there's potential there for the quick adjustment. Kershaw's 2nd year was close to great and he hasn't looked back. I want to be sure he is providing Nats with elite level pitching as soon as possible. I want to maximize the BRYCE/Giolito ace time as much as possible and I think that's the way to do it. Of course, the Nats presumably know more than me about what Giolito needs.

Let's get this season started

God Killer

If you haven't been paying attention Lucas Giolito has been getting a lot of high marks as a prospect for a while now.  Baseball Prospectus currently has him at #3, as does ESPN's Keith Law and MLB.com. Sickels had him at #3 last year. He's thought to be a sure thing, a lock, as much a can't-miss as a pitching prospect can be. He's actually been called a rotational "demi-god". Even I, who tends to downplay, won't try to tell you that Giolito won't be an impact arm for the Nationals in the future.

However, commenter BJD1207 asked if I could temper the Giolito love. Can I bring a fan soaring on high expectations, down to Earth?

Of course I can! The easy way would be to go the "There's no such thing as a pitching prospect" route. These guys are notoriously fickle and big gambles. Or we could go with the "He could get injured at any moment!" However, that's a bit too easy. I wanted something a bit more substantial. So I dug around until I found some things I feel you can hang onto... you know, if you want to downplay expectations.

These aren't going to be great reasons. All these pundits aren't wrong. Giolito is a great prospect. But without further adieu :

THREE REASONS YOU SHOULDN'T BE SUPER SUPER EXCITED ABOUT LUCAS GIOLITO

Reason #1 : The fact he did great as a 19-year old in A ball doesn't mean much. 

Prospects get love because of skills, but they also get love because of production and Lucas Giolito was damn productive as a 19 year old in A ball in 2014. That's part of why he gets a lot of excitement behind him. He threw 100 innings of 1.00 WHIP ball basically showing no problems dominating guys around 2-3 years older. This would seemingly be a good indicator of future success but historically we actually don't see that.

I took a look at all 19 year olds (age is impt here - no 18 year olds or 20 year olds allowed) who had a WHIP of less than 1.100 in the Sally League (that's important too - sometimes these leagues are very different in results) over the past decade to see how these type of seasons predicted future success. Here is what I saw :

2013
Tyler Glasnow - doing well, likely to debut in 2016
2012 
Clayton Blackburn - doing well, though less dominant, likely to debut in 2016
Jose Fernandez - Immediately impressive in 2013, injured
2010 
Arodys Vizcaino - injury prone, finally put up a good major league season in 2015... in relief
2009 
Casey Kelly - injured, has not pitched a good season yet
2008 
Kelvin de la Cruz - hit wall in AA, never made it. 
2006 
Carlos Carrasco- hit wall in majors, injured, eventually had a good major league year in 2014. 
Wil Inman - struggled through AA and AAA, converted to relief, never made it
2005 
Troy Patton - hit wall in AAA, converted to reliever, had several decent major league seasons... in relief.
Gio Gonzalez - Hey! Gio! A bit of an struggle upon initial debut. Good to very good major league pitcher since 2010
Gaby Hernandez - Hit wall in AA, never made it.
Phil Hughes- struggled in majors for a long while, finally had a decent full year as starter in 2012 and a good one in 2014
Matt Harrison - struggled in majors for few years, had good years in 2011 and 2012 before losing it

At least over the last 10 years this hasn't been predictive. There are a number of reasons why: lucky A-ball years being exposed, injury, talent hitting its level in upper leagues, small sample size, but it's not nothing. I especially think that this tells us that the idea that Giolito will be very good in the majors in 2016 or 2017 might be reaching. Out of 12 (Glasnow excluded for this) the only one to have a very good year within 3 years of his A-ball performance was Jose Fernandez. All these other guys, nearly all Top 100 prospects took at least 5 years to do it, if they ever did.

"But Harper", you say, "Giolito is like Jose Fernandez!  He's not like these other guys! He's a stud!" Funny you should say that because comparison to other pitching studs is what the next reason is all about.

