Monday Quickie - the final run

The Nats are sadly done with the Marlins a team that they dominated this year (11-2) which helped them in their attempt to reach last year's lucky win total with a deserved version of it. Yes, without the Marlins the Nats look more mediocre (55-80) but you can't really do that. Or at least you can't do that and not pull out a team they did really bad against like the Padres (0-6) or Phillies (2-8) or Mets (2-8). The rest of the season is harder, but with 14 games left they should easily get to 70 wins. Beating last year would take going 5-9 also a better than even chance. This is the nice results you can have when you start the first quarter of the season .500. Everyone thank oddly fantastic Trevor Williams.

One thing you might have noticed is that the Nats have a sort of split.  They are one of a series of teams that can beat up the bad teams (WP% .571 or a 92-93 win pace) but get beat up by the good ones (WP% .380 or a 62 win pace) This puts them as a team that if made up like this again will struggle to get to .500 and of course then the playoffs. That's about as far as this analysis goes. They can get better by time. Young players getting better, etc. but why take that chance? Lerners - make the team better!

Everything about the Nats team this year strikes you as "this is what they are" they were a little unlucky in one-run games, but a little lucky in extras. They don't particularly favor RHP or LHP. They are better at home (35-39) than away (32-42). As the season winds down this is the narrative of 2024. Hot start meant they wouldn't be bad, kids came up and they have mostly been good. That was enough to keep them at the a decent pace after the hot start. Now it's about either:

1. setting up the team around these young players, or 
2. doing nothing and seeing what the young players do before committing money 

Nats fans have been patient and have accepted that this go around wasn't going to have the Werth-esque move of bringing in a high cost vet (or two!) in anticipation of getting better. But now you have a ~70 win team with a couple of players that people like to get better (Crews & Wood) a couple young arms introduced this year that also might improve (Parker & Herz) and various other young players that can also take steps forward - with various levels of probability that they do (Gore, Garcia, Abrams, Young, Ruiz, Tena). You could take the time to see if they don't need a lot of free agent help, but that could also put you in a spot next year where you are approaching 80 wins and .500 instead of 85 wins and fighting for a Wild Card. I know where most fans would rather be.

How are the kids doing #2 - Keibert Ruiz

Is "Yikes" an official baseball term? Because that's how I'd answer the question. After a solid rookie cup of coffee and a first year with some promise, the Nats committed long term to Keibert Ruiz as a catcher. In year one his defense seemed to fall off a cliff while his offense didn't really improve. Now he's not hitting, though his defense is not as egregiously bad. What's wrong? 

Well defensively, it's tough to say.  Defensive stats are hard to believe for a single year and require patience to get a real sense of a player's ability. You are constantly going on stats and eyeballs as best you can (see our discussion on Wood last post) but they are best served almost in retrospect, unless you are identifying outliers. Last year Ruiz looked like an outlier in the bad sense. This year he's passable and that agrees more with what we've seen other years. So last year was likely some sort of fluke but it does suggest that he's not a secretly great defensive catcher waiting to get out. He's a mediocre catcher as far as we can tell. Watching him I don't see any reason to disagree. 

Still catcher is a hard position to fill and if you can be average at the plate and averageish behind it, it's probably worth playing you rather than trying to find someone else. But Ruiz has not been average at the plate.

It appears also part of his approach has been trying to swing at more pitches, earlier in the count, and get them up in the air, preferably pulling the ball. In theory this should take advantage of his ability to make contact (still really good at that) but that has only lead to fewer walks, not more hits.  He's putting more balls in play and more in the air but doesn't hit the ball hard enough that that is a good thing. His HR/FB rate has always been low.

If Ruiz was a speedy OF or MI you could tell him to just scrap this and put the ball on the ground, but Ruiz is a slow catcher. Not slow for a catcher, but not speedy in general. That's not a long term solution for him. 

I don't know what is though. Ruiz's best ability is contact. If he wants to put the bat on the ball he will. But as baseball has emerged into the stats age it's become clear that that's not all that great a skill in terms of creating a production. You'd much rather have someone who misses the ball more but when they make contact it's loud contact. There's a balance of course but Ruiz is not there. 

There are two paths forward. First would be to keep trying this : Get it up in the air on both sides, and try to work on his bat speed and power so this matters. This doesn't seem to me to be a particularly promising path given you are working against his nature and he's starting to age into what should be his prime. The other would be to let him be the weak ground ball hitter he is from the right side and let things go as they will.  Neither path is promising but the latter path might let his contact skill get him to be an average bat overall. Maybe you GO for LDs and GBs from the right.  I don't know. The lack of bat speed and foot speed really doesn't leave a good solution. 

