I restrained myself this morning from posting a comment ....(hard to believe I know).....on Barry's "lack of concern about Hill"......Normal soreness give me a break! For Hill normal is not good. He has never, ever being able to pitch without sorness and he has never ever been able to pitch more than what 100 innings (or so...someone will correct me if he made 115 once I trust).

Livo was the answer this team needed...too late now.....the gamble they took had very low probability of success......Patterson is next.....I give him 10 days before he shuts it down too.....

(responding to Barry's earlier posting)

Nats ST Fraying At the Edges!

... Barry's reports are always interesting and often intriguing. But today he spares us the sugar entirely. Today we read about the little struggles that we all knew were there, but had hitherto enjoyed the luxury of avoiding. Estrada, Lo Duca, Dmitri, Maekawa, Mackowiac and now Hill: nothing new in any of it (except Dmitri's pulled muscle maybe), but facing them all at once magnifies each one individually.

... but all is not lost. These are also the little things that must be confronted, the demons that must be returned to their lairs before the team heads north. And that's exactly what is happening.

... and so it's still Game On.

Go Willie Harris! Go Nats!!

Bret Boone makes an impressive running snag of a hot grounder to the hole in the top of the third - then correctly decides to go to first rather than pushing for a DP. Happily surprised. .

oh by the way Barry....Phil Wood said on his radio show this AM that he is talked to several people on the ground at SP they say Young has lost tops 10 lbs.....not really a major shift for someone at his starting weight.....someone else commented on just how slow he looked on the bases.....What is the story with his weight and is he any faster than what we came to accept last year?

I'd say about 10 pounds is right. And yes, Young is still quite slow.

Shawn Hill maybe on the DL?

Well, it's a good thing we didn't waste any of the Lerners' largess on Livo.

By the way, speaking of cheap, here's yet another story about the Lerners' penny-pinching policies that the Post decided not to cover (for reasons known only to them):

WTOP.com:
The Washington Nationals have lost their first battle at the new stadium, or at least the first battle over the new stadium.

Since last summer, the team and the District have been in arbitration over who is required to pay for ancillary items at the new stadium, such as golf carts, fork lifts, and medical and office equipment.

On Wednesday, a three-member arbitration panel unanimously voted in favor of the District, saving the city $4.2 million.

Bill Hall with the D.C. Sports and Entertainment Commission tells WTOP the decision helps to keep the stadium costs within the $611 million price cap.

"We are very happy with the decision because it saves the sports commission $4.2 million dollars in furniture, fixture and equipment costs that the Nationals claimed we owed, and it further ensures that the new ballpark will remain within the cost cap established by the D.C. Council," Hall says.

The District did make some concessions.

As part of the ruling, D.C. will have to pay the Nationals $1.4 million for items such as plumbing, air conditioning and a special bird net.

Hall says that money was budgeted for a long time ago.

"The net gain is $4.2 million. The amount that we are paying has been included in the budget so it has no impact on the cost cap."

Early on in the negotiations, the team had asked the city to pay for team uniforms as part of the fixtures of the stadium. That request never reached the final arbitration process, but an another uniform request did. The Nationals unsuccessfully argued that D.C. should pay for the uniforms for the stadium security guards.

While the decision settles one dispute, another face off may be looming. The stadium lease agreement requires the stadium be substantially complete by Opening Day.

Hall says he hopes the team doesn't raise this issue.

"Whether there are disputes over that remains to be seen," Hall says.

The lease requires the stadium to be "substantially completed, meaning that the stadium is ready for a Certificate of Occupancy to be issued, and it will be," Hall says.

The certificate is expected to be issued within the next few weeks.

In Lerner-ville, $4.2 million could pay for 6 or 7 players.

Folks, don't overlook this graph in the DC Entertainment ruling:

"Early on in the negotiations, the team had asked the city to pay for team uniforms as part of the fixtures of the stadium."

The Lerners wanted the city to pay for the players' uniforms!

And do we read about this in the Washington Post?

Nope.

Why?

Ombudsman, anyone?

Swanni: I posted that same article on the Nats board and they deleted the thread, I guess the truth hurts. How can we ask the team to pay for Livan when they don't even want to pay for uniforms?

PowerBoater69,
Indeed. Not sure which is more distressing: The Nats' penny-pinching policies or the Post's policy to ignore them.

I have a feeling that a new post will pop up here soon so fewer people will read about the D.C. Entertainment Commission ruling.

