With the divisional race now out of reach and the wild card drifting farther and farther, writers are turning to the blame game. According to Tom Boswell of the Washington Post, the Nat’s problem is that they don’t execute fundamental baseball:
… another huge Nats problem, and the one that absolutely must be solved before anything really good can happen, is that they play the game badly at the fundamental level night after infuriating night. The Nats think, correctly, that they are talented. But bad baseball always beats talent. The Nats aren’t winning because the way they’ve played, they don’t merit it.
According to Rachel Levitan, writing at MASN’s Nationals Buzz, the team’s problem is lack of passion:
… this is exactly what’s bothering me about this Nats team. Where’s the fire? Where’s the passion?
In both cases, the writer sees the disappointing outcomes not as the result of bad luck, or lack of ability, or poor management, but as a MORAL failure—they don’t merit winning because they haven’t learned and executed the fundamentals or because they aren’t bringing the right attitude. That’s a very common theme in sports writing—sports is a morality play in which winning is the result of moral superiority and losing is the punishment for moral failings.
Fortunately, Harper at Nationals Baseball has demolished Boswell’s argument, showing that the Nats’ failures in the so-called fundamentals are really pretty small in magnitude and have little to do with putting together a winning team. I won’t spend time on Levitan’s argument about passion, except to say that if passion is indeed their problem, we will also see it in their statistics. Instead, I’d like to walk through how I like to look at this from an analytical perspective. A couple of weeks ago, I walked through some of the numbers. This time, I’d like to talk my way through the concepts.
Let’s start with why everyone pre-season was picking the Nationals to dominate the National League this year. I think most people started with the Nationals win-loss record last year—98 wins, the most in baseball—and then started making various additions and subtractions. Stephen Strasburg and Bryce Harper will be available all season. Most of the players are young and are likely to improve. Wilson Ramos will be back. They added Rafael Soriano to the bullpen. All were reasons to add some wins. On the other hand, Adam LaRoche had just had his best season at age 32 and probably wasn’t going to be that good. Several other players, such as Ross Detwiler, Danny Espinosa, and Ian Desmond, hadn’t had sustained success yet, and several might regress. You have to allow for injuries. All of these were reasons to subtract a few wins.
If you approach it that way, a lot of people were guessing that the Nats might win anywhere from 92 to more than 100 games. I’m going to suggest that that wasn’t the best way to approach the problem of projecting performance.
Analysts—especially those who forecast player performance—tend to think of players having an unobservable “true talent” level, which unfortunately is clouded by a lot of statistical noise. In some cases, true talent levels may be exposed relatively quickly. For example, abilities for walking or striking out may be relatively well measured in as few as a couple hundred plate appearances. But other abilities, and in particular, a player’s overall true talent level, may take several years to fully reveal itself. We get fooled all the time—Todd Frazier got some Rookie of the Year votes and sure looked like a great player—Oops! Wait a minute.
The problem is that even while we’re gradually learning about a player’s true talent, their talent is also changing. For a young player, it’s often learning or improvement in skills—Anthony Rendon is learning to turn the double play. But as time goes on, more often the changes in true talent are the effects of injuries or of aging. It can be tough to identify changes in true talent.
So returning to our question, “Why were we so wrong?” there are several possible explanations:
- Maybe the 2012 Nats played above their true talent level, leading to faulty expectations.
- As we’ve seen more data and learned more about the players this season, we may be learning that their true talent level isn’t as high as we thought a year ago.
- Maybe their true talent levels have declined due to injury, aging, or other reasons.
- Maybe the 2013 Nats are playing below their true talent level due to bad luck or a myriad of other possible reasons.
Fortunately, their are some numbers available that let us get a sense of how important each of these explanations are. In particular, I particularly find useful a couple of datasets at fangraphs.com. First, there’s their positional power rankings from the beginning of the season. This represents a systematic forecast of each team and player’s performance based on the information that was available pre-season. Although it’s not exactly the same thing as # 1 because of personnel changes between 2012 and 2013, it does give us a pretty good idea of what a systematic, unbiased projection system thought the Nationals true talent levels were at the beginning of this season. The other resources are their projected standings and team depth charts, which provide an updated version of those projections based on currently available information. In particular, the projected rest of season numbers provide an objective estimate of their current true talent levels.
So which of our four explanations is most important in explaining the disappointment. I think # 1 may actually be most important—we gave too much credit to the 2012 team relative to their true talent. The pre-season positional power rankings indicated that the Nationals were not a 98-win team, but instead were projected for approximately 88 wins. Furthermore, rather than walking away with the NL East, as most analysts were projecting, the fangraphs assessment showed the Nationals neck-and-neck with the Braves. I remember feeling a sense of shock when I first went through those rankings, but as I examined the projections more carefully, I decided that they were actually quite solid and that the Nationals had more holes in their lineup than I had realized.
In particular, that assessment indicated in advance two problem areas that most fans weren’t thinking of. The bullpen, despite the addition of Soriano, was only ranked as mediocore. And although the projections didn’t expose just how dreadful the bench would turn out to be, it did indicate that the bench was not a strength. Both projections were prescient.
On the issue of the bench, Bill James just posted this comment on his “Hey Bill” Q&A page:
One of the key differences between a contending team and a second-division team is that a team like the Red Sox has players coming off the bench, like Jonny Gomes and Mike Carp, who are clearly above replacement level, whereas the bench of a second-division team consists entirely of replacement-level players.