Reason #2 : The dominant pitchers of today were better in the minors than Lucas Giolito

Lucas Giolito is like Jose Fernandez you say? Well what the above should tell you is while they match up as 19 year olds Jose Fernandez was dominating in the majors at age 20 while Giolito was working on adapting to AA ball. This isn't an isolated case. If we look at the dominant pitchers of 2015 who were drafted out of high school we see notable differences from Giolito's minor league experience.

Zack Greinke - at 19 had no problems in AA, at 20 dominated in AAA and debuted.
Clayton Kershaw - at 20 really dominated AA and debuted.
Madison Bumgarner - at 19 dominated AA and debuted, at 20 had a Top 25 PCL year before sticking in majors for good 
Felix Hernandez -tore up minors, debuted and was great at 19

These are the guys you want to compare Lucas to and Giolito's minor league career is definitively behind these guys.  You'd probably even put his minor league climb right now behind those of Carlos Martinez and Yovani Gallardo who both had very good long stints in AA ball at age 20.  Who's then left of the non-college guys? Jose Quintana was still stuck in rookie ball at age 20. Chris Archer was good in A-ball and would basically have Giolito's age 20 season at age 21. Carlos Carrasco wat 20 was in AA adapting to the league.

If you look objectively at this Lucas Giolito probably fits more into the Martinez/Gallardo model than the Greinke/Kershaw/Bumgarner/King Felix model.

"But Harper", you say "the reason Giolito hasn't moved up fast is because he was injured to start. He could be dominating like those guys but the team is taking him slow!" You just know how to lead into my reasons don't you?

Reason #3 : The Nats themselves believe Giolito doesn't have that much major league time on that arm. 

The Nats have been quoted as saying they believe your "second elbow" the repaired one after Tommy John surgery has a lifespan of 8 good years. This is why it was relatively easy for them to say goodbye to Jordan Zimmerman and will likely do the same for Stephen Strasburg after this year. Thing is Lucas Giolito had one of those Tommy John surgeries too, a long time ago, like in Obama's first term. Assuming the Nats are correct, Lucas has already put 3 of those seasons on his arm without giving the Nats any major league value and it's possible that 2016 will mark a fourth.

It's more likely that Lucas will give the Nats something this year but not a full year, meaning that 2017 or "Year 5 of 8 on elbow #2" will be the first full season Giolito will give the Nats. If he's immediately great the Nats' themselves would expect four seasons from him. Throw in a struggle year, maybe an injury and the possibility of 2 years seems just as likely. While it could be a awesome two years, it's still just two years, and that's hardly something to get excited about as a Nats fan.


There you go. Did I make you come back down from that cloud? There's always a way to be pessimistic if you try. Take all these together and you could see a Giolito that doesn't make an impact until 2019, is only good not great, and is promptly injured by 2021. However, that's a bit of a stretch though.

A fairer pessimism is that Giolito, while a great prospect, is just under that level of the true aces in the majors. That means he may very well be very good to great in the majors but the road there may be a bit longer. He may struggle a bit in the upper minors or the majors first. It shouldn't be much, he's kind of behind them by one year now so maybe one more year. That wouldn't be too much of an issue except for Giolito is on a clock. A timer counting down from an unknown number. The longer he takes to get to the majors and get great in the majors, the less time the Nats have with this #1 type arm on their staff. If he takes a year longer than expected or the elbow goes a year earlier than expected then that's a big issue.

He's got the stuff. The question is how will the timing work out for the Nats.

The MASN excuse

 Svrluga's column

The Lerners aren't cheap.

Subjectively this is easily proven. During the lean years we worried for a while that they would run this team solely to maximize profit, but the past few years have shown those worries to be misguided. The Lerners have spent more as the team has turned into a contender. They even spent enough to close in on a Top 5 payroll in 2015. Their payroll will likely be lower in 2016 but fears that they would revert all the way back to a 130 million or so "topped out" base were also unfounded. It appears they will find a happy middle, spend around 145 million and be close to, if not in, the Top 10 payrolls.

The Lerners spend this much while not having a great TV deal in comparison with other teams, meaning that a higher percentage of their revenues are put toward the team on the field.