I'm sure that, if permitted, a Metro reporter could write quite a story by just asking city officials what they think of the Lerners thus far. I bet the city is going nuts with these guys trying to squeeze them for more money.

It has begun. Shocker.

Someone better get on the phone with Jerome Williams or Pedro Astacio. We're going to need them before we know it.

So... everyone still glad we didn't go after any pitching help?

God forbid we "overpay" for someone reliable.

Just for conversation's sake, can we look at a couple of very basic pitching stats from last year? Definitely not the whole picture, but a good enough basic sample of how: 1-reliable, and 2-effective; Nats starting pitchers were last year.

Innings pitched: 1 pitcher with 150+ innings (Chico), and 2 with 100+ (Bacsik, Bergmann)

WHIP: (again, not the end-all, be-all stat, but a good basic judge of how effective they were at their core job: keeping guys off base) The Nats starters had a combined WHIP last year of 1.54. To give you an idea of how bad that is, 1.27 was the best overall pitching staff WHIP in the NL (San Diego), and 1.58 was the worst (Florida). Nats were 12th with a 1.44 for their overall pitching staff.

Available as free agents this year:
Andy Pettitte: 215 IP, 1.43 WHIP, 1yr/16mil
Carlos Silva: 202, 1.31, 4yr/48mil
Tom Glavine: 200, 1.41, 1yr/8mil
Randy Wolf: 102, 1.45, 1yr/4.75mil
Brett Tomko: 131, 1.50, 1yr/3mil
Mark Hendrickson: 122, 1.39, 1yr/1.5mil
Chad Durbin: 127, 1.43, 1yr/900k
Josh Towers: 107, 1.41, 1yr/400k
Kris Benson: 183, 1.40 (2006), minor league deal
Odalis Perez: 137, 1.66, minor league deal (by us, obviously)
Kyle Lohse: 192, 1.37, unsigned
Jeff Weaver: 146, 1.53, unsigned
David Wells: 157, 1.54, unsigned

The only deals there you'd have to think twice (or three times) about are Pettitte's, Glavine's and Silva's, but at least they all at least were out there for 200 innings, and any one of them (especially Silva) would have been the best pitcher in our rotation last year, hands down.

I'm all for giving our young guys a shot and seeing what they can do. But do you all really think the team is going to be better off in the long run throwing our (very) young guys out there so soon? Would it have really been so horrible to sign Silva to that deal and have him anchor the staff for the next few years? $12 million a year is nothing in baseball terms, especially to billionaires.

Sorry for the long post, but this has been on my mind for a while.

Hey Barry,

Could you comment on a pet peeve of mine......baseball only please.....Acta teams do not seem to learn to call the ball.....From listening on the radio and reading posts of those their the first week or two.....several balls are hitting the ground and players are still running into each other......Could you ask Manny what he plans to do about this continuing problem. If he gives you one of those "just part of the game, every team has this problem" I will be very disappointed. I watch a lot of ball and have so for many years....this team has a problem with calling pop ups and outfield flies.

One another note.....where is the hitting? Take out the minor college pitching and these guys are not doing much at all......is anyone talking about it down there?

I think we already know Casto can not hit MLB pitching from last year....why play him so much?

It appears to me that Shawn Hill needs to reassess his offseason workout and conditioning program. In my day, I'd stay fit with rigorous cardio work, and I would keep my arm strong by punching my hand into a barrel of rice. I could have started both ends of a doubleheader in January if asked. These sissies need to man up.

The Chicken Little's and "Cheap" birds are out today. Ease up folks, the sky is not falling and the Lerner's are not cheap.

I'm concerned as anyone about Hill's arm but, let's not jump to conclusions.
I'm just trying to figure out how the soreness in Hill's arm has anything to do with the Lerner's being cheap?

Oh, and the last time I checked 4.2 million was a lot of money even for the Lerner's. Let's not forget the completely inept DC Government was the other half of this legal fight.

if anyone thinks the Nats could have gotten either Pettitte or Glavine in the offseason, then they are nuts. There was NO WAY Pettitte was going to play for anyone else. He either was going to re-sign with the Yankees or retire. Glavine was either going to sign with the Braves or retire. Plain and simple.

As for Silva, any team willing to pay for more than one seaso of this hack, more power to them. I, for one, am glad the Nats didn't waste time or money on him.

All the other pitchers listed ... meh! No problem signing any one of them for just one season. Which is exactly what the Nats did.