Although no one could have forecast how dreadful the Nats’ bench would be, there clearly were signals that the bench probably wouldn’t be as strong as in 2012. With Mike Rizzo spending some money to try to strengthen the team during the off-season, he really should have spent more time and money on the bench.
Going back to our four explanations for our miss on the Nats’ performance, I guess I would rank the second most important as being that the 2013 team has played below their true talent level. The fangraphs current projected rest-of-season winning percentage for the Nats is .524 (or 85 wins over a full season). I think that’s a rough estimate of their current true talent level, and you can see that it’s only deteriorated a bit from where it was at the beginning of the season. At present, the Nats are 6 games below a .524 winning percentage. This difference between actual performance and true talent could be due to luck, or to any of the other factors like fundamentals that sports writers love to emphasize. It’s certainly within the usual range for luck, though, so we can’t rule out the idea that they’ve simply had some bad luck.
The other two factors, changes in true talent and learning more about players’ true talent, receive the most attention but are probably the least important overall. I’ve already written about some of these issues—for example, in the case of Strasburg, his decline in strikeout rate and increase in walk rate, which are both statistics that stabilize at new levels relatively quickly, seems to be indicative of an actual decline in his talent level. As a Nats fan, I’m quite concerned by this apparent diminution in talent. Other players for whom injuries or aging appear to have resulted in talent declines include Ryan Zimmerman, Danny Espinosa, Drew Storen, and possibly Adam LaRoche.
For many of their other players, however, a comparison of their beginning-of-year and current projections indicate minor adjustments to the estimates of true talent, but maybe not any actual change in those levels. For example, although Gio Gonzalez has given up more home runs this season than last, his strikeout and walk rates have barely budged, and the projections have barely budged as well. The change in home run rates seems to mostly be a matter of luck. In the case of Desmond, even though his performance this season is slightly below last season’s his projected true talent has actually gone up, as the projection now recognizes that his 2012 season was not a fluke and was close to his true talent.
Over the coming weeks, I’ll be writing more about the Nats players as we try to establish the team’s needs for the off season. But I come away from this discussion with the following message. Last season’s team was not as good as it looked at the time, but neither is this season’s team nearly as bad as it may seem. The fangraphs rest-of-season projection actually has the Braves at .525, neck-and-neck with the Nationals. In other words, if we were able to get a reboot on the season, we should be perfectly matched, talent-wise, with our divisional competitor. While that doesn’t let us off the hook for doing something this off-season, it does suggest that the situation is not completely dire and we don’t have to think about a major re-build.
Last year, after Stephen Strasburg completed his 33rd career start on June 30, 2012, I wrote a post noting that he had completed the equivalent of a full season and looked at how he’d done. With his last start in Detroit, he’s now at 66 career starts and has completed the equivalent of a second full season, so it seems like an opportune time to see how he’s changed over the last 13 months.
This post will also kick off a series of posts I’d like to do, looking at the team’s key personnel and how they fit into the team’s prospects for 2014 going forward. (I haven’t completely given up on 2013, but I’m realistic enough to recognize that 2014 should now be the team’s most important focus.)
| Period | W | L | ERA | IP | HR | BB | SO | SO/BB | FIP | IP/G |
| First 33* | 15 | 7 | 2.68 | 185 | 11 | 46 | 238 | 5.17 | 2.09 | 5.6 |
| Second 33** | 11 | 12 | 3.26 | 196.2 | 21 | 62 | 209 | 3.37 | 3.41 | 5.9 |
* 6/8/2010 thru 6/30/2012
** 7/6/2012 thru 7/30/2013
We can see that with the exception of innings pitched, every statistic has declined. In his 33 starts since July 2012, Strasburg has given up more runs, more home runs, and more walks, and has gotten fewer strikeouts than he had in his first 33 starts. If we do those comparisons on a per-batter-faced basis, his home runs increased from 1.50% to 2.60%, his walks increased from 6.26% to 7.67%, and his strikeouts decreased from 32.38% to 25.87%.
In my earlier post, I compared his first-season-equivalent performance with the MLB leaders in 2011. Those comparisons looked pretty good—if his first 33 starts had all been completed during the 2011 season, he would have ranked sixth in the majors in ERA, ninth in fewest home runs allowed (among qualified pitchers), third in strikeouts, fourth in strikeout-to-walk ratio, and first in fielding-independent pitching (FIP). If we make a similar set of comparisons of his second set of 33 starts to the 2012 MLB leaders, Strasburg’s performance looks much less impressive. If starts 34 through 66 had all occurred during 2012, Strasburg would have ranked 16th in ERA, 40th in fewest home runs allowed, 9th in strikeouts, 28th in strikeout-to-walk ratio, and 19th in FIP.
Over the last 13 months, Strasburg has basically slid from being perhaps one of the top five pitchers in baseball, with comparisons made to Pedro Martinez in his prime, to maybe one of the top 20 or 25. In fact, it’s no longer clear that Strasburg is even the Nats’ best pitcher. It’s funny—when Nats fans and bloggers talk about why the team has disappointed, they talk a lot about Denard Span and how his on-base percentage is maybe 10 points lower than it should be. Span is not the problem the Nats should be worried about. They should be much more worried about Strasburg’s FIP being up 1.3 runs per game, and about Ryan Zimmerman‘s fielding and Adam LaRoche‘s hitting. Those are the problems, along with an incredibly weak bench and a disappointing bullpen and Dan Haren‘s strugges, that have caused the Nats to miss their expectations by so much.