So the MASN deal is understandable. There is a relationship between revenue and payroll. The team is already likely on the high end of that in comparison with other teams. If payroll has to go higher, then the revenue must go up just to maintain that relationship. That is expected to happen, one way or another, in the next couple of years as the MASN deal is re-jiggered. Whether the Nats get what the MLB promised them (come on, you know that is how it went down) or what is decided by the industry standard method, it will be more money. Putting off contracts until this money is expected to come in is the only way to make this work.

The Lerners are cheap

Objectively though things are different. Most outside team valuations confirm that almost all major league teams turn a profit. Washington is one of those that seemingly do. That could be even underselling what teams make. It isn't clear how much of the ancillary income is included in here. The MLBAM cut? Nearby parking owned by owners that isn't technically part of the club? Increased sale prices for land the owners bought up nearby the tax-payer financed stadium? Plus revenue doesn't consider the greatest money maker in the long run - the increased value of the team when sold.

Sports are one place where telling someone what to do with their money is understandable, even expected. You know when you buy into the business that the people that care about the product aren't just the few employed but millions of others who all wish for the same thing. Success for their team, namely championships. You are supposed to be running a team to win a title, not to compete regularly, and certainly not to make money for yourself.

So the MASN deal is just the extension of an sports owner doing what an owner does. Trying to maintain a steady (and fairly large) profit stream from their professional sports team. The Lerners could spend more and make less but they are not interested in that in the long haul. They have reached the point they are comfortable with. Now it's about maintaining payroll, about not spending more in order to ensure that money is made on this venture, potential wins are a secondary concern.


I've been pretty consistent on where I stand. The industry is cheap. MLB specifically but sports in general. The owners make a ton, they spend less than that and for what amounts to a toy for them but a lifeblood for millions of others that seems wrong. You should always press the owners to spend more because they can and they aren't. Payrolls aren't hard and fast limits against making or losing money, but arbitrary limits against making a whatever amount they wish to make. If an owner doesn't want to spend nearly all his profits on the team, he shouldn't be an owner.

Of course that's not how most fans think. We go by the standard operating procedures that we've seen done for as long as we've followed sports. Think of how we give managers an out for using their #4 best relief pitcher in a crucial spot in the 6th. That's just how everyone does it. We can't blame Joe Manager! We give owners the same sort of out for not spending. Everyone tries to make a bunch on sports. We can't blame Joseph Owner III!

Except we can, and we should.  MASN isn't a reason. It's an excuse to keep up a facade. You can spend. You don't want to. Be honest at the very least. It's not like fans won't keep coming. We always do.

Monday Quickie - Top FAs

FAs? Can the Nats use any? Let's put money and draft picks aside for a second and look at the players left and the talent at hand. 

Ian Desmond 
How he'd help -  Fan Favorite, knows clubhouse. Could allow Danny Espinosa, who looked pretty bad toward the end of last season, to sit. Give Trea Turner as much time as he needed to get ready.
Why he wouldn't be wanted - Nats don't like guys who don't take their offers. Danny is just holding spot warm for Turner. Bad performance last year.

Dexter Fowler
How he'd help - Makes lineup better with RH OF power. Could platoon well with LH OF speed in Revere if you'd like. Adequate fielder. Takes walks. Can trade Taylor or Revere then.
Why he wouldn't be wanted - RH OF power is what Taylor brings, and he's a great fielder.  Line-up already RH heavy, that was part of the point of bringing in Revere.

Yovani Gallardo 
How'd he help -  established decent pitcher who has a reliable arm. Pushes Roark back into pen for depth. Covers injury concerns with Strasburg. When on heavy GB type who can really limit the long ball.
Why he wouldn't be wanted - Last year worst year by most fancy stats. K's are rapidly disappearing, more of a back of the rotation guy who may not make a big difference for this team.

Tyler Clippard
How he'd help - solid relief pitcher with rubber arm known to hold down 8th inning. Would allow Nats year to figure out which of Kelley, Rivero, et al were really in line for a move up.
Why he wouldn't be wanted -  Lots of innings on that arm and a slight slip in results in 2015. If they were fine getting rid of him before 2015 do they really want him back now?

David Freese 
How he'd help -  Good D, decent power, solid offensive player. Far, far better than Stephen Drew as bench player.
Why he wouldn't be wanted - Nats already have a 3B and he's not IF flexible. Not exactly reliable looking at health.

