Lensterino.

To Chris's Cry of "Fire Lenny Harris." comes a resounding rejoinder of "So Say We All!"

Jumping on the bandwagon, here is Harris himself.
From The wapo-

"Harris, who collected more pinch hits than any other player in history, also drew clear distinctions between what he sees going on with the Nationals and what he experienced during his career. "I had mentors," he said. He's not sure the younger Nationals do.

"I had baseball guys who felt for the game," he said. "When we came out, we already felt that we were going to win the ballgame. . . . It's hard for me to speak for them. All I can do is see and watch them play, and I see a difference already, because our attitude on the bench was different. Every team we played for, we were always encouraging, always in the game. This is like a different environment now. We got a whole bunch of young kids."



Really? He had mentors? He had baseball guys telling him about the game? You mean like coaches? You mean like hitting coaches telling him about the game and how, in the game, to hit baseball? That kind of mentor?

BPIBB

If one can trust the MLB probable starting pitchers page two days before a game, Wednesday is the big day for us.

Personally, I wouldn’t waste him on us, but thankfully they are going to. Should be some nice padding to his universally predicted Cy Young campaign.*

*For the value of universal predictions, please see ‘Tigers, Detroit. 2008 Edition’

As a Nationals fan, I’m pretty happy with Santana pitching in this division. We are most likely not play-off bound during his peak years. Meanwhile, a whole bunch of potentially good players are no longer going to be helping the Mets when the Nats are playoff contenders. A move of this magnitude also hopefully puts some more “win now” pressure on the Phillies, and to a lesser extent, the Braves. If several teams start mortgaging their future for the present, we could have a lull in division strength in 2011-14 or so.** During that lull the Nats, with some group whoever survives the perils of prospectdom could hopefully start making the playoffs, increasing team revenue, and then making the playoffs again with better and then better teams.

**While I do believe I am more correct than incorrect with this assessment, I must admit I have not recently looked at who is under control for how long by which teams. I am making my judgment based more on gut than on facts. In the case of the Braves, Chipper has to age, right? Teixeira is a free agent at the end of the year, and they traded their farm system to get him. Their pitching is, mostly, ancient. The Phillies seem to have a lot of players in their peak years right now, although I cant speak to their farm system. The Mets have two of the best young players in the game, a few young pitchers, F-Mart, and then a whole bunch of oldies. Can all of these teams fix their coming problems? Sure. Still, they have a lot of problems on the way. If we capitalize on those problems, we can beat them.

Much more importantly, as a baseball fan, I love the move because we get to see Santana pitch. How wonderful is that?

I think I need to talk about my relationship with baseball in order to talk about my idea of Santana. It seems to me that most serious Nationals fans were baseball fans before the 2004-2005 off season. They were Yankees fans or expos fans, Brewers or Angels fans, Sox or Sox fans, and of course reformed Os fans. . They became Nationals fans through their love of baseball. I, on the other hand, began to love baseball because of the Nationals.

I was sorta a Mets fan my first few vague years, mainly because my older sister was a Yankees fan and Darrly Strawberry’s last name was, like mine, a common object. During that period the Mets won the World Series, an event I have no recollection of. Then I spent several years in England, where my nascent love of baseball, and Darrly Strawberry, waned away to nothing. Years later, after moving to the NoVa area with my family, we would go to several Orioles games a year. I took my lack of interest in these excursions to mean I did not like baseball, rather than learning what was probably the correct lesson, that is- I just do not like the Baltimore Orioles.*

*Except Cal. Like everybody, I liked Cal. Turns out the rest of the team was on steroids. So yay for me for not liking them.


Then, the Washington Nationals came. My roommate that off-season was a member of that proud, knowledgeable, and often-wronged race, Mariners fans, and he pushed and prodded and sorta forced me to fall in love with baseball. So I started following baseball in earnest in 2005. However, having so much to learn about baseball (which is still true) I just focused on the division the first year. The American League was something I did not particularly care about.
I remember during the 2006 season having to admit to a bay area friend that no, I did not know who this Barry Zito fellow was, except I thought he was probably a pitcher. This is the level of ignorance we are talking about.