What’s caused Strasburg’s performance to slip? It’s hard to point to any one thing. Turning to the annual data (I didn’t try compiling pitched ball data across the 33 game periods), we see that his fastball velocity, which averaged 97 during 2010 pre-Tommy John surgery, has never regained that level and has continued to slip a bit, down 0.5 mph this season from 95.8 to 95.3. Although the increase in walks and hit-by-pitch suggest control problems, I don’t see a significant decrease in his percent of pitches in the zone. But there is more contact and fewer swinging strikes. Batters seem to be seeing his fastball better and are making better contact with it, which gives him fewer opportunities to turn to his still excellent curveball and change-up.
In putting together a list of players with the highest trade value, Dave Cameron of fangraphs.com recently gave a nice summary of Strasburg’s current status, which I pretty much agree with:
He’s still an excellent pitcher, but it’s been awhile since he looked like the best pitcher on the planet. He might not ever look like that again… It is likely that Stephen Strasburg peaked in 2010, as a rookie.
All that negativity aside, teams would still be lining up out the door if the Nationals made him available. He’s got three years of team control left at arbitration prices, and the low innings totals and lack of sexy win numbers this year will keep his price reasonable. He still throws 95, gets strikeouts and ground balls, and has an ERA of 2.99. He might be worse, but worse than historically amazing isn’t so bad.
Strasburg is both terrific and kind of disappointing at the same time.
It’s really, really tough for a pitcher to maintain elite status year after year. Pitchers can and sometimes do re-gain that status—maybe they pick up a new pitch or make some change in mechanics to improve their command. But most don’t. While we remain hopeful that Strasburg may eventually reach the heights that originally looked possible, the reality may be that we’re looking forward to several seasons of a merely very, very good pitcher, and not an historically great one.
The Nationals entered July one game above .500 and 6-1/2 games back of the Braves, needing a strong, winning month in order to remain relevant for the divisional or wild card races. Instead, they stumbled to their worst month since May 2011, back in the Jim Riggleman era. After an especially brutal 2–11 stretch from July 8 through 24, the team’s chances had faded away, and they stood pat at the trade deadline. The Nats went 11–16 in July and ended the month four games below .500 and 11 games back of the Braves. According to coolstandings.com, the Nats’ odds of winning the division had dropped to a miniscule 0.6%, and their odds of making the wild card fell to 3.6%.
The month actually began on a hopeful note, as Bryce Harper was activated from the disabled list on July 1, and Wilson Ramos on July 4. For the first time in months, the position players were all healthy. A trade for Scott Hairston allowed them to option Tyler Moore to Syracuse. Initially, it looked like it was working, as Harper homered in his first at bat from the DL, and Ramos drove in five runs in his first game back. The Nats split a four-game series with the Brewers, then swept a three-game set against the Padres, finishing a 5–2 home stand and closing their gap with the Braves to four games.
A road trip to Philadelphia and Miami followed, and things began to unravel. Former Nat John Lannan pitched the opener in Philly and outpitched his replacement, Dan Haren, for a 3–2 Phillies win. Ross Detwiler missed his next start and would eventually be moved to the disabled list, with Taylor Jordan taking his place in the rotation and taking a 4–2 loss against Cole Hamels. With Gio Gonzalez pitching the third game, the Nats beat Cliff Lee’s Phillies 5–1. But they lost game four 3–1, despite a good performance from Jordan Zimmermann. In Miami, things really started falling apart, as Stephen Strasburg lasted only two innings in the worst start of his career. In the next game, Haren pitched well, but Harper got tossed in the 8th inning of a tie game, which was lost in the 10th when his replacement, Hairston, was unable to get a clutch hit. They managed a win in the last game before the All-Star game, but they were 2–5 on a disappointing road trip.
After the break, they returned home to face the Dodgers in three games, the Pirates in four, and the Mets in four. The Dodgers swept a three-game set, despite good pitching performances from Strasburg and Gonzalez (and an abysmal start from Zimmermann). The Pirates won the next three, giving the Nats a 6-game losing streak, before they finally came back in the final game against the Pirates with a walk-off home run by Harper. They next played a day-night doubleheader against the Mets and were crushed 14–1 in the first game. In the nightcap, however, Ross Ohlendorf made a spot start and was excellent, keeping the game tied against Matt Harvey. Ryan Zimmerman won the game with a walk-off homer in the ninth. The next day, Haren pitched well in a 4–1 win, and in the final game, Jordan got his first major league win as the bats finally came alive in a 14–1 rout.
The month ended with a road trip and two games against Detroit. Although the Nats had Strasburg and Gonzalez pitching, they were clobbered in both games, 5–1 in Strasburg’s start and 11–1 in Gonzalez’s.
Where did the Nats go wrong? Basically everywhere. In batting (measured by wRC+) their index for July was 95, ranking 8th in the National League. Starting pitching, which had supported the weak bats in previous months, was even worse. The starters had a 4.53 ERA in July, ranking 11th in the NL. And the relievers’ ERA was 4.24, 13th in the league. Even their fielding was bad, with the Nats ranking 13th in the measure of fielding runs calculated by fangraphs.com. It was a truly dismal month.
