I’ve been doing this blog for nearly three years now, but I think this is my first season preview article. My general approach to this blog is to try to do stuff that other Nats blogs aren’t doing. We’ll see if that works for this post.
In thinking about the Nats’ prospects for 2014, I think about how similar this team is to the one that started the 2013 season 12 months ago—7 of the 8 regular position players, the top 3 starters, and the 4 pitchers who constitute the core of the bullpen are all the same. Only the bench looks significantly different. I remember I was projecting last year’s team for about 91 wins… how does this year’s team compare?
Since the team is so similar, mostly we’re comparing the prospects of individual players with the prospects of those same players a year ago. And the worrisome news is that in most cases, I’m seeing reductions in their projected performance. Ryan Zimmerman? He now looks like a liability as a third baseman. Adam LaRoche? His 2012 season is looking more like a fluke, and we’re wondering if he’ll ever be even an average first baseman again. Stephen Strasburg? While he didn’t have a bad season, I notice he’s no longer showing up in the conversation when people talk about the top ten pitchers in baseball. Gio Gonzalez? He also took a step backwards. Ross Detwiler? With health issues and inconsistency, he stepped all the way off the rotation. Drew Storen? Rafael Soriano? They each took a huge step backwards. Denard Span? While I think he suffered more from unrealistic expectations and was seen as the scapegoat by too many fans, I have to agree that this year’s expectations are lower. Danny Espinosa? More like several giant leaps backward, moving from regular to bench player.
Some other players project about the same this season as last. I’d put Bryce Harper in this category. Whereas last spring we were worried about a sophomore slump, this spring we’re worried about him staying healthy. But I see his chances for a breakout season as about the same that I thought they were 12 months ago. I also see Tyler Clippard and Craig Stammen as about the same as a year ago.
Finally, there are a handful of players who project a little higher. Two have moved up quite a bit: Ian Desmond and Jordan Zimmermann. Desmond actually didn’t hit as well last season as he did in 2012, but a year ago we still had a lot of questions whether he was a one-season fluke; now we believe he really is this good. Zimmermann quietly put together an excellent season. Jayson Werth also put together his best season since he left the Phillies, but I wouldn’t say his projection is much higher than what it was last spring. After all, he’s also another year older now, and his defense has continued to slip. Wilson Ramos also demonstrated that he’d come back from his injury, so his prospects are better than they were a year ago.
So looking at all of the returning players that are still here a year later, I have to say that the Nats’ prospects as a team look worse—the handful of players who’ve improved don’t offset the large number whose projections simply aren’t as bright. But there is another partial offset – the new players that have joined the team, in comparison to the players who’ve left.
In general, I think the new players help offset the losses among the existing core. Doug Fister certainly seems like he should be an improvement on Dan Haren (knock on wood). Anthony Rendon has been a pleasant surprise, as have Tanner Roark and Taylor Jordan. Nate McLouth and Kevin Frandsen seem like upgrades compared to last season’s bench.
So on the whole, I’m willing to project this year’s team as close to, but not quite as good as last season’s team. Last season, I projected them at 91 wins, so this season I’m going to project them at 89 wins. (That’s also close to where the statistics sites are projecting them—FanGraphs has them projected at 89 wins, and Baseball Prospectus has them at 87.6 wins.) If the Braves had stayed healthy, I’d have seen the Nats as neck-and-neck with Atlanta, but with the injuries to Medlen and Beachy, I now think the Nats have the clear edge.
Dave Nichols of the Washington DC Chapter of the Internet Baseball Writers Association sent around a pre-season survey, which I completed. For the full results, see the DC-IBWAA website. Here are my responses:
Since my last post with my thoughts on the Nats’ lineup, I ran across a site, Baseball Musings, that has a lineup optimizer. If you type in your assumptions for each player’s on-base and slugging percentages, it tells you how man runs per game to expect from the lineup you’ve entered, and also spits out the best lineups (roughly 25 of them) and the worst lineups.
