Strategic Losses

As we reported first here at Distinguished Senators, the season is over and the Nats won. Just put up that NL East pennant right now. Our gonfalon bubble is unprickable.

Because the rest of the division is engaged in a dispirited slapfight for second place, our beloved, triumphant Nationals can afford the occasional strategic loss.

Jonathan Papelbon blew the save on Sunday, and that's OK. It didn't happen to somebody that anyone likes, Papelbon can handle it, and it gave our unfortunate friends in Philadelphia something to be happy about. He showed real perspective when asked about it. “We’re in first place and we won the [gosh darn] series, man. You know?”

So it's not too upsetting that the Nats failed to complete a sweep of the Phillies, since that game three loss threw into relief the only problem this team has: the save would not have been blown if Jayson Werth were still capable of playing baseball.

The Phillies won when somebody (who cares?) hit a double over Werth's head. Babyhead would have caught it. Den Dekker would have caught it. Any number of the offseason free agents who weren't interested in playing for the Nats would have had a shot.

Ian Desmond probably wouldn't have gotten it.

The hope here is that we gave up a loss, but in return made Dusty Baker aware that he shouldn't leave his worst player out there in the later innings. Maybe - this is a long shot, I know - this will prompt Dusty to consider that he shouldn't be playing his worst player at all.

That's how a loss becomes a win.

Former Nationals Update!

Helpful commenter "Anonymous" sends along with that Austin Kearns is a volunteer coach at Lexington Christian Academy. It's nice that he's staying busy, and I hope he doesn't break anyone's femur.

I have also discovered that Kory Casto has been inducted into the North Marion High School Hall of Fame. I was always pretty hard on Casto, but that was only because he was taking playing time away from Chris Snelling. Plus I think he was pranking us with how to spell his name.

Such Luminaries

Let's check in on some former Nationals, even though nobody's played hardly any baseball yet!

Jordan Zimmermann made the most of the one game he got to play, pitching seven scoreless innings for the Tigers. Also, it was cold but he didn't wear long sleeves because he's from Minnesota or Wisconsin or Manitoba or somewhere like that.

Ian Desmond has been playing (badly) every day in the outfield for Texas - he even got a couple starts in center. Should the Nats have kept him? Nah. There's only room for one .100-hitting outfielder at Nats Park!

Doug Fister's debut for Houston saw him pitch five kinda-lousy innings to get the win. He anointed a new Doug's Dude in Milwaukee second baseman Scooter Gennett, who was obviously hungover on photo day.

Someone get this poor man a Bloody Mary STAT!

Drew Storen picked up with the Blue Jays right where he left off in Washington! He lost out on the closer position, and with a 7.71 ERA over three appearances, he's not about to win it now. I mean, Papelbon's a pretty hateable guy, and I wouldn't be surprised if this is the year his pitches stop working, but the Nats clearly got rid of the correct closer.

Livan "¡Livan!" Hernandez is returning to Cuba to play golf with his brother. They'll be joined by such luminaries as Luis Castillo and Rey Ordoñez at a charity golf tournament in May. Also, he bought a giant dog to protect his house, so don't get any ideas while he's out of town.

I can't tell if this is an artist's impression of Livan and his brother in golf attire or a photo of Livan and his brother in golf attire.

I couldn't find anything about Austin Kearns.

Triumph

After a successful campaign, a Roman general could celebrate a triumph. He'd ride in a chariot through the city with his face painted red to make him look like a terra cotta statue. The crowd would cheer as they gazed upon the spoils of war, and the victorious soldiers would sing dirty songs about their leader.

At the end of the parade, the guy who lost the war would be ritually strangled. In the case of Vercingetorix, he had to wait around for five years between his surrender and the administration of the coup de grâce.

The Nationals have gone to New York, not with dirty songs and painted faces, but with the resignation of a Gaul who's killing time until it's killing time.

This happened a few weeks ago. We're just now getting around to the strangling.

I haven't been paying much attention the last couple of weeks. It's not that I've been especially busy or whatever. I just don't care. The Nats aren't playing for anything, and . . . well, I mean, do you like these guys? It dawned on me over the course of the season that I don't.

And that was even before Barry Svrluga set down the recriminations. It turns out that the Nats don't like the Nats any more than I do. It further turns out that I was right not to like these guys, since they're the most emotionally fragile pack of narcissists that ever failed. I always figured that you had to be mentally tough to make it to the majors, but the 2015 Nationals put that notion to bed.

Among other things:

• Drew Storen responded to his demotion by melting down, sulking, and breaking his thumb.
• Ian Desmond responded to his impending free agency by taking a run at Cristian Guzman's "Worst Nats Shortstop Ever" title.
• The whole team got all weepy over the Tyler Clippard trade, got even weepier about the Papelbon trade, and was just generally weepy about other dudes' paychecks.
• Jonathan Papelbon attempted to demonstrate what happened to Vercingetorix, using Bryce Harper as a stand-in.
• Jayson Werth got a day off and responded by being the biggest jackass in history.