I'd say move on but the Nats aren't deep at C. Neither Adams or Millas seem much better and their previous hopeful Lomavita hasn't had a good year.  Maybe the drafted Bazzell will do something. He definitely has an eye.

I don't think there's a good future for Ruiz. He has a lot of PA under his belt and it shows what he is : A generally mediocre catcher and a bat that can make contact but with no pop. Still finding catchers who can even be average can be hard. If the Nats let him be him he can be an annoying hitter at the very bottom of a lineup. A guy you can't K who might turn on one from the left side. Accept the "no better than average" Ruiz for the next few years and get the most value out of him, rather than try to make him something he's not.

How are the kids doing #1 - James Wood

The most exciting prospect in baseball* Wood shot up everyone's charts in the last few years and when you are starting around 15 there isn't that far to go. #1 prospects have greatness expected from them. Is James Wood living up to that? 

My take would be yes. While occasionally there's a rookie that just comes in and steamrolls baseball, most need a little bit of a start first. Wood FEELS like he's having a slow start and yet I say that and he's got a line of .274 / .367 / .413 and is currently the best hitter on the Nats. If that's his starting point stardom is on the horizon. The only question is what kind of stardom.

At the plate the short description on Wood would be : He does strike out a lot (30%) but he walks alot too (12%) and when he makes contact it's so hard it's usually a hit. Assuming these numbers don't get worse, and you usually wouldn't think they would, he's a guy that will hit and walk and be an impressive producer. 

If there is any caveat it's that he is not hitting homers. His 162 game average would be like 14. This isn't so much about bad luck (HR/FB is a little low for his history but like 1 homer low) but that he is hitting a bunch of balls on the ground. His 57% GB rate is the highest he's had at any level. He's also not pulling the ball as much which could be another factor. It's tempting to blame the hitting staff, the Nats are known to focus on all fields as opposed to power, but historically Wood IS a GB hitter. That is his natural swing. Outside of a half-season on AA he's basically hit 45% GBs or higher. 

The Nats could try to change it but in my mind given his success I'd be real hesitant to try to that. To me, sure the upside is he becomes Aaron Judge but the downside is you throw him off his game and he gets worse.  Whereas if you just let him develop and if he doesn't naturally hit more homers he becomes what... Edgar Martinez? You going to complain about that? 

So right now all is lining up at the plate for a seriously fun season next year, with a line starting at .300 / .400 and the question being will it be 15 homers, 25, or 35?

What about off the plate? Hey, remember when I said Edgar Martinez a paragraph ago? The Nats didn't even bother trying him in CF, which some people said he could play, and stuck him over in LF.  Even there with Jacob Young doing some serious Gold Glove work in CF Wood looks... bad. I'll just say it. He doesn't look natural out there.  The last time we had an argument like this was about Soto. I said "no don't play him in the OF" you guys said he's fine and will get better. That didn't happen. It doesn't usually happen. You might get experience but you don't gain instinct. It's hard to get that first step. You get slower as you age. He is sure handed with a good arm so I'm not saying you have to shift him to DH tomorrow, but I think it will happen. 

This defense thing is a bit confusing because how universally praised he was but it goes to show you the major leagues is a different animal. Slightly faster pitches, swings, and hits, mean your instincts have to be at a certain level. You may not be able to see the separation in the minors that comes at the majors. That's true with every skill. He looked like a fringy CF who should excel in the corners. Now he looks like a fringy corner. Maybe time will prove me wrong but Wood probably has a body working against him every year.

The speed on the basepaths has also been underwhelming. His SB rate is not good and his baserunning stats are middle of the road. He does seem fast but it's not translating yet. If there can be AAAA hitters, I suppose there can be AAAA fielders and baserunners too, no?

So James Wood does not look like the Willie Mays / Mickey Mantle one man army savior of the franchise in this extended first year trial. Instead he looks merely to be in line to start a HoF career at the plate. Maybe that means he won't be first ballot. I hope that's ok.

Am I pumping him up too much at the plate? Maybe. Am I letting too much air out otherwise? Maybe. But this is what we've seen. And if you are going with "he's going to get even better at the plate, while improving his defense, and baserunning" understand that's a Pollyanna take. It could happen. He could also start striking out 45% of the time and drop back to AAA. But I don't think either is likely. Hoping that you guys take "Future HoFer" as a good thing rather than focus on "Not Willie Mays"

One win away

From not losing 100. 

First of the modest goals for 2024 specifically. I'd say 

• Don't lose 100 games
• Don't be worst team in league (not guaranteed yet but it would take quite the collapse) 
• Don't be worst team in NL East (also need collapse)
• Win 70 games (should also happen) 
• Win 72 games (that's more than last year. It is also their pace so it could go either way)
• Win 80 games (probably about as likely as being the worst team in league)