Giants Talk: Exploring team's return haul in Tyler Rogers trade with Mets
Giants Talk: Exploring team's return haul in Tyler Rogers trade with Mets originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
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Overmatched, indifferent and ugly: Is this what Nats fans signed on for?
Soooooooo … who's planning on staying up to watch those Washington Nationals on Friday night? First pitch in San Francisco is 10:15 p.m. Sounds like a good night to turn in early. Really early. And when putting head to pillow, the inescapable question could be: Is this a low point in the existence of this franchise? Put that aside for a moment and acknowledge this much: These Nats are awful. Part of that is by design, because you don't sell off established pieces for prospects at the trade deadline and expect to get better at the major league level. But part of it is just sloppy, unforgivable baseball, the kind that should have been retired when Dave Martinez was the manager. It needs to be better under Miguel Cairo, the interim. The Nats didn't get a spark from the change. They decided to roll over and play dead. There's Luis García, ostensibly the second baseman of the future, losing a pop-up in the sun Thursday afternoon against the vagabond Athletics. There's an overmatched and indifferent lineup managing three hits and no walks while striking out 12 times. There's left-hander Mitchell Parker getting whacked around in the second inning and some hi-nice-to-meet-you relievers allowing the A's to add on in what became another dismal data point, a 6-0 loss. These Nats have lost seven of eight, which doesn't even tell the story. Their run differential in those eight games: minus-49. So on average, for more than a week, they're losing by more than six runs a game. That's hard to do. Despite the struggles this summer, Washington had two all-stars. About them: In his past 25 games, James Wood is hitting .117 with three extra-base hits and 43 strikeouts in 106 plate appearances. MacKenzie Gore's previous four starts produced a 13.21 ERA and a 2.17 WHIP. Yikes. Also … yuck. The primary issues with this franchise all have to do with ownership, and there's a huge test for the Lerner family this offseason in committing to a new direction for the front office and investments up and down the organization. But on a nightly basis, can't the guys already here just play better baseball? 'That's absolutely something I want to see,' said Mike DeBartolo, the interim general manager overseeing Cairo and his can't-get-rid-of-them-fast-enough staff. 'You want to see a much cleaner game, a more fundamental game. Miggy and the staff, they've been doing extra pregame work. You'll see them out there earlier than they've been all year, more regularly than they've been all year. That's something they're putting all their energy into.' Great. Let's hope it changes then. Because the product on the field for this most recent stretch has been unwatchable. 'I mean, losing stinks no matter what,' veteran designated hitter Josh Bell said. 'It's a loss whether it's by 20 or whether it's a walk-off. They all sting.' Well, sure. But as a consumer, I'll take competitive baseball over the noncompetitive brand every day of the week. Look, these Nats are in an impossible spot. They were bad in the present, so DeBartolo's only responsible move was to take what few assets he had and make sure he got what he could for them. In that sense, the July 31 trade deadline was a success. 'When you're not in the position to compete for a playoff spot — very clearly — you have to use that opportunity to add some young talent to the organization, some prospects that can help you get into that position in the future,' said DeBartolo, who took over when his longtime boss Mike Rizzo was fired in July. 'So as painful as it is to trade a Kyle Finnegan, an Alex Call — guys who contributed this year and certainly in the past and that fans have a connection to — that's obviously a challenging thing to do.' Intellectually, it all makes sense. Aesthetically, what's left borders on nauseating. Thank goodness for Cade Cavalli's bounce-back start Wednesday night, the Nats' only win in a week. The right-hander's first major league appearance since 2022 was electric, with a fastball that touched 100 mph, an effective curveball and an intriguing changeup. Can he pitch again tomorrow? 'We're on a 65-win pace,' said DeBartolo, who in just five-and-a-half weeks in the big chair has shown he has a clear-eyed, realist's view of what the Nationals lack and what they need. 'That's obviously not acceptable. As I've said, fans are right to be frustrated, and we are frustrated, too, with where things stand. 'What we use the next seven weeks for, we want to evaluate our young players, see which players can be a part of those future, successful Nationals teams. That's where our focus is.' Makes complete sense. DeBartolo also says that having no idea whether he'll be part of the Nationals' future. These are unsettling times. DeBartolo has made clear that the way the Nats ran their baseball operations department needed fundamental change, but he can't fully overhaul things unless and until he has been empowered for the long term. That's TBD. What has become abundantly clear, though, in the weeks since Martinez and Rizzo were let go is that the club missed an opportunity to change the energy in the clubhouse. Cairo, the former bench coach and Martinez crony, was the easy and convenient candidate to bump up. That was also a mistake. The right move: Bring in Matt LeCroy — a longtime loyal servant of the franchise and the manager at Class AAA Rochester — because LeCroy would have overhauled a vibe very much in need of overhauling. The Nats' 'Go 1-0 today' era should have walked out the door when Martinez was shown it. Cairo is trying to keep it going, even as these Nats turn it into 'Go 0-1 today' so frequently. So, then, low points. For a franchise that has five postseason appearances and won a World Series, there are plenty of choices. The 2008 Nats who opened Nationals Park with Ryan Zimmerman's walk-off homer on 'Sunday Night Baseball' were in last place by April 10 and never climbed out of it, losing 102 games and finishing 32½ games out of first. The next year's team started 0-7, was in last place alone by the third game, lost 103 times and finished 34 games back. But that was before this fan base got reeled in — and expanded — by years of competitive, meaningful baseball. So I'll put in a vote for the previous low point to be about this time in 2022, after the Nats traded generational talent Juan Soto. The Nats won the night they dealt Soto to the San Diego Padres, but then lost their next six and 11 of their next 14. They finished the year on a five-game losing streak to go 55-107. It was ugly. And so is this. There can simultaneously be an understanding of where the Nats are and why they made the moves they did — and a demand they play better baseball. Losing by 20 runs or one may count the same in the standings. It doesn't feel the same to a fan.