Using the same assumptions as in my last post (the projections from FanGraphs with a 9.8% platoon factor for the left-handers and a 6.1% platoon factor for the right-handers; for pitchers, I used the Nationals’ pitcher batting statistics from last season), here are the “optimum” lineups. Actually, the website gives two sets of lineups, based on two different periods on which their model was estimated. This first set of lineups is based on data from 1989-2002:
vs. RHP (4.627 R/G)
1. Jayson Werth
2. Bryce Harper
3. Anthony Rendon
4. Ryan Zimmerman
5. Adam LaRoche
6. Wilson Ramos
7. Ian Desmond
8. Pitcher
9. Denard Span
vs. LHP (4.665 R/G)
1. Werth
2. Zimmerman
3. Rendon
4. Harper
5. Ramos
6. LaRoche
7. Desmond
8. Pitcher
9. Span
In contrast, the optimizer said that the lineups I proposed in my last post were worth only 4.418 R/G vs RHP and 4.464 R/G vs. LHP. Now the analysis says that the lineup that Matt Williams seems inclined to go with (1. Span, 2. Rendon, 3. Werth, 4. Zimmerman, 5. Harper, 6. Desmond, 7. LaRoche, 8. Ramos, 9. Pitcher) does even worse, 4.413 R/G vs. RHP and 4.396 R/G vs. LHP.
However, when we run the same assumptions through their other sample period, 1959–2004, we get quite different results:
vs. RHP (4.525 R/G)
1. Werth
2. Harper
3. Ramos
4. Zimmerman
5. LaRoche
6. Rendon
7. Span
8. Desmond
9. Pitcher
vs. LHP (4.563 R/G)
1. Werth
2. Zimmerman
3. Ramos
4. Rendon !
5. Harper
6. LaRoche
7. Span
8. Desmond
9. Pitcher
Rendon as cleanup hitter certainly was a surprise! Also, the optimizer doesn’t ask for handedness, so it doesn’t know that it lined up the Nats’ three left-handed hitters in a row. Looking over some of the other high-ranked lineups, this alternative is estimated to result in only .004 fewer R/G and avoids having the lefties all in a row: 1. Werth, 2. Zimmerman, 3. Desmond, 4. Harper, 5. Ramos, 6. Span, 7. Rendon, 8. LaRoche, 9. Pitcher.
Against these alternatives, my suggestions from the last post are worse, but not by nearly as large a margin (4.491 R/G vs. RHP and 4.517 R/G vs. LHP). The “Matt Williams” lineup is also only a little worse (4.477 R/G vs. RHP and 4.494 R/G vs. LHP). So the results from the longer time span seem to support the idea that lineups don’t make that much difference, whereas from the shorter time span, it seems to make quite a lot of difference.
Do I believe the Baseball Musings model? Actually, I’ve got some problems with their methodology. They base their model on linear regression analysis based on a model with two explanatory variables, OBP and SLG. The most common problem with regression models is that when there are additional variables that affect the dependent variable (in this case, runs per game), and they are left out of the model, the estimated coefficients of the variables that are included are going to be biased. In this case, it’s easy to think what some of those excluded variables might be—base running, for example.
Another model, the Markov model, is less affected by this problem, and it’s the model that was used in The Book: Playing the Percentages in Baseball by Tango, Lichtman, and Dolphin. It looks like it would be feasible to develop a similar script that could generate optimal lineups based on the Markov approach, and frankly, I’d trust that model a lot more. But the main message that comes through from all of this is that Span really shouldn’t be leading off any more.
Ok … I admit it … I find spring training boring. Sure, there’s baseball being played (of a sort). But the decisions being made are about the fifth starter, the last spot in the bullpen, and the last spot on the bench. You wait all winter for spring training, and then you wait another six weeks for real baseball.