Austin Jackson
How he'd help -  Good D, not terrible at the plate.  If you don't believe in Taylor, Jackson gives you a 4th OF that can field sort of like he does with more offense.
Why he wouldn't be wanted - If you do believe in Taylor, Jackson doesn't give you anything. 

Mat Latos 
How he'd help - Similar to what Gallardo with more potential to be a mid to top rotation type. Prior to 2015, a very effective pitcher. Peripherals haven't change much execpt one.
Why he wouldn't be wanted - the one was "getting hit". Far more bust potential than Gallardo. Arm not reliably healthy. Thought to be a clubhouse problem for a team stuck with one already.

Marlon Byrd
How he'd help  - See Fowler's first two sentences.
Why he wouldn't be wanted - aren't Nats old enough already? Doesn't offer walks or defense. More of a DH type at this point.

Randoms
Jeff Baker - MD guy they had vague interest in prior to 2015 who crushed lefties... before last year. Maybe better than Tyler Moore but they already have Tyler Moore signed.
Matt Belisle - another arm for the pen. Decent last year and coming out of Colorado might have needed year to get back to form
Justin Morneau - veteran leader who can still swing a bat but can't play in the field at all.  Maybe better than Tyler Moore but they already have Tyler Moore signed.
Matt Thornton - didn't he just prove last year he could pitch here and pitch well? He is old but I'll take good before I'll take young.  
David Murphy - adequate middle of the road hitter who can't play field anymore. Maybe better than Tyler... hey! this sounds familiar.

Around the league

Nothing's really going on is it?So I'm going to ramble a bit

Fister signs with the Astros.

When the Fister had his great 2014 a lot of us were thinking that he was incredibly lucky. His strikeouts dwindled down to nothing and while his walks followed that down it still took a big drop in BABIP and increase in LOB% to get him to where he was. While a few optimists thought "Maybe Fister suddenly started learning how to get guys to hit it where he wanted to AND started bearing down with men on base!" most understood that as a 30 year old if he could control that, he would have done it already. Perhaps he wasn't a ~4.00 ERA pitcher as xFIP suggested (Taking out the fielding of his team) but he certainly wasn't a sub 2.50 ERA pitcher either.  So we braced for a mediocre bad year and prayed it would take place after his time with the Nats was done. No such luck.

Injuries probably played a part but the main problem still exists with Fister. He doesn't strike anyone out. Given that he can't work out of trouble by himself. Even if he induces a GB when he needs one he has to get lucky in a sense that it's weak enough and doesn't find a hole. In short Fister has to keep his BB% down, GB% up, and HR/FB rate down to have any sort of quality season. His BB% rate was the highest it had been since his rookie season of 2009, but it's low in general so that's good. His GB% is going down since peaking in 2013 and he's spent more of his career as an middle of the road creator of grounders, so that doesn't bode well. His HR/FB rate is also up and that has varied, so that's a question mark.

So is Fister a bounce back candidate? Not in my mind. He should be very average and with a FB speed that was down to 86.4, I think there is a good chance he could be terrible. Other stats (like how many times he was hit hard) are trending the wrong way, the expected way for a guy at his age. Those that think Fister can bounceback look at 2014, but 2014 was an aberration. Unless he gets lucky again the best Fister should be is a 4.00 ERA type guy. Now is that worth what the Astros paid? Probably. And I guess that's the important part. Assuming you don't REALLY care about winning, just about plugging a hole.

Dickerson was dealt for McGee

Those are two guys some Nats fans wanted. Now of course getting them would mean trading or moving around some guys already here but both would be good pieces to have and maybe are available still. For Dickerson, who I think is least likely to be available given his control and the fact the Rays have wanted an OF for some time (say hi to Souza for me!), the "he plays in Colorado" thing is mostly overblown. As many noted yesterday for the 80 games where a player gets a Rockies bonus, there are like 40 where they get a San Diego, LA, SF problem. So you can't look at road splits and go "Oh that's how he'll play". Really I think what you'll get is roughly the same player but scaled back for what that means in a normal environment. That means the power and average will take a hit but he'll still work out to be roughly the same OPS+ type player.  So instead of .305 and 25 homers, expect him to hit .290 and 20 homers in Tampa. But that's not a drop, really. Relative to the team he retains the value he did in Colorado. That's my guess anyway. 