Record:
11–16 (.407)
Pythagorean Record:
11–16 (3.93 R/G – 4.59 RA/G)
MVP for July:
Jayson Werth (.371/.448/.629, 26 G, 105 PA, 7 HR, 17 R, 21 RBI, 1.3 fWAR, 0.11 WPA, 10.15 RE24).
Most valuable pitcher:
Wow. Until the last day of the month. Gio Gonzalez had this award locked up, but now, I don’t know—I guess I’ll go with Dan Haren (1–2, 3.13 R/9, 4 G, 23 IP, 10.2 K/9, 2.3 BB/9, 2.56 RE24, 0.5 rWAR).
Most valuable reliever:
Tyler Clippard (0–0, 0.00 R/9, 13 G, 13 IP, 11.1 K/9, 2.1 BB/9, 1.4 H/9, 5.95 RE24, 0.87 WPA, 6 shutdowns, 0 meltdown).
Worst month:
Drew Storen (1–1, 13.03 R/9, –8.06 RE24, 12 G, 9-2/3 IP, 15 H, 3 HR, 4 BB, 33.8% LOB%, 4 shutdowns, 4 meltdowns). After a series of notable meltdowns, Storen was optioned to Syracuse on July 27. Dishonorable mention also goes to Adam LaRoche (.163/.236/.288) and Jordan Zimmermann (1–3, 7.18 R/9), who’ve been just awful this month.
Best start this month:
Stephen Strasburg (July 24, 4–2 loss to the Pirates at home). Strasburg pitched 8 innings, gave up 2 hits , no walks, and one run (on a solo home run), and got 12 K with a game score of 86—the best start of his career according to game score. Yet he left with the Nats trailing 1–0, and the bullpen (Storen and Fernando Abad) gave up three more runs in the top of the ninth. Though the Nats’ batters rallied with two runs in the bottom of the ninth, it wasn’t enough, and Strasburg was charged with the loss.
Worst start:
Gio Gonzalez (July 31, 11–1 loss to the Tigers in Detroit). Gonzalez lasted 3-1/3 innings and gave up 11 hits, 10 runs, 1 walk, and 2 home runs, while getting only 3 K with a game score of 0. There was lots of competition for this one though, with Stephen Strasburg and Jordan Zimmermann each pitching the worst game of their careers. Strasburg’s was a 8–3 loss against the Marlins on July 12 (2 innings, 7 runs, game score of 16), and Zimmermann’s was a 9–2 loss to the Dodgers on July 21 (2 innings, 7 runs, game score of 11) could have won this category in most other months.
Tough loss:
Stephen Strasburg (July 24, 4–2 loss to the Pirates—see “Best start this month” above).
Cheap win:
Jordan Zimmerman (July 1, 10–5 win over the Brewers at home). Zimmermann pitched 6 innings and gave up 9 hits, 4 runs, and 2 home runs, while getting 5 K with a game score of 43.
Best shutdown:
Rafael Soriano (July 6, 5–4 win over the Padres at home). This was Soriano’s only one-run save this month. Although he allowed a pair of one-out singles, he followed them with two ground outs to get the save. (Win probability added .152).
Worst meltdown:
Drew Storen (July 2, 4–0 loss to the Brewers at home) entered in the top of the 8th in a 0–0 tie. He gave up a single, a stolen base, a pair of doubles, and another single, giving up 4 runs before getting the third out. (Win probability added –.464)
Clutch hit:
Bryce Harper (July 25, 9–7 win over the Pirates at home). With the score tied 7–7, Roger Bernadina at first, and two outs in the bottom of the 9th, Harper hit his first career walk-off home run. (WPA .440)
Choke:
Scott Hairston (July 13, 2–1 loss to the Marlins in Miami) came in to replace Bryce Harper, who was ejected in the 8th inning for arguing balls and strikes. Hairston came to bat in the top of the 10th with the score tied 1–1, runners on second and third, and one out. He struck out (WPA –.209). Zimmerman followed with another strikeout for the third out. In the bottom of the inning, Craig Stammen came in, Chad Tracy made an error to let the winning run get on base, and Stammen gave up the winning run.
The Nats got swept by the Dodgers in two cliffhangers followed by a rout. They’ve slipped to two games below .500, and though they didn’t lose too much ground to the Braves who were 1–2 this weekend, the Nats are losing ground when they should be making it up.
There is still talk about the Nats making a deadline deal, perhaps for a starting pitcher. But with the Nats’ odds of winning the division now having slipped to about 4%, and of making the wildcard to about 7%, it’s time to concede that this probably isn’t the Nationals year. I’m not saying the team should give up – the odds say every couple of years one team makes up this much ground, and the Nats could be the lucky ones. But trading valuable prospects in a deadline deal usually doesn’t make sense unless the teams odds of making the post-season are at least 25%, in order for the deal to give the team’s odds a reasonable boost.
Now, it still could make sense to make a trade if it’s to fill a hole and the talent is cheaply available. The Scott Hairston deal made sense, and exchanging a C-grade prospect for some starting pitching depth might make sense. But giving up highly rated prospects in a dubious stab at making the post-season doesn’t make sense.