But sportswriters have to keep writing, so this is the time of year when we get the fluff pieces and personality profiles. But, as token analysis, we usually also get an article or two about construction of the Nats’ lineup.
This blog leans toward sabermetrics, and sabermetricians have written a lot about constructing lineups. Actually, the main thing they all agree on is that lineups don’t matter all that much. Poorly designed lineups usually cost, at most, maybe five or ten runs a season. Nevertheless, it’s still interesting to see what research says about lineups, and how far most actual lineups are from the ideal.
I’ll work with the rules from The Book: Playing the Percentages in Baseball by “Tom M Tango” (better known as tangotiger), Mitchel G Lichtman, and Andrew E Dolphin, though I’ve read a number of other articles that reach generally similar conclusions. Here are a couple of their rules:
Rule #1: Your three best hitters should bat somewhere in the #1, #2, and #4 slots. Your fourth- and fifth-best hitters should occupy the #3 and #5 slots. The #1 and #2 slots will have players with more walks than those in the #4 and #5 slots. From slot #6 through #9, put the players in descending order of quality.
Notice that they don’t want you to lead off with the slap hitter who steals a lot of bases. Where do you put the base stealer?
Rule #3: If you need to leverage a basestealer, put him in front of a batter who hits lots of singles and doesn’t strikeout much. The likelihood is that your basestealer will be batting fifth or sixth.
How would I apply these rules to the Nationals lineup? First, I want to focus on projected hitting ability rather than on past hitting ability. Decision making should always be forward looking rather than backwards. We’re interested in how players are likely to hit in 2014, not in how they’ve hit in past seasons. Fortunately, projections are widely available. I’ll use the ones from FanGraphs, which are based on an average of Steamer and Zips projections.
Second, because almost all players have significant platoon splits, I’ve constructed separate lineups for use against right-handed and left-handed pitchers. For the platoon splits, I’ve used common factors, rather than trying to estimate separate platoon factors for each hitter. The factors I used were 9.8% for left-handed hitters (that is, their wOBA, or weighted on-base average, is assumed to be 9.8% higher against right-handed pitchers than against left-handed pitchers), and 6.1% for right-handed hitters, with these numbers taken from a 2013 study by Bojan Koprivica.
I basically followed Rule #1, with one additional rule—I tried to avoid placing left-handed hitters adjacent to each other, to cut down the ability of the opposing team to leverage their left-handed relief pitchers. Here are my suggested lineups, with each player’s projected wOBA adjusted for handedness in parentheses:
Versus right-handed pitchers:
1. Jayson Werth (.349)
2. Adam LaRoche (.339)
3. Wilson Ramos (.326)
4. Bryce Harper (.384)
5. Ryan Zimmerman (.345)
6. Anthony Rendon (.325)
7. Ian Desmond (.321)
8. Denard Span (.319)
Versus left-handed pitchers:
1. Bryce Harper (.350)
2. Ryan Zimmerman (.366)
3. Wilson Ramos (.346)
4. Jayson Werth (.370)
5. Anthony Rendon (.345)
6. Adam LaRoche (.308)
7. Ian Desmond (.341)
8. Denard Span (.291)
These lineups, of course, are not at all similar to what I expect to actually see. First, I show Denard Span, who will almost certainly bat leadoff for the Nats, as the worst hitter in the lineup and better suited for batting 8th. Could this be correct? Absolutely – his wOBAs over the last four seasons have been .307, .308, .325, and .313. While that’s actually not bad for a good defensive center fielder, it’s clearly the worst of any of the Nats’ regulars. Look, back in 2008 and 2009, Span was a fine leadoff hitter. But that was then, and the team needs to evaluate him on what he can do now. Please, I’m not criticizing Span (in fact, last season I was ready to nominate him for the All-Star team), but we need to recognize that he’s valuable for his defense, not as a leadoff hitter.