That would have been nice to have but the Nats were in no position to trade a good reliever to get him and that's what Jake McGee is. Other than a 2013 that looks like an aberration Jake has been damn well dominant; ERAs around 2.00, good against both sides of the plate, not old, cheapish. He's the player now the Nats hope Kelley or Rivero becomes.  Unfortunately the Nats didn't have a young OF to tra... wait. Yes they did. That is a question - would you have given Taylor up for McGee. The Nats do need Taylor. I've said this before but I don't see him being traded because right now he's the only + outfielder on the roster and he's cheap and in control for a long while still (until after 2020). But this is more about belief. As nice a 4th OF he may be, if he's never more than that than an impact reliever for two years could be worth more. I lean toward, no though. I wouldn't deal Taylor for McGee. It's not really about Taylor, who I'm pretty suspect about. Two injuries for McGee last year to me means I can't count on him next year for sure and with only two years of control I think I'd have to feel that way to pull the trigger on a deal like this.


Nats prospects

Last year a lot was made of the Nats pipeline with 6 prospects in the Top 100. I tried to tell you though "6 in 100" wasn't really fair. More like "one of the best, one good one and a bunch of ones that have promise" Now that Ross - who surprised - and Taylor - who was a needed graduate but shows you really how most ~50th best prospects may pan out -  are officially out things are bleaker. Giolito is still the best. Turner though is not - should be a useful everyday player, could be better than that (I think he will be) and everyone else... is gone from the lists.Victor Robles, impressive but not even out of low A yet, has generally passed the Difo, Lopez, Cole crowd who all had various levels of disappointing 2015s.

This isn't so much a big deal for the Nats OD rosters in 2016/7. The Nats have things pretty well in place for that time frame. It's more for the in-season acquisition. If no one steps up to become that mid-100 level prospect then you have to offer bulk. If the Nats offer bulk though it'll pretty much empty out the organization. It's not a problem today, but it could be a problem tomorrow. Just keep an eye on these guys and let's hope a few guys really start to impress.

Toxic Amender

Are the Nats Toxic?

Briefly, no but the baseball off-season has drifted into the post-holiday funk where you dig for news when none is presented to you and the fact the Nats have been in on so many free agents and have landed only one, well that's something to talk about. But let's do it intelligently. Let's look at the facts and come to a conclusion, not start with a conclusion and try to work the facts around it.

Are the Nats toxic? The Nats lost out on O'Day, Zobrist, Heyward, Leake, Upton and Cespedes. Phillips chose not to waive his no trade to come here. Doesn't that say something? While admitting each decision made sense, is there something running through all of these situations that causes FAs to flinch?

O'Day - Nats deal was posted at 3/25. O'Day really wanted the 4th year and the O's caved and gave him 4/31 (4 mill deferred).

Zobrist - Nats deal was at 4/60, as was Giants. Went with Cubs 4/56 claiming love of the weird wuss.

Heyward - Nats deal was presumably around 200 million. Cardinals also had a deal and were thought to have offered the most money. Years were not disclosed for either though. Went with Cubs 8/184 with opt out.

Leake - Nats deal wasn't disclosed and their interest seemed decidedly minimal. Would sign with Cardinals 5/80 presumed to be the best deal offered.

Upton - Nats interest was again tempered, only really coming out after Tigers deal disclosed. Nats apparently offered a shorter term deal for less money than the 6/132.75 Upton would get from the Tigers.

Cespedes - Nats offered 5/100 with an opt out after 2 but the money, if reports are to be believed, was to be paid out over 15 years, making the true value of the deal closer to 75-80 million. Signed with Mets for 3/75 and an opt out after 1.

Phillips - Wanted an extension to leave Cincinnati. Already being paid 27 million for next 2 years. Even reporters thought this was an unacceptable stipulation.

For the most part O'Day, Leake, Upton, and Cespedes, we see what we expect to see. The player takes the most money/best deal and runs with it. There isn't much more that needs to be read into this. If we look at pretty much every other FA signing this year, we see the same thing. This is standard and not telling of anything in particular.

