Dusty Baker sees the same minor league box scores available to everyone else online, so he knows Joe Ross pitched seven innings of one-run ball Thursday afternoon for Triple-A Syracuse.
The Nationals manager, however, isn't so quick to evaluate Ross' performance strictly off his pitching line. Because the setting didn't exactly match what the right-hander would be seeing in the big leagues.
"It's a little different pitching down there," Baker said. "You've got to create your own...
The Nationals should finally have their regular No. 5 starter pitching for them next week. And, barring some unforeseen complication, for many weeks to come.
After a strong start for Triple-A Syracuse on Thursday, Joe Ross is now lined up to join the Nationals rotation next week and make his major league season debut Wednesday in Atlanta.
Ross tossed seven innings of one-run ball Thursday afternoon at Pawtucket, scattering six hits and striking out six without walking a batter. He threw 85...
Fresh from a day off, the Nationals return to action today for a rare Friday matinee against the Phillies. For those asking: No, I don't know exactly why this game is starting at 4:05 p.m. It's Good Friday, which has something to do with it. But nobody with the Nats I've asked over the last week was able to provide an explanation, or was even able to say whether this was something they requested or was unilaterally done by MLB.
The Nationals are facing the same Phillies club that took two of...
WHAT: On Saturday, April 15, 70 years to the day that Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in Major League Baseball, the Washington Nationals will host Black Heritage Day. This year's Black Heritage Day event falls on the same day as the league-wide Jackie Robinson Day celebration.
During the pregame ceremony and the game itself, the Nationals will honor the contributions of African-Americans to the game of baseball and the community. For this special occasion, all players and on-field...
It's a strange new world for Nationals fans. For the last five seasons, the Nationals have been a good team and sometimes one of the best teams in baseball, and they've done so on the back of their starting rotation. This current iteration of the Nationals is very different. Pitching is not a strength, and after Tanner Roark, the starting rotation is a weakness. When July 31 rolls around, the Nationals are going to be looking for a starting pitcher and bullpen help. The latter has been the...
The first week and a half of the Nationals' season has not lacked for compelling storylines. There have been positives (eight-ninths of the lineup, four-fifths of the rotation) and there have been negatives (injuries to everybody who plays shortstop, struggles by everybody who pitches out of the bullpen).
The end result of all of that? A 5-4 record, with series wins at home over the Marlins and Cardinals and a series loss on the road at Philadelphia.
The Nationals are off today before...
They are 5-4, with one of the most productive lineups in baseball and a 2.49 ERA among the permanent members of their starting rotation. So let's not write the Nationals off altogether.
Having said that, there are without question several areas of concern nine games into the season, areas that have mostly been responsible for their four losses to date and have nearly turned a couple of their wins into defeats.
There is the bullpen, which has surrendered a staggering nine home runs already, the...
The Nationals could not solve Mike Leake in the series finale, and that was part of a 6-1 loss to the Cardinals.
Right-hander Max Scherzer had an up-and-down start. While he struck out 10 hitters, command of his changeup caused issues, as the Cardinals put up a run in the first and two more in the fifth to salvage Game 3 of the series.
"It's never fun taking a loss," Scherzer said. "Any time that happens, you always reflect on the things you could be better at. The wild pitches, sometimes...
The Cardinals again score in the first inning, but this time they got the rally started with two outs.
Max Scherzer struck out the first two batters he faced. Matt Carpenter then nursed a walk. After a wild pitch, Carpenter raced home on a Stephen Piscotty RBI double.
The Nationals had the exact opposite happen to them in their first at-bat of the game. Adam Eaton doubled and Anthony Rendon singled to put runners on the corners with no one out. It was Eaton's 100th career double.
But...
Two days after placing their starting shortstop on the disabled list, the Nationals were forced to do the same with their backup shortstop, adding Stephen Drew to a rapidly growing infirmary.
Drew was placed on the 10-day DL with a right hamstring strain, an injury he sustained in the fifth inning Tuesday night running out of the batter's box on a comebacker to the mound. The Nationals purchased the contract of Grant Green from Triple-A Syracuse to account for their sudden dearth of healthy...
If nothing else, the Nationals have shown through the season's first week-plus they don't easily roll over. Six times in their first eight games, they came from behind to at least tie things up.
