Here’s the lowdown on Tyler Rogers: A 6-foot-5 right-hander from Littleton, Colorado, he’s the twin brother of a left-hander closer, he made his MLB debut this past August, and he’s a submariner. Moreover, he kills a lot of worms. The 1.02 ERA that Rogers put up in 17 games out of the San Francisco Giants bullpen was augmented with a 69.4% ground ball rate.

Unlike his traditional-arm-slot sibling, he’s not a power pitcher. Taylor Rogers — fittingly, a Minnesota Twin — features a 95-mph fastball and an 83-mph slider. Tyler features an 82-mph sinker and a 73-mph slider. The latter pitch, which the atypical hurler throws roughly a third of the time, is atypical in itself.

“I call it a slider, but it’s almost a curveball,” Rogers said in September. “I kind of curl it like people do when they throw a curveball overhand. It’s the same thing, I’m just bent over doing it. So yeah, basically it’s just a normal curveball grip that I throw from underneath.”

Rogers began dropping down his freshman year of junior college. He did so at the suggestion of a coach, and from there progressively got lower and lower. The transformation to an actual submarine-style delivery came after the Giants took him in the 10th round of the 2013 draft. Irony being what it is, the genesis of the more-extreme verticality was horizontal in nature. Read the rest of this entry »

Please note, this posting contains two positions.

Position: Analyst, Baseball Research & Development

Location: Washington, D.C.; West Palm Beach, FL

Summary:
The Washington Nationals are seeking a data analyst to join their Baseball Research & Development team. The role will focus on using the tools of data science to derive insights from baseball datasets to support decision making related to player evaluation, player development, roster construction, and in-game strategy. The analyst will work on projects both independently and collaboratively with other baseball R&D analysts and developers. Candidates should be passionate about both baseball and data analysis.

The Washington Nationals are committed to creating a diverse environment and is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, or veteran status.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

• Build predictive models to answer baseball research questions and support organizational decision making.
• Collaborate on projects with other analysts in baseball R&D and other stakeholders in baseball operations.
• Perform analyses at the request of members of the baseball operations, player development, and advance scouting.
• Design and build informative data visualizations for use in automated reports or internal web applications.
• Write scripts for cleaning, processing, and summarizing datasets.
• Review public research in baseball, statistics, and machine learning.

Requirements:
Minimum Education and Experience Requirements

• Advanced degree or equivalent experience in statistics, computer science, machine learning or a related field.
• Experience with analyzing datasets and training statistical models using R or Python.
• Experience working with SQL databases.
• Authorized to work in the United States.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities necessary to perform essential functions:

• Independent worker with close attention to detail.
• Creative and analytical thinker.
• Ability to write and communicate clearly and effectively.
• Enthusiasm for learning new skills related to programming, statistical modeling, data visualization, and using software tools.
• Demonstrated passion for baseball and working in baseball operations.
• Working knowledge of sabermetric concepts.
• Uphold Core Values: Excellence, Performance, and Accountability. These core values set the tone in everything we do, help us succeed on and off the field, make a difference in the community and provide the best guest experience in sports. It is important that the person in the position commits themselves to these core values so that we can constantly move forward in the same direction – Together.

Physical/Environmental Requirements:

• Office: Working conditions are normal for an office environment. Work may require occasional weekend and/or evening work.
• Analysts are expected to attend at least half of the Nationals home games. Meals are provided to staff during the games.

To Apply:
To apply, please complete the application that can be found here.

Position: Data Engineer, Baseball Research & Development

Location: Washington, D.C.; West Palm Beach, FL; Remote

Summary:
The Washington Nationals are seeking a data engineer to join their Baseball Research & Development team. The role will focus on building solutions for importing, storing, and delivering datasets to support the work of data analysts and software developers in the baseball R&D group.

The Washington Nationals are committed to creating a diverse environment and is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, or veteran status.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

• Maintain database systems to support the needs of data analysts, software developers, and front office staff.
• Oversee the import of baseball datasets from various sources and ensure data quality and integrity.
• Build solutions for integrating datasets from different sources.
• Explore new technologies or possible improvements to our data infrastructure.