So I would always hear about this guy, this magical unstoppable pitcher toiling away in the frozen north.

He had a weird name, he had struck batters out, he was just very very good. I remember the first time I heard him pitch, Minnesota had an afternoon play off game and I used my lunch break to listen. It sounded beautiful. I've never seen him pitch. Sure, games have been on a tv at a bar or some such. But I've never really watched him pitch, pitch by pitch.

The whole point is, its going to mean alot to me to watch Tim Redding get the win Wednesday night.

Oversights

Metsblog, a pretty good blog generally, does a recap of last nights 14-inning marathon. They do not once mention Scourge of Potential MVPs John Lannan, and his 11 strikesouts. Sure, starting pitching doesnt seem that important after the fourteenth inning stretch, but still, its an annoying omission.Since you know, that is all we had, really.

Nick 'The Stick' Johnson

Nick Johnson presents an interesting situation. He’s a very valuable player. He pounds out doubles, hits some home runs, and walks like a beast* He also get injured a lot. As in, I hate steroids, but I wish he’d take them so he’d heal faster a lot.

* Well, more like a horror-movie killer. You know, teenagers running, serial killer just keeps walking, same pace, unstoppable. Every times you turn around, there he is, walking at that same pace. That is Nick Johnson.


Here is my point. There are a number of teams, possible contenders, that could use a relatively cheap highly productive first baseman. Some of these teams have some good prospects. The Nats are not going to the playoffs anytime soon.** By the time we get there, one assumes one of our many 1B prospects will have developed into an at least ok MLB first baseman. So to trade a commodity that is valuable at present for one that has future value makes a lot of sense.

** You ever write a sentence and desperately hope somebody looks it up in a years time and says “ha, you are a moron!” This was one of those sentences.


Except, and here is the thing, I cannot see a Nick Johnson trade happening. Jim Bowden should be asking for a lot, because Nick Johnson is a very good ballplayer who seems to have come back unaffected by more than a year on the sidelines. On the other hand, any GM of moderate intelligence should be hesitant, because this guy is clearly hated by the gods of ligaments, bones, femurs, and such.

The thing that worries me is if Bowden decides to settle for some small package, worried that Johnson gets injured and the Nats get left with nothing. That might be the right move, but I’d rather risk holding on to him. I have little trouble imagining Johnson putting together two quality seasons and ending up an A free agent.* I have more trouble imaging us getting prospects in a trade that would be better players than the ones from those “A” FA draft picks.


*To be fair, I have no idea what criteria Elias uses to figure out A free agents. I just think Nick can have two really good seasons.

Billy Bulter in five years.

It will be interesting when some DH hits .400, and we get to watch the fight over whether it really counts, the hitter never having to field and all. Of course, most people playing DH aren't fast enough to get the infield hits they are going to need to reach the magic number. But some day, I can see it happening. Fucking DHs.

Attendence

Someday there will be regular sell-outs at PLEASE BUY THE JOINT STRIKE FIGHTER Stadium. There will lots of fans screaming as we make a playoff run. Most of those fans will be chumps.

On the other hand, most of them will not be those drunk guys from Boston who were behind my section last night.

Game Recap 4/4

Good: Christian Guzman (.360/.360/.560)
Bad:Dmitri Young (Not Pinch Hitting Late in Games)

Good: Nats Bullpen (4IP, 0R, 1H, 0BB, 3K)
Bad: Odalis Perez (4IP, 5R, 9H, 4BB, 2K)

Good: Nats collect 10 base hits, 5 walks and have the benefit of 2 St. Louis errors!
Bad: Nats strand 25 base runners and lose


On the whole, not a bad game. Considering that Perez reverted to his usual form and threw half a seasons worth of pitches in half a game, it was surprising that were in a position to wish that there were better offensive options off the bench in the late innings. Though it would be nice to give Saul a night off once in a while, and the rest of the bullpen too if things keep going this way. Guzman had better be careful. If he continues to hit like this, I might start liking him (shudder).

First Place(Even more so!)

I keep thinking it’s a bad idea for Guzman to be leading off and then he keeps getting on base. So we will see.


Update
Seriously, terrible lead off hitter. Two doubles in the first two innings.