So it wasn't surprising this evening when, despite trailing by three runs late and showing few signs of life to that point, the Nationals again made things interesting.
They couldn't complete the comeback this time, stranding the potential tying runners on base during a furious bottom-of-the-eighth...
The Nationals today send Max Scherzer to the mound with a chance to sweep the Cardinals. Now, hit the rewind button 48 hours and ask yourself how that statement would've sounded to you at the time.
The Nats have righted the ship a bit here the last two nights, riding a ridiculously productive lineup to a pair of blowout wins and now have their ace pitching this afternoon's series finale. It's been a nice bounceback after a rough weekend in Philadelphia.
Scherzer will be facing his hometown...
Left-hander Gio Gonzalez has something going after his first two starts. He earned his first win Tuesday in an 8-3 Nationals defeat of the Cardinals.
Gonzalez went seven innings and allowed only two runs (one earned), scattering six hits, walking none and striking out six for back-to-back quality starts to begin 2017.
Combined this season, he has pitched 13 innings, allowing only one earned run on 13 hits. But the most important number on his stat line to begin the season? He has surrendered...
The Washington Nationals selected the contract of infielder Grant Green from Triple-A Syracuse on Wednesday and placed infielder Stephen Drew on the 10-day disabled list with a right hamstring strain. Nationals President of Baseball Operations and General Manager Mike Rizzo made the announcement.
Green, 29, joins the Nationals after four games with Triple-A Syracuse this season where he went 2-for-13 with one double. The Nationals are the fourth Major League team Green has played for, coming to...
Daniel Murphy participated in the World Baseball Classic this spring as the United States went on to win the title for the very first time. But Murphy did not get everyday at-bats in the tournament. Even his Nationals manager, Dusty Baker, worried that he would have to play catch-up to get into a nice rhythm once the season started.
The regular season has arrived, and Murphy has had a hit in all eight games, which is a new career-high to begin a season.
Tuesday was his best game so far in 2017....
As you might have guessed, the release of last week's rosters was almost precisely what fans of the "Baby Nats" were hoping for - not too conservative with the kids, not too aggressive with the top pitcher and top position player.
The folks in Hagerstown have to be happy with the talent that's sent there. Because the Nationals tend to draft collegiate players over high schoolers, it's rare to have one teenager on a full-season roster, never mind four (Carter Kieboom, Juan Soto, Tyler...
The Cardinals were able to generate offense against Nationals left-hander Gio Gonzalez in their first at-bat.
Dexter Fowler doubled to deep left. Aledmys Diaz popped out to Ryan Zimmerman. But when Zimmerman exchanged the ball out of his glove, he dropped it. Fowler raced to third base.
Yadier Molina then provided a sac fly RBI to center field, and Fowler scored. The Cardinals lead 1-0.
Cardinals starter Lance Lynn has not allowed a Nationals base hit in the first two frames.
Gonzalez battled...
Right-hander Matt Albers made his season and Nationals debut a memorable one with two scoreless innings to bridge the middle of the game to the final two innings in a 14-6 win over the Cardinals.
Albers struck out the first batter he faced, Randal Grichuck. He fought through a Stephen Drew error to strike out Dexter Fowler to end the inning.
In the seventh, he allowed a one-out single to Matt Carpenter. But a hotshot liner to right field by Stephen Piscotty was turned into a double play as...
The Nationals returned home worrying about their bullpen. Turns out the Cardinals' bullpen issues are causing them a lot of difficulty.
The Nats rolled past the Cardinals 14-6, propelled by a seven-run eighth inning. One big factor heading into tonight's game two is that the Cards had to use five relievers to try to slow the Nats onslaught. The Cards bullpen was taxed for four innings, eight hits, eight runs while walking four batters. Kevin Siegrist's ERA is 19.29. Jonathan Broxton's ERA...
With starting shortstop Trea Turner placed on the 10-day disabled list, the Nationals lineup had to be shifted.
Adam Eaton was moved up to the leadoff spot. It also meant that manager Dusty Baker would have to decide who would play shortstop.
Baker had said before Monday's opener against the Cardinals that Stephen Drew would start the first and third games of the series. Youngster Wilmer Difo would start Tuesday night.
Maybe Baker will reconsider that platoon after Drew's 3-for-4, four RBI...