The Phillips deal is also pretty clear. What he wanted was nonsense that no one backed and the deal fell apart. It wasn't about the Nats it was again about money, money he felt he left on the table to stay in Cincy that he now wanted back if he was to be traded. The Nats weren't going to pay for Cincy's deal and Cincy wasn't going to offer that money and lose the deal they got. Again read nothing into it.

So we're left with Heyward and Zobrist, the two guys who did take less. (Even if Heyward took more value per year it's still odd to leave 16 mill on the table so I think it's still relevant to look at him). Is the "toxicity" of the Nats the most logical reason for the rebuttal here? Easily you can see it's not. Heyward left even more on the table to snub the Cardinals and Zobrist left probably the same amount to snub the Giants. You can't extend the toxic argument to the Nats and not these clubs. Yet these are two beloved organizations reporters would chop off their own fingers first before even hinting that they may be toxic.

If it's not the enviroment what could it be? Zobrist claimed Maddon love. Heyward claimed the best chance at long term success. Both are probably partly true. However looking at two signings that did happen might be more telling. The Nats did land Max Scherzer last year but deferred half his contract until after it was over. The Nats did land Daniel Murphy but had to defer about 1/7th of the money over the course of 3 extra years. Given those were the last two big deals the Nats made and given the contract offered to Cespedes included even more deferred money, it's fair to believe the Zobrist and Heyward deals included large amounts of deferred money as well. This makes the "turned down more money" point that looking at these players hinged on moot. They likely went for contracts that offered more real value.

This is the thread that runs through all the Nats deals. They offered contracts that were less than these players got from other teams. The Nats looked at a loaded and slow-moving market and tried to snag some players at fair cost. This usually fails. Toxic has nothing to do with it.

I can't help but also comment on this column. Not to be rude but does this guy even know Span was terribly injured most of 2015? Zimm/Murphy/Werth is bleak? I mean, I can totally see the issues with it but even I, soulless automaton, knows there's a good chance one of the three guys will be good. (Plus I'd be more excited by any of these 3 than Revere.)  And the offense was fine last year and lost a bad hitter in 2015, so... it'll be bad now?

The Nats went into the off-season with minor goals and major questions. The minor goals were to get rid of Storen, shore up the bench, and shore up the pen. They completed all three. The major questions were what would become of Papelbon, would they replace Desmond or wait for Turner, and would they get one more big bat. They did replace Desmond...after trading Escobar made it necessary. Effectively they are waiting for Turner. They are keeping Papelbon probably not by choice, but under the understanding that he is good and hard to replace. So what they really didn't address was getting one more big bat. A disappointment sure, but "nothing going right"? Hardly. (granted that's the copy editor and not him - the column is far less hot takey than the headline in it's final point).

I've said this before but this is what happens when national writers pop in to write about teams. It's hard to get a full picture when you are just stopping by and poking around. There's some value to what amounts to an outside opinion, but you should use what you know to inform what is being said. In this case the views in this column are just too negative. The Nats off-season is a little disappointing from their view. They thought they could make a FA splash without spending the big FA bucks. They were wrong. But they were pretty much able to accomplish every hard and fast goal they needed to. Now if it's more than a little disappointing to the fans, that's up to the fans. 

Monday Quickie - Lesspedes

Nats didn't get Cespedes. He signed a deal with the new hotness - an opt out. For Yoenis it was after a year. You might think the money would have swayed him - the Nats had to have been offering more for 5 than the Mets gave for 3, but as some noted, given the back-loaded and deferred money the Nats put in there the "real" value of the contracts were probably very close. Add in the opt-out and the Mets deal just might top it. (Plus I do think he wanted to stay in NY - he had a very good experience there)

What does this do? It makes the Nats worse than they could have been, yes, but not all that much worse. Cespedes, unless he's year long a player like he was to end 2015, is not a difference maker by himself. He's a great piece. Revere is an ok one. The Nats should be fine.

Really though it makes the Mets better and probably keeps them ahead of the Nats in terms of favorites for the East. Losing Cespedes would have hurt. Losing Cespedes to the Nats would have put them behind the eight ball. They avoided that scenario. It doesn't mean anything for sure but it's preferable to the alternative that was staring them in the face. 