That last one gets a block quote:

Incensed, Werth ripped the lineup card off the wall, bellowing that it was going to change. Then, according to several people who were present, he confronted Williams — not just about whether he would play that day but about what most of the clubhouse considered to be a chronic lack of communication with his players. Among the most jarring barbs, from Werth to Williams: “When exactly do you think you lost this team?” 

The Werth contract was never going to end up being a net gain. It was too long, too much money, and everyone who didn't make that offer to Werth laughed at the team that did. Still, it was looking good for a while there. Werth put up some good numbers as the Nats became a contender. He followed this up by going to jail, getting hurt, being the worst player on a team that included 2015 Ian Desmond, anonymously bitching to the media, and showing up and undercutting his manager.

He's truly the face of the team.

This season isn't a failure entirely because the players are blubbering children. The Lerners decided to get cheap when it came to improving the team. The only move Mike Rizzo made was like taking your car in for a sweet new sound system and instead installing a car bomb. Matt Williams is possibly the worst manager since Ted Turner. Still, it's not clear that these crybabies deserved any better.

I'm not going to cheer the triumphant Mets, but I'm not going to be upset when they get done strangling the Nats either.

Hippocraticritical

Why exactly is Ian Desmond playing every day?

The Nationals' roster construction philosophy appears to be built around a variation of the first line of the Hippocratic Oath. Instead of "First do no harm," it's "First don't hurt anyone's feelings (except for Drew Storen's)."

You can't replayce Jayson Werth - that would be insulting. You can't sit Ian Desmond no matter how terrible he's been. Feelings, man.

Perhaps the Nats would be surprised to learn that neither "First do no harm" nor "First don't hurt anyone's feelings (except for Drew Storen's)" is actually in the Hippocratic Oath. I learned that about a minute and half ago, and I still haven't recovered from the shock.

If Hippocrates didn't say it, maybe it's not a good principle for running a baseball team.

Hippocrates: "Don't blame me for this garbage, bro."

You don't need me to tell you that Ian Desmond has not been a contributor this year. He's hitting like Jayson Werth, and he's fielding like Jayson Werth. A list of possible shortstops who would be doing less than Desmond to sabotage 2015 includes:

1. Jason Martinson
2. Miguel Tejada
3. Trea Turner
4. Cristian Guzman
5. Yunel Escobar
6. Danny Espinosa

Espinosa's the most obvious option, but why he's not playing is anything but obvious. He has one (1) plate appearance since the Pirates series at the end of July. Why do you pinch hit with Werth (56 OPS+) when Espinosa (101 OPS+) is sitting there on the bench trying to remember what playing baseball is like?

Sure, Espinosa's not a real shortstop, and sure, his beard starts, like, right under his eyeballs, but neither of those should be enough to keep him out of the lineup like this. Put him at second, Escobar at short, and Rendon at third. Or just leave him at short and see what happens. The Nats are getting F-minus production from short; Espinosa can maybe get that up to a C.

I don't know - is it really just about Desmond's feelings? Everyone seems to like him; maybe the Nats are worried about a mutiny if Desi gets dissed, and the Werth situation shows that they are afraid to make a grown man cry by sitting him.

Or maybe they think Desmond's the best option. That's even worse.

Do They Like Him? Do They Like-Like Him?

More All Star voting news! Mark Zuckerman at teh Insider reports that our very own Bryce Harper has more votes than anyone else.

Harper has received 1,116,582 votes to date, edging out Cardinals third baseman [and Doug's Dude] Matt Carpenter (1,113,060) as the league’s top vote-getter and well ahead of all other NL outfielders.

That's good news. I'm not sure I completely agree with Zuckerman's conclusion, though.

No other Nationals position players rank in the top five right now, which is testament to Harper’s immense appeal around the country, not only in D.C.

Harper's getting all the votes; the other Nats are polling like Fat Elvis; that must mean America Loves Bryce!

I have my reservations about the "immense appeal" theory, assuming that Zuckerman is referring to something more than the respect a player earns from out of towners by being great - something closer to affection. I'd suggest that Harper leads all NL players in All Star voting merely because he's leading all NL players in being good at baseball. No appeal required.

And as far as his teammates not making anyone's ballot - really, what other Nat would you vote for unless you had a rooting interest that superseded any concern for the process? They won't let us vote for Scherzer. I guess Wilson Ramos has case, but it's a "he should be in the top five" case rather than "he should be winning." Other than that, our best candidate is Danny Espinosa, and he's not even on the ballot.

Nobody's voting for Ian Desmond, right?

Apples, Spray Bottles, Bacon

Professor Bacon is back, and he brought a brand new Distinguished Senators feature with him: It's the Professor Bacon Bacon Blast of the Week!

I would like an apple

This week's Professor Bacon Bacon Blast of the Week award goes to "Babyhead" Michael Taylor for Wednesday's ninth inning grand slam against Arizona pitcher [look up who this is later] [actually, you know what? Don't bother]. I mean, we all know Bryce Harper would have done the same thing if he had better impulse control, but Professor Bacon doesn't care who dings the dingers as long as the dingers get dung.