Requirements:

• Minimum Education and Experience Requirements
• Bachelor’s degree in computer science, computer engineering, information science, or related experiences.
• 3+ years of experience working with SQL database systems (MySQL, MariaDB, PostrgreSQL). Understanding of relational database schema design.
• Working knowledge of NoSQL database systems, such as MongoDB.
• Fluent in a scripting language such as bash, Python, or R.
• Experience working on Linux systems.
• Familiarity with cloud computing platforms, such as AWS.
• Authorized to work in the United States.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities necessary to perform essential functions:

• Independent worker with close attention to detail.
• Creative and analytical thinker.
• Ability to write and communicate clearly and effectively.
• Enthusiasm for learning new skills related to programming, databases, and using software tools.
• Uphold Core Values: Excellence, Performance, and Accountability. These core values set the tone in everything we do, help us succeed on and off the field, make a difference in the community and provide the best guest experience in sports. It is important that the person in the position commits themselves to these core values so that we can constantly move forward in the same direction – together.

To Apply:
To apply, please complete the application that can be found here.

The content in this posting was created and provided solely by the Washington Nationals.

In 2017, The Ringer called Anthony Rendon baseball’s “unknown superstar.” A year later, at the conclusion of the 2018 season, Beyond the Box Score described Rendon as “constantly overlooked.” I’m pretty sure there’s a law somewhere that says that when you write about Rendon, you have to describe him using the word “underrated” or one like it. But rules were made to be broken, and this one has run its course. Rendon is too good to be underrated any more. He has a strong case as being the best third baseman in baseball — which is an incredibly deep field — and an even better case as one of the top 10 players in the game overall.

Let’s start with the top-line figures and then get into the mechanics. Here are baseball’s WAR leaders since 2013, when Rendon made his debut for the Nationals:

Read the rest of this entry »

This could be the story of a kid with an awkward swing getting cut from his junior college ball team and never playing again, but it isn’t.

This could be the story of a rookie who debuted with the Angels by starting a slick double play, but never learned to hit, got sent back to the minors, and lived out the rest of his baseball days eating peanut butter and jelly and not hearing the phone ring.

But it’s not that either.

This could be the story of a young player who got spread too thin as his team experimented with playing him all over in the infield. “Things happen everyday in baseball,” Howie Kendrick told the L.A. Times in 2006. “One day I might be an outfielder. I’m open to moving anywhere.” And he did. He’s played 190 games in the outfield, so far.

This could be the story of a talented hitter trapped behind a middle infield logjam at the top of the Angels’ farm system. Or buried in their lineup under 700 pounds of struggling sluggers named Albert Pujols, Josh Hamilton, and Mark Trumbo.

Or a debatable starter who became the smiling face on the poster for “Batting Average Doesn’t Tell the Whole Story.” Or a veteran infielder relegated to the corners, sideswiped by strained hamstrings and a sore abdomen.

But it’s not any of things. Not entirely, anyway. Read the rest of this entry »

With their sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals, capped off by a 7-4 win last night, the Washington Nationals are bringing the World Series back to the nation’s capital for the first time since 1933.

No team gets to the World Series without their fair share of luck, and the Nationals certainly have seen things go their way so far this October. But at the end of the day, talent reigns supreme. It shouldn’t come as a surprise to you that the Nationals were a superior team to the Cardinals. They produced 48.3 WAR this season, more than 10 wins above the Cardinals’ aggregate of 37.9. Washington’s hitters produced a wRC+ eight points higher than St. Louis’; their pitchers produced a FIP- six points lower. The Nationals were simply better across the board. What’s arguably most exciting for fans in Washington is that their top talent has stepped up when things have mattered most.