Are the Nats not a desirable location? I think they are fine. Outside of the draw of Madden it's still about money and the Nats are offering fair deals, not great ones. That's smart business but more often than not someone will offer a deal that's great for the player and bad for the team so the Nats lose out. You think they would have learned from Werth and Scherzer, both of who they overpaid, but I guess not. 

Still time for stuff to happen. 

Quick enough for you? 

Snow day Cespedes thoughts

Quick bursts of thoughts on Cespedes

My biggest concern would be the league getting used to him. I feel like that might explain why he did great in 2012 and 2015 with the Mets but only good in between. The AL figured out how to pitch to him. If that's the case then sometime next year the NL will too and the Nats will be left with a decent hitting OF (with a power focus), on a team full of decent hitters. That's not a bad thing, but Clint Robinson is a decent hitting OF. You aren't paying Cespedes 20 million a year or so just because he has an arm.

Of course Bryce plays CF in this case, right? I mean Cespedes is proven to have his issue. You aren't sitting Werth (not for Revere to play CF) so Bryce, more of an unknown gets it. I'm not as high on Bryce in center as some are but it's better than the other options.

Does someone get traded? MAT is the obvious choice because (1) he's the worst so Nats won't play him, and (2) he's the "prospect" so other teams will want him but I'm not sure I see that. Revere is only on a one-year deal, Werth is a perennial injury risk, and MATs defense is something the Nats need. If I were Rizzo I would want MAT around if only because he'll be a cheap 4th OF for a while. Werth of course is untradeable. 40 million for a DH who may or may not play and if he does play may or may not hit? No thank you. Revere? That's probably the best bet.

Biggest thing that's being undersold with Murphy and Revere (and maybe Cespedes)? Health. They should play which means you can more rely on their projections than Werth/Zimm/Rendon. This was important in losing Desmond - a very reliable guy playing time wise.

How does he effect the clubhouse? Well I'll guess he's probably not great in the clubhouse - he has  been traded 3 times in 2 seasons and has surprisingly low FA interest. But it's the same in almost any situation. If the Nats win, which is more likely with him, they'll be fine with him (and fans will like him) if they don't win, that's when we see problems.

I don't mind 5 years covering the 30-34 seasons. That should be ok. The cost? Well we don't know 100 million would be too rich for me objectively. Subjectively of course - spend all your money.

We are mostly missing the second part of this as Donald noted - as a defensive move this matters too. Next year the competition for the NL East crown should be only the Mets, with an outside chance of the Marlins. If it's Nats or Mets then where Cespedes ends up counts double so to speak. Of course that should really only be figured as a set + for the team getting him in 2016 to be reviewed after every season.

Are you a Cesped-ophile?

Wait.  That phrasing may be problematic. Oh well.

The Nats are kicking all the tires on Yoenis Cespedes. He has been seeking a big-time deal in the range of what Justin Upton got (6 / 132, opt out after 2). The Nats didn't offer that. In fact, we have no idea what the Nats offered. If they really want him the deal has to be at least 3 years which is what the White Sox offered him. Other than that we have no idea. 3 / 75?  4 / 90? Guess away.

Does he fit? Not exactly. It would leave the Nats a bit defensively challenged and he's exactly the opposite of the contact driven team it seemed like the Nats were putting together.

But he can hit and honestly if Revere was manning centerfield and not MAT then the defense was going to take a hit anyway. It gives the Nats another power bat when it all it's righty bats (Zimm, Werth, Rendon) are in a state of flux. And this would have to free up someone - either Revere or MAT - for a deal.

I'll take it for 2016. It's the time to go all in.

What would you give up for Lucroy?

John Lucroy wants to win. The Nats want to win, too.  They've talked about liking Lucroy. A perfect fit... if it was 2015 again.

We mentioned just yesterday again the Nats' less than ideal catcher situation. You can blame injuries or you can blame talent but Ramos has never developed as they thought he might. He has had continuous trouble staying on the field and last year, in his first healthy season in years, he was awful. He hangs on to average usefulness through his defense. He may be ok this year, if the Nats are lucky. Then he hits free agency meaning the Nats would have to pay for a catcher to replace him.*  Going into the offseason with an outright NEED is not the Nats way.