Now, I admit that neither Werth nor Harper is a classic leadoff hitter. The problem, however, is that there just aren’t that many classic leadoff hitters around. I ran a search for all regulars last season (min. 350 PAs) who had at least a .355 OBP, a 10% walk rate, and an isolated power of less than .180 – thinking that those would be the characteristics of a classic leadoff hitter. Only 12 players fit those criteria, and only three of them actually hit leadoff—Shin-Soo Choo, Matt Carpenter, and Dexter Fowler. Among the others who fit those criteria were players that no team would actually use as a leadoff hitter—Joe Mauer, Billy Butler, Prince Fielder, Buster Posey, Aramis Ramirez, and Chris Ianetta. There were also a few players who weren’t being used as leadoff hitter, but would fit the role pretty well—Jason Kipnis, Dustin Pedroia, and Andre Ethier. But the fact is, most teams are not going to be able to find a classic leadoff hitter because those skills are exceedingly rare. Both Werth and Harper are pretty good at getting on base and at drawing walks, so I think it would make sense to use them as leadoff hitters.
The other thing that really stood out in this analysis is that LaRoche has reached the point where he really needs to be platooned. His .339 projected wOBA against right-handers is adequate, but the .308 projected against lefties is horrible. Whether it’s with Zimmerman or Tyler Moore, I hope that Matt Williams will see the need to institute a platoon.
Last season, 11 MLB teams won at least 91 games and made it to some type of playoff, wild card, or tie breaker game. Nine of those teams had a # 2 catcher with an OPS of at least .650; over all 11 teams, the average OPS of the # 2 catcher was .711 in 252 plate appearances. Although there are a lot of weak-hitting backup catchers in Major League Baseball, it is not characteristic of championship teams to have a hole in their lineup when the backup catcher plays.
Before this morning, it looked like the Nats were heading into the season with a gaping hole at their backup catcher slot. The backup catchers on their 40-man roster were Jhonatan Solano and Sandy Leon. Last year, Solano’s OPS was .523 in Triple A and Leon’s was .542 in Double A. Furthermore, their primary catcher, Wilson Ramos, has had several injuries and played only 103 games over the last two seasons. While the Nats had Chris Snyder and Koyie Hill available under minor league contracts, neither of them bring much of a bat either.
With today’s announcement of the trade of Nate Karns for Jose Lobaton and two additional prospects who haven’t been named yet, Mike Rizzo has taken a small step toward filling that hole. Although Lobaton had a .249/.320/.394 line last season, his career line of .228/.311/.343 is probably more indicative of his projected hitting ability. Furthermore, reports of a weak throwing arm and below average ability at framing pitches* leaves me wondering just how much of an upgrade he’ll be over Solano and Leon. Nevertheless, this was the one roster hole that most needed filling, and I’m glad to see Rizzo make this move.
* Update: I notice that there are reports that Rizzo said Lobaton’s ability to frame pitches was a “key” to the Lobaton deal, which would contradict my statement about “below average ability at framing pitches.” So I need to clarify. First, it’s a bit hard to find data on pitch framing, so I hadn’t actually checked his record before writing this; I was just remembering a comment by Harper a couple days ago on Nationals Baseball blog. According to StatCorner, it looks like Lobaton is about average at pitch framing, neither unusually good or bad. I misinterpreted Harper’s point, which was that Lobaton became expendible because he was not nearly as good at pitch framing as the Rays’ Jose Molina, who everyone agrees is one of the best at framing. So I was wrong, but it would also seem hard to defend Rizzo’s comment about pitch framing being a key to the deal.
There is a sense in which Rizzo may be right, that pitch framing mattered. It’s when you look at the bottom of the list, the worst pitch framers. This list includes not only Koyie Hill, whom the Nationals control under a minor league contract, but other free agent catchers that the Nats passed on, such as John Buck. So even though Lobaton’s average pitch framing is what made him expendible by the Rays, it may also have been the key that made him more attractive to Rizzo than Buck.