One of my favorite statistics to follow during the postseason is Championship Win Probability added, or cWPA, housed on the website The Baseball Gauge. It’s very similar to WPA in that it calculates how each plate appearance during every game has changed each team’s odds of winning the World Series. The Ringer’s Ben Lindbergh has covered cWPA in the past, such as in this piece about players who made late-season debuts and contributed to a postseason run, or in this one when analyzing the relative “mundanity” of the 2018 World Series. As you might expect, Nationals players are dominating in cWPA this postseason. Four of the top five individual cWPA leaders don the Nationals’ red, white, and blue: Read the rest of this entry »

The Washington Nationals are World Series bound following Tuesday night’s sweep-completing 7-4 win over the St. Louis Cardinals. They couldn’t be much hotter. Since a September 18 loss to the team they just vanquished, the Dave Martinez-managed Nationals have won 18 of their last 21 games.

How remarkable was their turnaround from the 19-31 start that had Martinez firmly in the crosshairs? The 2005 Houston Astros, the 1973 New York Mets, and the 1914 Boston Braves are the only other teams to have made it to the World Series after being 12 games under .500 at any point during the season.

The Cardinals deserve some credit of their own. The Mike Shildt-skippered squad went 47-27 in the second half, then beat the favored Braves in the NLDS. They simply had the misfortune of running into a pitching-rich Nationals team that has now punched its ticket to the Fall Classic.

Here are perspectives from participants on each side, gathered prior to, and after, Games 3 and 4.

———

Following Game 3, I asked Martinez about team’s confidence level, which is undoubtedly the highest it’s been all season. With the early-season struggles in mind, just how important is confidence to a team’s success? Read the rest of this entry »

There was only a moment during Game 4 of the NLCS on Tuesday when it felt as though whatever weird hex had enveloped the last seven years of Washington Nationals baseball might be ready to rear its ugly head once more. It was in the top of the eighth inning, when the St. Louis Cardinals loaded the bases with two outs and a three-run deficit. Washington had once led 7-0, but a rally by the Cardinals in the middle innings more than halved that advantage, and now, they actually had the tying run on base. It was on this same field, seven years ago, that the Cardinals had erased a 6-0 deficit to win a do-or-die Game 5 in the NLDS, and it was on this same field that the Nationals’ bullpen had let so many games slip away over the years. For a minute, one could see the narrative beginning to snap back into place. But then, Daniel Hudson forced Matt Carpenter to roll over on a groundball to second base, and Washington inched closer to one of the most dominant series victories in recent memory.

The Nationals defeated St. Louis by a score of 7-4 on Tuesday, completing a four-game sweep that secured the first pennant in franchise history. They outscored the Cardinals 20-6 in the series, with their pitchers yielding just five earned runs, seven walks, and one home run while striking out 48 in 36 innings. That works out to a 1.25 ERA, 12 K/9, 1.75 BB/9, and 0.25 HR/9 in the four biggest games of their season. It was the first NLCS sweep since the Mets defeated the Cubs in 2015, and just the third NLCS sweep of the last 24 years.

Patrick Corbin was the latest Washington starting pitcher to baffle Cardinals hitters. He struck out the side in the first inning, and went on to fan seven of the first nine batters he faced and a total of 12 in just five innings of work. He also allowed three walks, along with four runs on four hits. Corbin got swings and misses on 24 of the 94 pitches he threw, giving him a whiff rate of 25.5% that stands as the highest he’s ever registered in a start in his career according to Baseball Savant. Of those 24 whiffs, 16 came against his slider, which he threw a total of 42 times. Just one of those sliders was put into play by a Cardinals batter. Read the rest of this entry »

In the first ever NLCS game at Nationals Park, it took Stephen Strasburg four minutes to get through the top of the first.

This was not news. This postseason, the Nationals’ pitching staff has functioned like a predator perfected by nature, having adapted to years of playoff experience as the prey, maybe sporting a few scars, maybe missing an eye, but understanding at this point that the only way to win is to tear the other team’s heart out before they even start reaching for yours.

The next inning, another crucial component of the Nationals was on display. Cardinals starter Jack Flaherty got buzzed by a Trea Turner comebacker that Kolten Wong managed to snare and, going the other way, successfully bounce-passed to Paul Goldschmidt at first. Adam Eaton punched a casual liner to left, where it hung up just enough for Marcell Ozuna to get a glove under it. It was one of the few times on the evening Ozuna looked like he knew how to use it.