On the other hand, the Nats still have a chance, so they shouldn’t be sellers either. They really aren’t situated to be sellers anyway, with most of their players either in their prime or, for their older players, loaded down with expensive long-term contracts that make them relatively unattractive trade objects. About the only deal I can see is the possibility of trading away one of the relievers, as the bullpen is starting to get crowded with Ryan Mattheus due to return. But several of the relievers still have options, so it may make more sense to move one of them to Syracuse instead.
I continue to wish the team well, but I think we’re kidding ourselves if we think we’re just one starting pitcher away from a successful season.
With trade season upon us, I’ve seen a couple of posts about the team’s best deadline deal ever. I’m going to remind us that maybe the best deal was the one they didn’t make.
In July of 2006, Alfonso Soriano was headed into free agency and was having a career year. By the All-Star break, he’d hit 27 home runs and was hitting .272 with 56 RBIs, 63 runs scored, and 20 stolen bases. As a free agent, everyone knew that he would command an expensive multi-year contract and that the Nationals weren’t going to try to retain him. The rumors were flying fast and furious as the trade deadline approached.
And then… nothing happened. Soriano wasn’t traded. He stayed in Washington and finished even better in the second half, completing a 40-40 season. The Nationals lost 91 games.
Of course, the fans were in shock. How could Jim Bowden fail to cash in Soriano when his value was at its peak? “Incompetence!” the masses howled.
But by trading Soriano, the Nationals would be giving up two compensatory draft picks. They decided that the cost was too high, relative to what was being offered. And how did those draft picks work out? The first one went for Josh Smoker—didn’t work out so well. But the second was used to pick a pitcher from Division III Wisconsin-Stevens Point. That pitcher, Jordan Zimmermann, has worked out very well indeed. He’s been the most reliable and valuable pitcher during the Nats’ time in Washington.
Of course, without knowing what deals Bowden turned down, we really can’t know that the draft picks were better than the alternative. But if the offer that he turned down was Kevin Slowey, as one story has it, then waiting for the draft to get Zimmermann was far more valuable than the trade.
Of course all draft picks (as well as trades for prospects) involve an element of luck, so we shouldn’t give too much credit to Bowden. But in terms of impact on the organization, the trade we didn’t make may have been the best one of all.
The headlines say that this was the worst start of Stephen Strasburg‘s career. So, of course I have to look up his other bad starts to see how this one compares. Of 63 career starts, 8 had a game score of 39 or lower. These are his bad starts:
- August 10, 2010, 8–2 loss to Florida Marlins at home. In his first season, Strasburg went to the disabled list in late July with shoulder inflammation. He returned to make his tenth start, and for the first time he was shelled, giving up 6 runs on 6 hits, including one home run, and 2 walks in 4-1/3 innings. Game score 29
- May 15, 2012, 6–1 loss to San Diego Padres at home. After Tommy John surgery, he made it through 5 starts in 2011 and the first 7 starts of 2012 before his next bad game in start # 8. Sloppy fielding and a short rain delay left him in a hole, and he gave up 4 runs on 7 hits (including a homer) and 2 walks in 4 innings. Game score 35
- July 20, 2012, 11–10 loss to Atlanta Braves at home. I’ll never forget this game. The Nats jumped to a 9–0 lead and Strasburg was cruising through the first five. Then he hit a wall in the sixth and gave up 4 runs as the rain started falling. The bullpen couldn’t stop the bleeding, and by the time the carnage was over in 11 innings, the Nats lost 11–10. Strasburg gave up 4 runs on 8 hits (including a homer) and 3 walks in 5-1/3 innings. Game score 38
- July 31, 2012, 8–0 loss to Philadelphia Phillies at home. This one may have had the title of Strasburg’s worst start until last night. He lasted 4 innings and gave up 6 runs on 8 hits (including 2 homers) and 1 walk. Game score 24
- August 28, 2012, 9–0 loss to Miami Marlins in Miami. This time Strasburg lasted 5 innings, but gave up 7 runs on 9 hits (including a homer) and a walk. Nolasco shut out the Nats. Game score 27
- September 7, 2012, 9–7 loss to Marlins at home. This was the last game pitched by Strasburg before his shutdown. Strasburg gave up 5 runs on 6 hits (including 2 homers) and 3 walks in 3 innings. The Nats came back to tie it 6–6, but Clippard gave up 3 runs in the top of the 10th for the loss. Game score 26
- April 7, 2013, 6–3 loss to Cincinnati Reds in Cincinnati. In his 2nd start of 2013, Strasburg gave up 6 runs on 9 hits and 4 walks in 5-1/3 innings. Game score 27
- July 12, 2013, 8–3 loss to Marlins in Miami. You know this one. 7 runs, 5 hits, 4 walks, a home run by Stanton, and just 2 innings. Yes, this was the worst start of Strasburg’s carer. Game score 16
In a couple of hours, MLB will announce the All-Star teams. I could just talk about Nationals I think deserve to be on the NL All-Star team. But the way I think about it is that in order to decide which Nats belong, I have to figure out which players belong—all 35 of them—if I’m to determine whether a specific Nat is one of the deserving 35. So in addition to hearing about five Nationals, you get to see my whole team and hear about my methodology for picking them.
It’s important to note that I set up my criteria before ranking the players—I didn’t tweak the methodology to include or exclude any particular players. I was actually surprised that five Nationals made my team, with a couple of them being especially surprising.