My last “links to remember” post was just before the start of the season, so I have a whole season’s worth of material to choose from. Here are some links to this season’s articles or videos that I’d like to remember.
- Links to the Washington Post’s article, “Bryce Harper: A swing of beauty,” have been ubiquitous, so I’m sure many of you are tired of it. Nevertheless, I think it deserves to be remembered as a demonstration of how a newspaper can use the Internet, video, and in-depth analysis to tell a different kind of story than had been possible with old-fashioned print media.
- Of course, the ink on that story was barely dry (as they used to say in the days of old-fashioned newspapers) when Harper crashed into that wall in Los Angeles. Tom Boswell wrote about how Harper could be risking his career if he didn’t learn to play the game right. Stefan Flatsis of Slate wrote about the dangerous reluctance of the baseball establish to acknowledge their problem with concussions.
- While we’re talking about Bryce Harper, I have to add this article by Jeff Sullivan of FanGraphs about how amazingly hard he hits the ball.
- Harper wasn’t the only interesting National this season. Grant Brisbee of Baseball Nation takes another look at Jayson Werth‘s contract and wonders what he would make if he were a free agent now. Maybe his contract isn’t such a joke after all. (Though, to be fair I should point out that in a more recent article, Brisbee included Werth in a list of the the seven worst contracts in baseball.)
- At the end of the Nationals’ disappointing season, David Schoenfield of ESPN’s SweetSpot blog wonders if the Nationals missed their window of opportunity.
Let’s go the video:
- This diving catch by Gio Gonzalez is fun to watch.
- Adam LaRoche made a great stop of a bad hop—not so fun to watch, but still pretty amazing.
- In July, Harper hit the first walk-off homer of his career, avoiding a sweep by the Pirates.
- The next night, Ryan Zimmerman hit another walk-off homer in the nightcap of a doubleheader against the Mets. That one was bit more memorable for me because I was at that game.
- Stephen Strasburg got his first career complete game, a 4-hit shutout, with some help from Zimmerman with this diving, game-ending play.
- The best play of the season? No doubt about this one—Denard Span‘s diving catch of Hunter Pence’s drive to save, and end a 6–5 win over the Giants.
- Reaching on an error is a link to remember? It is when the Braves have a one-run lead, Craig Kimbrel is on the mound, and Span’s grounder to shortstop drives in the tying run, as the winning run scores after Adrelton Simmons boots it. That game was an incredible roller coaster ride.
I’m getting this post finished and posted a couple of weeks later than I originally planned – life intervenes – but even though there’s been some action on the market in the last couple of weeks, the Nats’ position and needs really haven’t changed too much. So here’s some data on projections for Nats players and free agents. I conclude with some thoughts on the Nats’ strategy this off season.
I’m pulling two sources of information—a series of articles on Bleacher Report that rank players at each position, and the Steamer projections that are available on the FanGraphs website. I selected these because both are forward looking—projecting performance next season rather than looking backwards at past performance. I list the Nats players followed by prominent free agents at the position. After each player, I list his age in 2014, followed by his Bleacher Report ranking relative to all players at the position, and his Steamer projection (in units of wins above replacement). Following Bleacher Report, I grouped all the corner outfielders together.
C: Wilson Ramos (26, # 11, 2.8); Brian McCann (30, # 6, 3.2), Jarrod Saltalamacchia (29, # 18, 2.8). Ramos is one of the better catchers in baseball when he’s healthy, but can he stay healthy enough? His legs have sustained a lot of damage. Getting a solid backup catcher should be one of the Nats’ highest priorities this off-season.
1B: Adam LaRoche (34, # 12, 1.2); Mike Napoli (32, # 16, 2.6). After a disappointing season, LaRoche is barely projected as an average player, but this is a weak market for first baseman and there really aren’t many better options on the market this year. (Steamer is a lot more skeptical about LaRoche’s prospects than is Bleacher Report.)