Already down 2-0 in the series, it was apparent after only two batters that the Cardinals could only hope to throw themselves on the Nationals, praying a heaping mass of nine men would be enough to smother the crackling Washington lineup, since their own offense was apparently only ever four minutes away from being off the field. It would take every defensive instinct the Cardinals had to stand up against the forces guiding the Nationals, as even getting their first two outs of the game had been a pair of adventures. Read the rest of this entry »

With the Nationals, it’s always the damn bullpen. Over the past eight seasons, that unit has provided the franchise with more embarrassment and grief than relief, from Drew Storen‘s ninth-inning meltdown against the Cardinals in Game 5 of the 2012 Division Series to manager Matt Williams‘ passivity in the late innings of Game 4 of the 2014 Division Series against the Giants, to Jonathan Papelbon‘s attempt to choke Bryce Harper near the end of the 2015 season, to the ongoing fiasco of the past two years, including Trevor Rosenthal’s reach for infinity. Washington’s bullpen ranked among the majors’ very worst this year, and while its overall numbers in the postseason aren’t pretty, some stellar high-leverage work has helped the team advance further than ever, winning the Wild Card game over the Brewers, defeating the Dodgers in the Division Series, and taking the first two games of the NLCS from the higher-seeded Cardinals in St. Louis.

Indeed, while the headline-grabbing no-hit bids of Aníbal Sánchez and Max Scherzer are the primary reason for that 2-0 lead, the unit with the 6.04 ERA thus far in October — third-worst among the 10 postseason teams, ahead of only the now bygone Twins (9.00) and Dodgers (6.75) — has come around lately. In winning their past four games, the Nationals’ relievers have allowed just one run and five baserunners (four hits, one hit-by-pitch) while striking out eight in 9.1 innings. Driven by a combined seven innings from Sean Doolittle and Daniel Hudson in that span, that small-sample stinginess probably can’t be maintained to the same degree over the remainder of October, but it’s a refreshing rebound given the bullpen’s work over the first three games of the Division Series, when the group allowed five homers and a ghastly 14 runs in nine innings, even with one exhilarating inning from Scherzer in their NLDS Game 2 victory:

Read the rest of this entry »

After getting shut down by Aníbal Sánchez, the Cardinals offense would get no respite with Max Scherzer taking the mound for Game 2 of the NLCS. Scherzer hadn’t been himself for much of August and September coming off a stint on the Injured List with back problems, but his last start against the Dodgers provided a hint that he was getting closer to normal. Against Los Angeles in Game 4 of the NLDS, Scherzer gave up four hits and three walks, striking out seven and allowing just one run, a Justin Turner homer in the first. Scherzer left no doubt that he was back against the Cardinals, shutting down the club’s offense and putting together a no-hitter through six innings. Adam Wainwright attempted to counter Scherzer, and offered his home crowd a vintage performance. It was the second straight very good postseason performance from Wainwright that ended with a Cardinals’ loss, and as the teams head to Washington, the Nationals do so with a huge advantage.

Scherzer was on from the beginning, striking out three in the first inning. He would strike out another seven before the Cardinals got their first hit, a Paul Goldschmidt single to lead off the seventh. A punch out of Marcell Ozuna and a groundball double play off the bat of Yadier Molina ended the “threat.” That would be Scherzer’s last inning, as there were signs he was wearing down. After his recent run of disappointing play (disappointing, of course, only relative to his usual greatness), his velocity in the postseason has been encouraging. After averaging 94.9 mph on his fastball during the regular season, Scherzer’s three playoffs appearances have seen his velocity move up to 96.3 mph on average. Before his start, he attributed the increased velocity to playoff adrenaline and finally moving past his injury.

[I]t’s just adrenaline in the moment, especially the Wild Card, when it’s a do-or-die it’s literally every pitch, you got one game to decide everything going into it. And I was on seven days’ rest going into that. So, yeah, that’s just the product of playing in the postseason sometimes. So I feel healthy, feel great, really recovered off of these injuries that I had in the middle of the year and made the progression back kind of all the way through September to get to this point where I really feel good about myself and what I can do with the baseball.

Read the rest of this entry »