I'll be sorry if Hill or Patterson goes on the DL, but I sure as heck will be rooting for guys like Ballester, Clippard, Lannan, Mock and Detwiler to come in and show that they can pitch in the majors.

Enough with the "Lerners are cheap" nonsense. Just because they're not throwing money out the window on terrible players doesn't mean they're cheap. It just means they aren't stupid.

Let me tell you this. I figured Hill and Patterson are both going to be injury prone this year and it is coming to fruition earlier than I thought. And not to pee on Boz's campfire, I watched Nick Johnson run out a grounder on the news. He looks hobbled. Spring is always hopeful until we start playing. Then baseball becomes a worry.

Come on, e -- they didn't want to pay for their own players' uniforms! That sounds like something out of the Charlie Comiskey days.

Swanni -- do we know if any other team's have asked for their city to pay for uniforms or anything else? I don't, so until I do I'll hold off on saying how cheap people are.

So the bloom is off the rose today. It's time that we stop deluding ourselves and face facts: Not a single one of the Nats' slated starting pitchers has ever thrown more than 200 innings in a season, or won more than 10 games in a season (putting aside O. Perez and his comeback attempt). The odds that Hill, Patterson and Bergmann will all be consistently healthy, get 30 starts and win 15 games each are close to zero.

There are a lot of talented pitchers in baseball, and there are several talented pitchers on the Nats. But there is a difference between talented and proven, and the Nats have no proven starters. Hill and Bergmann among others are great young guys, and they both have excellent stuff, as does Patterson. I hope they are all able to put things together this season. But I fear that we have another season of cellar-dwelling ahead of us due to an injury-riddled patchwork starting rotation. This is why building a championship baseball team is really hard.

If any other team tried to get out of paying for their own players' uniforms, we would know because the local paper would have gone nuts over it...

...oops, the Post didn't write about this? Oh, yeah, I forgot.

Give me a break. Did they also try to get the city to pay for the balls -- and Ronnie Belliard's bats?

How cheap can you get?

swanni, the uniforms in question in the arbitration dispute were for stadium gate personnel, custodians, ushers and the like. Not players. Get your facts straight before you hit your "Lerners are cheap" keystroke shortcut. (Which is probably worn out from overuse today. You'd better ease up a bit, or your keyboard may not make it out of spring training. Remember, it's a long season. We trust, though, that you ponied up the big bucks for a veteran keyboard. The Livo model, perhaps?)

Bulletin for immediate release: The Washington Nationals have requested funds from the DC government for cowbells that the fielders will wear in order to avoid collisions resulting in said players possibly spending time on the disabled list, resulting in the team having to spend more funds to bring up players earning minor league salaries. Urgent attention is requested in order to avoid a looming catastrophic situation.

The article says, "team uniforms."

"Early on in the negotiations, the team had asked the city to pay for team uniforms as part of the fixtures of the stadium. That request never reached the final arbitration process, but an another uniform request did. The Nationals unsuccessfully argued that D.C. should pay for the uniforms for the stadium security guards."

Now, 419+1, I will grant you that "team uniforms" could mean something else, but since the Washington Post won't write about this story, we're left to read the WTOP article literally -- and team uniforms sounds to me like uniforms worn by the team.

Well you can always use more cowbell.

---

The Washington Nationals have requested funds from the DC government for cowbells that the fielders will wear in order to avoid collisions resulting in said players possibly spending time on the disabled list, resulting in the team having to spend more funds to bring up players earning minor league salaries.

I don't feel sorry for the city. They are making fists full of money by the fact that the Natioals are here. Look at the construction on or around South Capitol. That all means tax dollars. No wonder Fenty, the biggest baseball stadium naysayer from years gone by, now is furiously tying to work a deal for the United and build a stadium for the Redskins to get them back into the City. If I were a Lerner, I would take it where I could get it.

Anyone know who get's to advertise on the other two scoreboard blocks? Seems to me they'd have the sign up by now. Does anyone know if they sold the spots?

Last time I checked Livo loves getting lit up and going 5 innings. Why sign him to 2 years $13 Mill or whatever he got? We can get the same innings from a young kid. All those pitching free agents are awful risks who we'd have to WAY overpay for. Go with the kids and call it good. (Please take notes from the Tigers four years ago)

JT "going with the kids" is not the right approach, because putting a kid in there to get lit up consistently is not the right way to develop a kid pitcher. It is not the right way to develop arm strength, and it is not the right way for them to learn situational pitching.