2B: Anthony Rendon (24, # 16, 2.6)/Danny Espinosa (27, # 25, -0.2); Robinson Cano (31, # 1, 5.3), Omar Infante (32, # 10, 2.3), Mark Ellis (37, # 18, 1.4). As Adam Kilgore of the Washington Post wrote, one of the few ways that the Nats might upgrade their offense this off-season would be to sign Cano. If the team is willing to spend the money and commit to the years, it would clearly make the team better for the next few seasons. On the other hand, I think Mike Rizzo truly sees Rendon as his second baseman of the future.
3B: Ryan Zimmerman (29, # 12, 3.0); Juan Uribe (34, # 19, 2.9). Like LaRoche, Zimmerman’s performance has slipped in the last year (especially defensively), but all the alternatives available on the free agent market are clearly worse.
SS: Ian Desmond (28, # 3, 3.0); Stephen Drew (31, # 12, 1.9). Steamer is taking a short position on Desmond, but the Bleacher Report is a lot more optimistic.
Corner OF: Bleacher report lumps together LF and RF. Bryce Harper (21, # 2, 3.9)/Jayson Werth (35, # 10, 2.2); Carlos Beltran (37, # 18, 1.8). The Nats are pretty well set in the corner outfield positions and no moves are likely.
CF: Denard Span (30, # 16, 1.9); Jacoby Ellsbury (30, # 4, 3.8), Shin-Soo Choo (31, # 10, 2.9), Curtis Granderson (33, # 12, 2.2). I think that Bleacher Reports is overly optimistic about the abilities of Choo and Granderson to play center field; I see both more as corner outfielders. If the Nats wanted to spend a lot of money on a position upgrade, signing Ellsbury for center field would be the other place that they could do it, though with his injury history you’d probably need to keep Span around as a fourth outfielder. I don’t think it’s a move the Nats are likely to make, but it should be mentioned as a possibility.
SP: Stephen Strasburg (25, # 10, 4.2), Jordan Zimmermann (28, # 19, 2.5), Gio Gonzalez (28, # 30, 3.0), Ross Detwiler (28, # 148, N/A), Tanner Roark (N/A, 1.8); Masahiro Tanaka (25, N/A), Hiroki Kuroda (39, # 17, 3.5), Ervin Santana (31, # 32, 1.8), A.J. Burnett (37, # 41, 3.9), Matt Garza (30, # 43, 2,3), Bronson Arroyo (37, # 44, 0.9), Bartolo Colon (41, # 64, 2.9), Ricky Nolasco (31, # 66, 2.7), Tim Hudson (38, # 78, 1.5), Scott Feldman (31, # 89, 2.7), Scott Kazmir (30, # 109, 2.1), Roberto Hernandez (33, # 114, 3.0), Ubaldo Jiminez (30, # 128, 2.1), Jason Hammel (31, # 144, 2.5). While the Nats’ top three seem set, for a fourth starter it doesn’t seem like it would be too hard to improve on their in-house options of Detwiler, Roark, Taylor Jordan, and Ross Ohlendorf. Garza’s name is mentioned because he doesn’t cost a draft pick, but there really seem to be quite a few free agents available who could shore up the back end of the rotation.
RP: Bleacher Report only ranked the top 55, with Rafael Soriano (34, # 47, 0.3) and Tyler Clippard (29, # 27, 0.3) appearing on their list. Drew Storen and Craig Stammen are the other mainstays of the Nats’ bullpen, but the remainder seems to be in flux, with most of the focus on finding one or more lefties. In-house southpaw options include Ian Krol and Xavier Cedeno (with another possibility of converting a starting pitcher, such as Detwiler, Sammy Solis, or Robbie Ray, to a reliever). Lefty free agents who are still available include Boone Logan, JP Howell, Scott Downs, Oliver Perez, Eric O’Flaherty, and Matt Thornton.