Here’s my method:
For position players, wins above replace (WAR), specifically the Fangraphs.com version, is my metric of choice, because it takes account of so many things that it would be difficult or impossible to account for without it—defense, park effects, base running, playing time and position.
For pitchers, the Fangraphs version of WAR is based on fielding independent pitching (FIP), whereas I also like to give some weight to runs allowed, including the effect of balls in play and timing. So, instead, I took an average of WAR (based on FIP) and a measure that Fangraphs calls RA9-Wins (based on runs allowed – it’s very similar to what baseball-reference.com uses for pitching WAR).
I give heavy weight to performance in 2013, but I’m also aware that it’s not unusual for players to be hot for two or three months, then fizzle the rest of the year. So I also give some weight to 2012 performance. Finally, I give a little bit of weight to career performance – really more as just a tie-breaker. If we’ve got two pitchers with similar performance in 2012/2013, but one of them is Mariano Rivera and the other is Brett Cecil, I’d rather see Rivera at the All-Star game. I mean that’s part of what an All-Star game is about!
My formula is 4*2013 WAR (or the average of WAR and RA9-Wins for pitchers) + 2*2012 WAR + Square root(Career WAR). However, if the 2013 WAR is higher than the 2012 WAR, I substitute the 2013 WAR for the 2012 WAR in the second term of this formula, thereby allowing rookies or players who were seriously injured in 2012 to still have an opportunity to rank well. Below, I show the number of points calculated according to this formula for each player in parentheses.
I rank players by position according to this metric. I start by selecting the best player at each position as the starter, with two special rules. For the outfield, not all outfielders can play center field, but normally corner outfielders can play either corner, as can center fielders. So I require that one starter and one reserve outfielder be a center fielder, but then pool the rest of the available outfielders (including any available center fielders) to select the corners, first for the starters, then for the reserves. The All-Star game also uses a DH, so my approach to selecting a DH is to select the best available hitter (based on hitting metrics alone) after the other position players are selected, again, first for starters, then for reserves. Also, I follow the rule that every team must be represented, and indicate below the players who bumped higher ranked players in order to represent their team.
I allocated the reserves as follows: 2 catchers, 6 infielders (including at least one at each position), 5 outfielders (including at least one center fielder), 1 DH, 6 starting pitchers, and 5 relief pitchers.
The following Nationals players make my 2013 NL All-Star team:
Ian Desmond starts the game at shortstop (in place of Troy Tulowitzki, who’s on the DL). The NL has a number of good shortstops—Everth Cabrera, Jimmy Rollins, and Jean Segura are all close and make my team as reserves (and are all better than any AL shortstop). But based on my criteria, Desmond is the best other than Tulowitzki.
Jordan Zimmermann – the 5th-ranked starting pitcher in the NL according to my metric.
Gio Gonzalez – the 6th-ranked starting pitcher according to my metric. His name really hasn’t been mentioned, so this selection was a bit of a surprise. But after a few rough starts at the beginning of the year, Gio’s quietly putting together a good season. Combined with his Cy Young-contender season last year, he ought to be on the consideration list for the All-Star staff.
Rafael Soriano – again he’s quietly putting together a good season, which, combined with good performance last year, lifts him to the 5th and final relief pitcher slot on my team.
Denard Span – This is the big surprise, and I have to admit that it’s may be a fluke of my system. There are really 3 very good NL center fielders according to my metric—McCutchen, Carlos Gomez, and Shin-Soo Choo—but because I allow center fielders to be in the pool for the corner outfielders and DH, they all wind up as starters on my team. Because I also decided I need at least one “true” center fielder as a reserve, I looked at 4th-ranked Dexter Fowler, who’s on the DL, and finally to Span, who is ranked 5th in the league among center fielders according to my metric. I’ll point out, though, that while Span seems to be considered a disappointment by many Nats fans, his 1.3 WAR for 2013 and 3.6 for 2012 are actually quite good. I feel like this selection can be defended.