Lucroy should solve the production problem. Even in an off-year caused by concussion he was close to average. It's reasonable to expect some bounceback to an average season which would be a huge improvement over the last 2 years of Ramos/Lobaton. And it shouldn't be at the expense of defense. Lucroy's D has been good across the board for years and was above average again last year. So what's the problem?

The problem is which Lucroy do the Brewers think they are trading and which Lucroy do the other teams think they are trading for. From 2012-2014 Lucroy was an all-star level catcher. He could field and he could hit and combining that with his relatively young age (28 at the end of 2014), health (played full 2013 and 2014) and contract situation (2 more controlled years) made him arguably the second most valuable catcher in baseball going into 2015 behind Buster Posey. That Lucroy was worth your best prospect. Maybe not Giolito, but a Ross+ or a Turner+ definitely. (at least to those of us that don't overvalue prospects). That Lucroy was never on the table.  

2015 Lucroy got injured and put up a much worse offensive season than he had in the past. He was barely average with more than half the league providing more offense than him. He also saw some major defensive declines biting into his other value. He seems like he could be a one year rental if he wants to test FA and he could be a coin flip on playing a full season.This Lucroy is worth a decent prospect but nothing more. Something sitting at the bottom of the Top 100, something like pre-2015 AJ Cole straight up.

The Brewers want to deal the 2012-2014 under the assumption the 2015 Lucroy was an anomaly. The teams want to give up talent equal to what the 2015 Lucroy is worth, acting like 2012-2014 is mostly ancient history. Can they meet in the middle?

The easy thing would be for the Nats to offer something in the middle, like a Cole+ deal. But the Nats have a particular problem with trades like this, because of an issue that has dogged them for years now. They have no "2nd tier" to their minor league. Rizzo bets big on his picks, often going for guys who should be great if they are healthy. Occasionally he hits and the Nats have a big time prospect on their hands (Rendon, Giolito) occasionally he misses and the Nats have nothing (Purke). Overall this works pretty good but it leaves the Nats devoid of those "next best" minor leaguers, the ones made for deals like this. You might have been tricked into thinking they did last year but that was only because Rizzo dealt for them, bringing in Ross and Turner. The rest of those touted propects were probably overrated as evidenced by the fact they are going to fall off the list. Cole's timed out not making that next step in 2 years. Difo hasn't put up a good AA year. Lopez was bad. Unfortunately no one is joining them. Any previous Fedde ranking was all hope and he didn't justify it last year. Victor Robles has potential but hasn't played a game outside of low A. Andrew Stevenson, the Nats highest pick last draft, is just a guy in A ball right now.

So there is no "Cole+" available to the Nats. They could step it up, but a Turner or a Ross straight up now seems like an overpay for a potential one-year rental who didn't perform last year**. They'd love to step it down but a Difo plus a couple whatevers seems like an underpay for a potential all-star at a bargain price.

The middle point then is in a group of these other guys Difo and Cole and Lopez or At least two and something not terrible. But that guts the farm. It's a tough call.

This would all be easier if Lucroy had just had another very good year or if he wasn't that good to begin with. We'd all have a good idea on what the price should be. Then it's just a do they want to do it. With the price fluctuating it becomes harder.  I'm saying it should be around Difo/Cole/+ but the Brewers may not agree, or the Nats may not agree. That's even before getting into the "should" part.

What do I think? I think you do offer Difo/Cole/+ and you do try to sign Lucroy to an extension because we're at the end of something here. There may be a new beginning, there may not be but I don't see Difo/Cole as keystones to any new beginning and we know there is a chance in 2016. Take it.

*Lobaton is no better and is older. Nats catching prospects are not good or close. 

**Yes, I said Lucroy was worth these guys PLUS other stuff going into 2015. Things change. Lucroy was unexpectedly injured/bad. Ross went well past expectations skyrocketing his value and Turner kept on his, raising his value as he got closer to majors. It happens. Works the other way too. You might have said Lucroy was worth Cole, Difo, Lopez going into last year.  Let's say Lucroy had a 2015 like 2014. Even with one less year of control it'd be hard to say he was worth the same as those guys this year given they've all disappointed in one way or another.