Nats’ needs and strategy. For regular position players, the strategy is usually to identify your weakest position and try to make an improvement there. The Nats, however, have incumbents at each position who are mostly league average or better with no glaring weaknesses, so that suggests no moves for regulars. If the team did want to improve its regular lineup, the only obvious way to do it would be to chase the best available players regardless of the cost. This off-season, that means Cano or Ellsbury. I have to admit I still don’t have any clear idea of what budget the team thinks it’s operating under. If the Nats want to compete with the really big spenders (Yankees, Red Sox, Phillies, etc.—I won’t list the Dodgers, since they seem to have moved into a different universe), this strategy might work. On the other hand, my impression is that the owners may want to keep the payroll mid-level, maybe more comparable to teams like the Braves and Cardinals. If that’s the case, they’re not going to pursue Cano or Ellsbury. Other potential regular position player upgrades, such as Choo, don’t really make much sense because the improvement would be modest relative to the cost.
The more likely strategy, and the one I’d recommend if they aren’t busting the bank, is to sign a free agent fourth starter. I’d love to see them pursue Tanaka, but I expect he’s also out of their price range. Garza seems like the next best option, especially considering that he doesn’t cost a draft pick. But there are a number of other options listed above. I just hope that Rizzo doesn’t go bargain hunting again, as he did with Dan Haren last year, and take a chance on damaged goods. I’d look for someone who can still throw hard and get strikeouts.
The team’s next highest priority, in my opinion, is a backup catcher. You always need a # 2 catcher, and with someone with an injury history like Ramos has, it’s essential that they be able to take over if Ramos goes down.
After that, comes the bench. After the terrible cost of the Nationals’ substandard bench this last season, I’d be terribly disappointed if Rizzo thinks he can go forward another season with bench players like Tyler Moore. A good left-handed bat, preferably one who can play some defense too, is a high priority, as is a fourth outfielder.
Finally, there’s the bullpen, where again the big need is a left-hander. I rank this lowest, because I think there’s a chance that the Nats could put together something decent with existing resources. But the bullpen is clearly not one of the team’s strengths at this point, so investing in improving it would make sense.
You’ll see that I’m not saying much different than everyone else who has already given their recommendations. But in this case, the conventional wisdom seems to work—strengthen the back of the rotation, the bench, and the bullpen.
It’s been widely reported that Matt Williams will be the Nationals’ new manager. I don’t know that much about Williams, so I don’t have too much to say. I think it’s good news that he’s got a lot of history with Mike Rizzo and that they apparently get along very well. We saw with Jim Riggleman just how bad things can get when a GM doesn’t hire, or even get along well, with a manager.
Although I think it’s a negative that Williams doesn’t have any managerial experience, even in the minor leagues, that’s not a disqualifier—just something I think might be helpful.
Ultimately, though, even though I sometimes gripe about managerial decisions, the fact is that we don’t know that much about the impact of managers, and most of the in-game strategies we write about probably have very little impact on team performance. Games are basically won and loss because of the players, rather than the managers.
I tend to think that perhaps 80% of a manager’s impact comes in areas we can’t directly observe and measure. I’m not just talking about things like providing motivation and discipline. Some things that are seldom mentioned, like making sure that there are good communications flowing between players and management—for example, are players reporting when they’re hurt? (or when they suspect that their teammate may be hurt?)—can really affect the performance of a team (and have sometimes adversely affected the Nats. Yet communications is not something I see discussed often in books on baseball management.
I wish Williams well in his new job and will certainly have more to say as we get a chance to observe him.
Seventy years ago yesterday, October 5, 1943, the Washington Homestead Grays won the Negro World Series, the first of three World Series championships that they would win over a six-season span.