Here’s my team:
National League – Starters
C – Buster Posey – Giants (32.8) – In one of the closest races, he just edges out Yadier Molina
1B – Joey Votto – Reds (29.9)
2B – Matt Carpenter – Cardinals (27.5)
3B – David Wright – Mets (39.8) – The leading NL player according to my system
SS – Troy Tulowitzki – Rockies (28.7) – Disabled List – Replaced by:
SS – Ian Desmond – Nationals (24.4)
LF – Ryan Braun – Brewers (28.3) – Disabled List – Replaced by:
LF – Carlos Gonzalez – Rockies (25.9)
CF – Andrew McCutchen – Pirates (33.6)
RF – Carlos Gomez – Brewers (29.5)
DH – Shin-Soo Choo – Reds (20.2)
SP – Clayton Kershaw – Dodgers (33.6)
Reserves
C – Yadier Molina – Cardinals (32.4)
C – Russell Martin – Pirates (21.2)
1B – Paul Goldschmidt – Diamondbacks (22.4)
2B – Chase Utley – Phillies (23.7)
3B – Chase Headley – Padres (25.7)
SS – Everth Cabrera – Padres (23.9)
SS – Jimmy Rollins – Phillies (22.0)
SS – Jean Segura – Brewers (21.6)
OF – Matt Holliday – Cardinals (21.2)
OF – Hunter Pence – Giants (20.9)
OF – Jason Heyward – Braves (20.7)
OF – Giancarlo Stanton – Marlins (17.6) – to represent the Marlins (in place of Starling Marte, Pirates, 20.6)
CF – Dexter Fowler – Rockies (18.2) – Disabled List – Replaced by:
CF – Denard Span – Nationals (16.4)
DH – Carlos Beltran – Cardinals (20.6)
SP – Adam Wainwright – Cardinals (30.7)
SP – Cliff Lee – Phillies (30.6)
SP – Matt Harvey – Mets (28.2)
SP – Jordan Zimmermann – Nationals (23.6)
SP – Gio Gonzalez – Nationals (21.9)
SP – Jeff Samardzija – Cubs (16.6) – to represent the Cubs (in place of Patrick Corbin, Diamondbacks, 20.7)
RP – Craig Kimbrel – Braves (14.1)
RP – Aroldis Chapman – Reds (13.2)
RP – Mark Melancon – Pirates (13.0)
RP – Jason Grilli – Pirates (11.0)
RP – Rafael Soriano – Nationals (10.7)
Finally, I can’t end this article without answering the question about Yasiel Puig. Puig did remarkably well according to my metric, with 13.4 points, considering he’s only played for one month. If he’d had two months at that level (as Mike Trout did last year), he would have made my team. But despite Puig’s phenomenal month, I think it’s fair that he wait a year to better demonstrate his talent before possibly making next year’s team. When other very good players like Gerardo Parra and Jay Bruce can’t make my team, I don’t have a problem with leaving Puig off.
PS. The official All-Star Game selections have been announced, and Bryce Harper was voted in as a starter by the fans, while Jordan Zimmermann is the only other Nat selected. (Ian Desmond’s name will appear on a ballot for the final slot.) How did Bryce do according to my criteria? He had 17.9 points. That came close. The only outfielder with more points who didn’t make my team was Starling Marte, with 20.6. Two outfielders with fewer points did make my team, however—Giancarlo Stanton with 17.6 (because the Marlins needed a representative) and Denard Span with 16.4 (because we needed a reserve center fielder). I understand how Harper made the team, due to his huge celebrity, but at this point his career continues to be more promise than realization (though his fantastic start in April suggests that the realization may be coming soon).
Other Nationals who came close to making my team but missed included Adam LaRoche with 11.7 points, who ranked 5th among NL first baseman behind Votto and Goldschmidt, who made my team, and Adrian Gonzalez and Allen Craig, who didn’t. At third base, Ryan Zimmerman ranked fourth with 18.7 points behind Wright and Headley, who made my team, and Aramis Ramirez, who didn’t. And Stephen Strasburg ranked ninth among starting pitchers with 19.3 points, placing behind Kershaw, Wainwright, Lee, Harvey, Zimmermann, and Gonzalez, who made my team, and Patrick Corbin and Mat Latos, who didn’t. All in all, the Nationals did very well on this exercise.
PPS. I made a mistake. There are actually 34 roster spots, rather than the 35 that I was assuming. (I must have thought that the final slot filled by fan ballot was in addition to the 34 rather than included in that total.) If I had used the right total, Heyward is the one that I wouldn’t have selected.
For the third straight month, the Nationals played mediocre and disappointing baseball in June. With a 13-13 record for the month, they ended the month the same as they started it, one game above .500. But the Braves went 16–12 in June, so the Nats slipped to 6-1/2 games behind. According to coolstandings.com, the Nats’ odds of winning the division have dropped to 7.9%, and of making the wild card to 19.9%.
On the injury front, Bryce Harper and Wilson Ramos were out all month on the disabled list, and Stephen Strasburg missed the first half of the month. On June 4, the Nats did a minor roster overhaul, designating Henry Rodriguez and Zach Duke for assignment and placing Danny Espinosa on the DL for his broken wrist, calling up Anthony Rendon to take his place at second. Jayson Werth returned from the DL at about the same time. A few days later, Rodriguez was traded to the Cubs, and Duke, after being released by the Nats, signed with the Reds.
The injuries and releases created opportunities, as relievers Erik Davis, Ian Krol, and starter Tyler Jordan each made their major league debuts in June. Ross Ohlendorf was also called up to make a start against the Rockies, and pitched so well that he was asked to stay as the long relief man.
The month began with the Nats playing the last two games of a series in Atlanta. They had won the first game on the last day of May, but lost the next two and the series. They returned home where they split two games against the Mets, slipping to third place behind the Phillies. The Nats then won two of three against the Twins, pulling back into second place.
Next came a 9-game road trip. The Nats won two of three against the Rockies, then lost two of three against the Indians. Going to Philadelphia, they lost the first two and dropped into a tie for second place with the Phillies, before losing the third game to move back into sole possession of second place.
Returning the Washington, the Nats split a 4-game series against the Rockies. They took the first two games against the Diamondbacks, but lost the third game in an extra inning heart breaker. The Nats then went to New York City to play the final series of the month against the Mets. In the first game, they were mostly shut down by Matt Harvey in the first part of the game, but were able to come back against the Mets’ bullpen for a come-from-behind victory. The second game, Jordan’s major league debut, was a sloppy game in which the Nats were killed by errors. But the final game on the last day of June was a long-awaited blowout, which the Nats won 13–2 behind four home runs and 7 innings of shutout pitching from Gio Gonzalez.