Professor Bacon also wants to recommend this video. It's like he's trying to tell us something.

Having triumphed in the desert, the Nationals are off to sunny San Diego, where the locals play baseball in the middle of the night and sometimes wear camouflage uniforms so as to confound their enemies.

Will Ian Desmond commit three or four more errors? Will Bryce Harper punch an umpire in the throat? Will Alexi Amarista become the next Doug's Dude?

If you could let me know about any of those, that'd be great. I'm not staying up for this series.

UPDATE: It looks like mid-2000s relic Professor Bacon isn't compatible with mobile devices. I asked him about it, and he just kind of tilted his head at me. So I said, "You know, Apple products," and then he suggested that apple products sounded pretty tasty and maybe I should him feed him one.

Brains

Last night (and maybe you saw this) Ian Desmond strode to the plate with the bases loaded and one out in the ninth. It was a tie game thanks to a blown save as predictable as a sunrise.

A single would win the game. So would a fly ball to the outfield, a balk, a walk, a wild pitch, a passed ball, a forfeit by the Cardinals, an error, and probably some other stuff I'm forgetting.

The important thing is that Desmond needed to get the ball to the outfield. Not only did he not do it, he completely didn't do it. After he dove at that first slider like a dying eagle, everyone - from me to Ian Desmond - knew he wasn't going to make any but the gentlest contact.

He struck out, of course, but it's OK because we won, and Desmond really did play some good defense in that game, and if we have to choose between a shortstop who can hit but not carry out even the most basic of his fielding tasks or a shortstop who's the other way around, the latter option is not necessarily the worse. That was a really long sentence, but I ain't changing it.

This isn't really about Desmond; it's about my perception of Ian Desmond. Owing to some kinda combination of confirmation bias, Dunning-Kruger effect, selective memory, manifest destiny, the ablative absolute, the phantom time hypothesis, and Moore's law, I have this idea that Desmond strikes out every time he comes to the plate with men on base. "Here comes Desmond to kill another rally," I say to myself. And then he does it. Every time!

But actually no. I did some actual reporting or at least fact-checking, and my impression was pretty much the opposite of true. Desmond hits better with men on base, and his strikeout rate drops significantly (I was about to say it drops noticeably, but I certainly didn't notice it). The lesson here is don't trust your eyes. Or at least don't trust my eyes, not that there was any great danger of that.

The nifty thing about this is that when Desmond leaves at the end of the season, I won't miss him even though I should. So I'd like to thank my brain for preemptively cushioning that blow. Thanks, brain!

Reversal

I guess it wasn't about getting Desmond out of the leadoff spot after all.

Ian Desmond will return to the leadoff spot tonight rather than swapping places with Danny Espinosa as Manager Jim Riggleman had originally planned. Espinosa will play tonight against the Marlins, but Riggleman simply changed his mind after saying yesterday he planned to hit Desmond, who began the season 0 for 13, seventh in the lineup and move Espinosa to leadoff.

It's been a bad day and a half for the two levels of management just above the players. Let's review!

• Jim Riggleman reverses his own inexplicable mistake and moves Desmond down in the order.
• Riggleman makes me watch a couple old men in the middle infield instead of playing the starters.
• Third base coach Bo Porter kinda loses the game by faking out Jerry Hairston with all the ankle-breaking elan of a prime Allen Iverson.
• Riggleman, concluding after less than one try that his new lineup wasn't optimal, moves Desmond back to leadoff.

So yeah, that's a pretty sour mixture of indecisiveness and incompetence, like a cocktail made of Coors Light and dishwater. Jayson Werth kinda lost the game too, but at least he hits doubles.

But none of that matters, because ¡LIVAN!'s pitching tonight. There should be a name for beautiful days like today. I mean, we had Strasmas last year, but ¡LIVAN!'s been bringing us joy since day one. Livanoween? La Fiesta de Santo Gordo? National 82 MPH Fastball Awareness Day?

A Post

They've rolled out the B-team four games into the season. Santangelo likes it, but I kinda want my money back. I wasn't prepared for a Cora - any Cora! - in the starting lineup just yet.

Other than my disgruntledness, the big effect here is to hide for a day the drastic reshuffling of the lineup. Ian Desmond, who's looked as bad as anyone can over three games, is no longer leading off; Danny Espinosa is.

Bob Carpenter was quick to point out that "This isn't about getting Desmond out of the leadoff spot." He didn't explain what other objective aside from getting Desmond out of the leadoff spot was to be achieved by getting Desmond out of the leadoff spot, so I'm going to go forward with the assumption that this was primarily about getting Desmond out of the leadoff spot.

Why was he ever there? I realize that this roster doesn't give you a lot of good options there, but Desmond doesn't get on base. It's just not part of his skill set. Other than just picking the up the middle guy with the most seniority, I can't figure out the thought process that wound up with him batting first anyway.