The Homestead Grays were the dominant team of the Negro National League (the eastern league), having won six of the last seven league championships. The team featured five future Hall of Famers—left fielder and leadoff hitter Cool Papa Bell, first baseman Buck Leonard hitting third, catcher Josh Gibson hitting cleanup, third baseman Jud Wilson, and pitcher Ray Brown. Rounding out their regular roster were Sam Bankhead at shortstop, Howard Easterling at second base, Jerry Benjamin in center field, Vic Harris in right field, and pitchers Johnny Wright and Roy Partlow. While the Grays were loaded with stars, it should be noted that most of the players on their 1943 roster were old. Wilson was 47 years old, Bell was 40, Harris was 38, Leonard and Brown were both 35, and Bankhead was 32. Only 31-year old Gibson and 26-year old Wright could be considered to have been in their prime. Of course, it was the middle of the World War II and many of the younger players had been drafted.
The Grays, originally from Pittsburgh, had begun playing about half their home games at Griffith Stadium in Washington in 1940. After an especially successful season in 1942, in which they lost the World Series to the Kansas City Monarchs, they adopted Washington as their primary home and played the 1943 season as the Washington Homestead Grays. The Negro National League played a split season format, but because the Grays won both halves of the season, no playoff series was needed.
Their opponents were the Birmingham Black Barons, champions of the western Negro American League. The Black Barons’ roster did not include Hall of Famers, but it was a talented team that would win consecutive pennants. Prominent players for the Black Barons included shortstop Piper Davis, second baseman Tommy Sampson, right fielder Clyde Spearman, and catcher Ted (Double Duty) Radcliffe. Birmingham won the league playoff series against the Chicago American Giants to win the pennant.
The first game was played in Washington at Griffith stadium on the evening of Tuesday, September 21. The Black Barons took the opener 4 to 2, with Al Saylor on the mound for Birmingham facing Wright. A second game was played on Thursday in Baltimore, but it was called after 12 innings with the score tied 5 to 5. The next evening, they played again in Griffith Stadium before 7,000 fans. It again went to extra innings, and the Grays were able to win 4 to 3 to tie the series at one game apiece.
The next three games were played in Chicago, Columbus Ohio, and Indianapolis—the Negro World Series usually included several games held in neutral sites. On Sunday afternoon, September 26, the Grays beat the Black Barons 9 to 0 at Comiskey Park. They scored runs in the second (on an Easterling double) and third (on a Leonard triple) before breaking it open with six runs in the 6th. Wright pitched a 5-hit shutout. On Tuesday night, September 28, the Black Barons defeated the Grays 11 to 10 in Columbus. The Grays pulled ahead 6 to 2, but the Barons tied it in the bottom of the fifth and scored 5 more in the 7th to take an 11-6 lead. Gibson hit a grand slam home run in the 8th to narrow the lead to one run, but the Barons held on to win and tie the series at two games each. The next evening in Indianapolis, the Grays regained the lead with an 8-0 victory in Indianapolis. Wright again pitched a shutout, allowing 8 hits.
The series continued on Sunday October 3 at Rickwood Park in Birmingham. This time it was a pitching duel, with both Birmingham’s John Markham and Washington’s Partlow pitching 10 scoreless innings before Partlow allowed a two-out triple to Birmingham’s Leonard Lindsay, followed by a single from Ed Steele for a 1 to 0 walk-off win. The series was tied at three games each. The finale was played on Tuesday October 5 at Rickwood Park. Wright was pitching for Washington, but he was knocked out in the sixth inning when the Black Barons took a 4-2 lead. Brown came on in relief. In the top of the 8th, Leonard walked and Gibson, Easterling, Harris, and Bankhead each singled, scoring four runs and giving the Grays a 6-4 lead. They added two more in the 9th and won the game 8-4, clinching their first World Series title. Additional titles would follow in 1944 and in 1948.
References
I relied on contemporary newspaper articles from the Baltimore Afro American, which are available from Google News Archives.
For general background on the Homestead Grays during their Washington years, see Brad Snyder,Beyond the Shadow of the Senators: The Untold Story of the Homestead Grays and the Integration of Baseball, Contemporary Books, 2003.
Nats Noodles 