Record:
13–13 (.500)
Pythagorean Record:
13–13 (3.92 R/G – 3.81 RA/G)
MVP for June:
Ian Desmond (.306/.355/.633, 26 G, 108 PA, 9 HR, 16 R, 28 RBI, 1.5 fWAR, 1.24 WPA, 13.33 RE24).
Most valuable pitcher:
Gio Gonzalez (2–0, 2.01 R/9, 6 G, 40-1/3 IP, 9.8 K/9, 3.1 BB/9, 10.25 RE24, 1.6 rWAR). Honorable mention goes to Jordan Zimmermann (3–0, 2.83 R/9, 35 IP).
Most valuable reliever:
Tyler Clippard (3–0, 0.84 R/9, 10 G, 10-2/3 IP, 6.8 K/9, 3.4 BB/9, 5.1 H/9, 4.08 RE24, 0.72 WPA, 6 shutdowns, 0 meltdown). Close behind were Ian Krol (1.54 R/9, 5 shutdowns, no meltdown) and Rafael Soriano (1.64 R/9, 7 shutdowns, no meltdown).
Worst month:
Dan Haren (0–3, 9.82 R/9, 4 G, 18-1/3 IP, 29 H, 7 HR).
Best start this month:
Jordan Zimmermann (June 9, 7–0 win over the Twins at home in first game of a doubleheader). Zimmermann pitched 7 innings, gave up 2 hits, 2 walks, and no runs, and got 8 K with a game score of 79.
Worst start:
Ross Detwiler (June 23, 7–6 loss to the Rockies at home). Detwiler pitched 3-2/3 innings and gave up 9 hits, 7 runs, 1 walk, and 2 home runs, while getting 3 K with a game score of 17.
Tough loss:
Stephen Strasburg (June 16, 2–0 loss to the Indians in Cleveland). In Strasburg’s first start after returning from the DL, he pitched 5 innings and gave up 1 run on 1 hit and 4 walks, striking out 4, but received no run support and was charged with the loss. (Game score of 61)
Best shutdown:
Rafael Soriano (June 15, 7–6 win over the Indians in Cleveland). Soriano entered for the one-run save after Rendon hit a solo homer in the top of the ninth to put the Nats ahead. He struck out Giambi and Raburn, then gave up a double to Aviles before getting Bourn to line out to end the game. (Win probability added .195).
Worst meltdown:
Henry Rodriguez (June 1, 2–1 loss to the Braves in Atlanta in 10 innings) entered in the bottom of the 10th in a 1–1 tie. He walked Gattis to lead off the inning. Gattis was replaced by pinch runner Schafer, who stole second, and after getting a foul out, Rodriguez walked Uggla. BJ Upton hit a one-out single to score Schafer, giving the Braves a walk-off victory. (Win probability added –.370) Fernando Abad also allowed a couple of walk off wins under similar circumstances, but I’m giving the award to Henry because his came against our divisional rival.
Clutch hit:
Anthony Rendon (June 15, 7–6 win over the Indians in Cleveland). In the top of the 9th with the score tied 6–6 and two outs, Rendon hit a solo home run—his first major league dinger—giving the Nats the lead and the margin for victory. (WPA .415)
Choke:
Jhonatan Solano (June 16, 2–0 loss to the Indians in Cleveland) came to bat in the top of the 7th with no outs, the bases loaded, and the Nats trailing 1–0. He lined out, with Steve Lombardozzi doubled off second and no runners scoring (WPA –.290). Roger Bernadina followed with a ground out to end the inning without the Nationals scoring.
Like a lot of Nats fans, I was questioning Dan Haren‘s role as the fifth starter as early as the third week of the season. I looked at it then and concluded that we should give him more time. Although he’d already been bombed a couple of times, there were still a lot of things to like—a good strikeout rate, an excellent walk rate, and evidence that some of the home runs allowed were just bad luck. Now he’s had 15 starts, and the picture is similar. His strikeout rate (7.35/9) continues to be good. His walk rate (1.43/9) is excellent. His batting average on balls in play (.328) is a little above average, while his home run rate is huge, but 15.8% HR/FB is well above the norm and would typically be indicative of bad luck.
Nevertheless, I think it’s now time for him to go. Look at what he’s allowed from the perspective of a batter’s line: .306/.340/.548. He’s simply being hit too much and when he’s hit, he’s hit hard. The typical opposing batter’s .548 slugging percentage would rank 7th in the NL league leaders for batters. You can’t have the average opposing batter hitting like Ryan Braun and expect to win. (Though, as I noted earlier, despite having now made six terrible starts, the run support in those starts has been so bad that it’s doubtful that he’s cost the Nats more than about one win.)
Also, with the emergence of Ross Ohlendorf as a viable fifth starter, it just doesn’t make sense to continue to trot Haren out every fifth day. I guess I don’t have a strong opinion whether Haren should go to the DL, to the bullpen, or should simply be released, but I don’t think he deserves to continue starting.
PS. About the time I posted this, news was coming out that Haren’s being placed on the DL. That’s not really a surprise. I think it would be surprising to see him return to the rotation again. Unless Ohlendorf melts down, I think we’ve seen the last of Dan Haren as a Nats starter.
Nats Noodles 