Matt Chico did not get past the 5th inning in over half his starts last season. Whether or not he embarrassed himself last year, that was not the best way for him to develop long-term.

So it doesn't matter that some "kid" might do as well as a more expensive retread (and why are you concerned with how the Lerners spend their money by the way?). Signing such a retread saves the kid from pitching at a level he isn't ready for and undermining that kid's development.

My heart sank too on the title of this post, but sheesh people. You act like this is out of left field or something. (heh, heh).

Hill and Patterson deserve every chance they've been given, but there ARE more than five good pitchers at camp right now. Nobody but us has penned in the opening day rotation yet and it very well might not be either Hill or Patterson. They get first dibs, but it's not the end of the world if something goes wrong with either of them. Sad and disheartening, but not the end of the world.

419+1,

You are wasting your time trying to convince people who take daily chugs of the "Lerner's are cheap" Kool-Aid, that they are in fact, not cheap.

I agree with 6th and D. Fenty sure has come around on the fact that stadiums/arenas are cash cows for the city in tax dollars. My question is, what took him so long? What, the Verizon Center wasn't a good enough example for him?

I never claimed that the Nats should have signed Pettitte, or that he would ever have any interest in playing here. That wasn't the point. My point was in looking strictly at the numbers and the salary and debating whether or not it would be worth it to pay big bucks on a pitcher simply for the purpose of keeping our young guys in the minors, where they belong... and whether or not Silva is a "hack" is debateable, but whats not is the fact that he would have been our best pitcher (by far) last year.

*yawn*

There is a fallacy in the "Yes, Sign a Middling FA Pitcher" argument... that being that they're better than the pitchers we already have. We have a TON of pitchers under contract... plus a bunch of non-roster invitees. For a Livo signing to work out and be worth it, all of the stars would have had to align, and he would have had to revert back to his 2005 form... Anything less would be a waste of money... and that is even more true for almost all of the other choices out there.

Managing baseball personnel is much more nuanced than simply looking at dollars spent... and none of us have all of the information... for good reason - the information is proprietary. A lot of people believe that it is an indication that the organization is cheap because they don't sign a FA pitcher. That's hogwash. As much as people believe that, you just cannot possibly argue that is the case simply because the team doesn't sign a pitcher out of the available free agent crop.

Plus... the Nats DID sign a free agent pitcher... and saved themselves a lot of money by getting a minor league incentives-laden contract... and he has something to prove... so he has every reason to excel, and none to slack.

So I ask you this, those of the "Nats Are Cheap" camp... do you by a $15 a pound steak today, if you know it is going on sale tomorrow for $6, just to prove you're not cheap? I think I know your answer... and I have some steaks for you.

I echo what e said.

Matt, signing the pitchers you cite would have been the equivalent of paying Ryan Church $4-5 mil a year to be our left fielder. There is no evidence that the Lerners are cheap. I choose to believe that they are, intelligently, keeping their powder dry until signing free agents makes sense. What makes sense right now is to see what the 7-8 young arms can do, and to pounce on undervalued guys like O. Perez after the market falls on experienced #4-5 starters. There is no point in signing proven average MLB starters to 3-5 year contracts unless your goal is to field an average team. Save the money and keep stockpiling prospects and other assets. Buy low, sell high.

"Yawn" is what.....

What we are going to be doing in the 3rd inning of games where Chico (are best pitcher) is walking the bases loaded again, and again, (just like last year)?

Could this "yawn" have been avoided with some proactive moves this winter to get proven pitching in here?

Should the Post have gotten out and done some more work this winter instead of just picking up the phone and asking Hill how he is feeling? Maybe even going to winter league games and asking scouts instead of looking at box scores on the internet?

Wake up people .....RFK ERA of over 5 will soon be ERAs of 6.5 in the new ball park. This team needs to stop reading Barry's batting practice stories and start hitting some home runs or it is going to be how did 231 put it......."yawn" all summer long!

everyone -- it's been 4 games (3 if you don't count GU). The sky is not falling yet. Arizona is 0-2. The Mets are 1-3. Johan Santana gives up a 3-run HR to Juan Gonzalez. It doesn't mean that these teams are going to be terrible this year just like the Nats won't be terrible (hopefully). It is WAY too soon to discount the 2008 season. As for the hitting, pitchers are always ahead of hitters the first week or two of spring training. Happens every year. Chill.

Also, newpost